New Cape Town Mayco is Nothing New

Cape Town mayor Patricia de Lille announced her new Mayoral Committee on Friday night and it was a move necessitated by the increase in support for the DA during the past national and provincial elections.

The announcement did not come without criticism.
On the one hand the mayor has been accused of cronyism and on the other hand she is criticised for not having changed the demographic representation of the Mayco.

Two of the mayoral committee members are going to Parliament. They are human settlements head Tandeka Gqada and health head Lungiswa James, while corporate services head Demetri Qually has left to focus on heading the SA Local Government Association.

The new members joining the committee are Siyabulela Mamkeli heading up the Human Settlements portfolio, Xanthea Limberg in charge of Corporate Services and Benedicta van Minnen as the head of the Health directorate.
Then there is also newcomer Johan van der Merwe, who will take over economic, environmental and spatial planning from Garreth Bloor, who is shifting to the tourism, events and marketing portfolio left vacant by Grant Pascoe who defected to the ANC before the elections.

The rest of the committee remain the same: Brett Herron – transport; Belinda Walker – community services; Ernest Sonnenberg – utilities; JP Smith – safety and security; Suzette Little – social development and early childhood development; and finance – Ian Neilson.

It all seems good and well that there was a reshuffle and that it was done out of necessity.
So there is some form of continuity and it is business as usual… and that is perhaps what bothers those who say that Cape Town is not the best run city for all who live in it.

There are some, even within the council, who are not quite happy with the appointments made and others who believe that it is an opportunity missed; an opportunity to completely overhaul the City of Cape Town’s Mayco.
According to IOL, unnamed sources within the council are claiming that Mayor de Lille used the reshuffle only as an opportunity to consolidate her power base within the DA and that the ideological differences between the former ID members and those originally from the DA are a stark reality.
Though it is more than common sense for any political leader or even a business leader to want to consolidate their power base at such an opportunity by appointing the people whose loyalty they can rely on, or as a reward for loyalty, this is of
course denied by the mayor’s office.
In any case whether it is a power play or not, what the citizens need is that any reshuffle should serve the best interest of all the city’s people, and not only the interest of the politicians.
However, having said that, who says the final decision of who gets appointed to the Mayco lies solely with the mayor?

It is the criticism from those outside the council coming from political commentators and activists that drew the interest of bruinou.com and one has to wonder; Should the demographics of those in this city who have voted the DA council into power and who have just recently also helped increase the DA’s representation in parliament be reflected in the composition of the city’s Mayco?

Have the DA missed an opportunity to show the large majority of Coloureds and the significantly increased number of Blacks in this city who have voted for them in the national and provincial elections that Cape Town, which during the elections they’ve touted as the best run city in the country, can be run by a Mayoral Committee which is not made up of mainly White members?
Certainly there must be enough Coloured and Black ward councillors as well as proportional representatives able to head up any of those portfolios.

On Saturday former Western Cape premier, Peter Marais who is retired from active politics and is now seen to be an activist against the marginalisation of Coloured people noted that given the demographic make-up of the DA support base, for Mayor Patricia de Lille to appoint a predominantly White Mayoral Executive Committee was a slap in the face of Coloured Capetonians.
He called on Coloureds to withdraw their support of the DA in the 2016 municipal elections asking “Why do DA supporters allow this? And don’t tell me it’s simply because you are non-racial”

He further commented: “The point which I am trying to make and which many people don’t realise is that the DA is telling the world ‘Coloured people are too unintelligent, inexperienced and not educated enough to serve on the city’s Exco.'”
He says: “These positions are according to the DA best suited to White men and women who will remain in those positions till they retire or die one day. Belinda Walker and Ian Nielsen have been serving on the Exco for 14 years. Could the DA not have trained others to fill their place?”

Mr Marais’ comments cannot and should not be viewed as him simply taking a dig at the DA for the sake of it and turning this into a ‘race issue’ just to stir up a bit of trouble.
If he is a rabble-rouser then perhaps he is the kind of rabble-rouser we need more of.

A few months ago when Mr Marais along with other activists challenged the ANC about the need to “Consider the Western Cape’s Demographics when applying AA and EE” the Democratic Alliance by voice of its leader Helen Zille jumped on the bandwagon and
loudly supported the call to take demographics into account when making key appointments in corporate as well as government positions.
How is this position thay have taken not reflected in the make-up of the city’s executive body?

Speculation is rife that any appointment to the Mayco is not something the mayor herself controls and that she is just towing the party line. She might not have much of a say who end up as members of the Mayco especially when one looks at what the mayor’s spokesperson Paul Boughey said when the mayor was criticised of centralisation, nepotism and cronyism.

“The appointments were made fully in line with the DA systems and procedures. “The mayor consulted with the deputy mayor (Ian Neilson) and the speaker (Dirk Smit) on the recommended list that would be presented to the DA’s federal executive committee for approval,” Boughey said.

The federal executive approved the recommended people at its meeting on Friday.
One cannot help but think that the recommended list was in fact as recommended by the federal executive and that if she had recommended a Mayco that truly reflects the demographics of the city’s people, the DA Federal Executive would not approve it.