Chaos & Instability: When Joburg Had Two Mayors
Remember That? What a Movie!
Do you remember when, for 25 days in 2022, Joburg Metro had two Mayors? Ah, yes. Fun times in the Economic Capital of the Republic.
For those who may not be familiar with this dark chapter, here’s a quick recap:
After the Local Government Elections of 2021, Dr Mpho Phalatse was elected the City’s first Woman Mayor of the City on 22 November 2022. By the time the vote for Mayor happened, the would-be Mayor herself was none-the-wiser. In fact, the DA leadership was taken by surprise as DA Mayors were voted in across the three Gauteng Metro Municipalities. At least, from what I could see, Helen Zille looked stunned as she received news that this is what was happening – she too was in the room on the day and saw the surprise election playing itself out in technicolour.
I rate the DA was surprised because coalition negotiations had collapsed the night before, so they likely fully expected ANC Mayors to be elected. What many did not know at the time was that the DA Mayors were elected because Herman Mashaba, ActionSA President (and one of my old bosses), made an early morning last-ditch call to the EFF and secured their support for his idea – the EFF would vote with ActionSA to get whoever ActionSA supported elected. The plan worked spectacularly. Over the next three weeks or so ferocious negotiating happened and tenuous coalitions were installed.
Now you’re caught up.
Fast forward to late 2022, September 30 to be precise, and the “Multi-Party Government” (MPG) coalitions of the DA, ActionSA, and Many More have been ambling along for just over nine months led by Dr Phalatse. While this coalition its tensions behind the scenes, many of the partners meant well, had some good ideas and were committed to delivering services and turning the City around. Whether they made any inroads or not is for you to judge. Nevertheless, politicians being the way they are, there is always aggrieved about something. So, there would also be a great deal of bickering – people feeling disrespected, others feeling that some were “stealing the limelight” and other such very mature things. This, dear reader, is an environment ripe for destabilisation. After all, the good book tells us that a house divided against itself cannot stand. Enter the ANC and the “Minority Bloc” partners of a handful of 3-man parties, led by one Dada Morero.
Morero & Co managed to convince some of the smaller coalition partners (ie: COPE) to switch sides and join them in deposing the Joburg MPG. Having convinced COPE’s lone Councillor, one Madam Colleen Makhubele (now MKP Member of Parliament), to switch sides, she quickly facilitated first the removal of the DA Speaker of Council and got herself elected into the post. Having done that, she quickly moved to arrange a Council Meeting wherein a Motion of No Confidence against the Executive Mayor – Dr Mpho Phalatse – would be debated.
On the day the vote was to be held, the DA ran to court on an Urgent basis to interdict the Council meeting from sitting, alleging the meeting was unlawful because of irregularity in how it was put together, but by the time the court heard the matter, Dr Phalatse had been removed, and so the Urgent court hearing became moot. The matter would have to be heard under the Court’s normal Opposed Roll.
Mere minutes after Phalatse’s evidently unlawful removal, Speaker Makhubele called for the election of a new Mayor. The DA, ActionSA and Many More Coalition no longer had enough numbers on their side as some former partners had since switched sides. Thus, Dada Morero was elected Joburg’s seventh Mayor since 2016 and began leading what they now styled the “Government of Local Unity” with the EFF, Patriotic Alliance (who switched coalitions), Al Jama-Ah, UDM and Many More. This bogus election made him Joburg’s sixth Mayor in six years.
This arrangement lasted exactly 25 days, while the DA fought to overturn it in court. On 25 October 2022, Judge Raylene Keightley of the Gauteng Division, Johannesburg, ruled the September Council meeting unlawful and ordered that Morero & Co should leave immediately so that Phalatse and Co could return to Power.
Thus, for 25 days, the City had two Mayors – a legitimately elected one out of Office and an illegitimately elected one in charge. Wonderful.
Once removed by the court, the now Illegitimate “Former” Mayor was seen on ENCA stating that he had every intention of fighting to return to power, because that is what is in politics for – the pursuit of power. I’ve never been able to locate the clip online after seeing it on TV, but I’m sure one of you smart people will find it.
True to form, that is exactly what he did. This time, lawfully. On 26 January 2023, he sent the MPG packing and installed one of Al Jama-ah’s three councillors, our good man Thapelo Amad, to lead the City whilst securing himself the not-insignificant Finance portfolio.
Part of me understands that reasoning. That is the part that is a former politico. It is the nature (and obsession) of politicians to pursue power, at whatever costs. The other part of me that has been developing since active politics started leaving my system in its voice over time finds that reasoning repulsive because, honestly, you are just pursuing power for the sake of it. Just to be powerful? Like, you have no vision for what is to be achieved with the power once you have it? That is mos how we end up with a leadership that is, frankly, taking the City nowhere and achieving nothing at the same time. All whilst the City slides deeper into a death spiral and, boy is it dying.
Let me not digress. My intention was not to rant about the City’s leadership. I want to talk about what I’ve observed happens in a government when there’s instability amongst the political leadership. In short: “very bad things.”
A senior manager in one of the GP Metros once told me at a tense Council meeting, deadpan, that the people who truly run the show in municipalities are the senior managers below the City Manager. These are the “Section 56” Managers accountable to the CM and their direct reports. Everyone else is basically chopped liver, including the political leadership. Why? Because the way the system is configured gives the managers extraordinary powers that would ordinarily be the preserve of the elected political leadership. Additionally, even in an Executive Mayoral system, many of the powers needed for proper and efficient day-to-day management are given to the Council, so Mayors and their Mayoral teams, have to constantly get Council Approval for sometimes even basic things.
Related: I’ve always believed that the system was designed this way because, in the late 1990’s when the laws regulating local government were developed, the ANC did not believe in the quality of its local leadership so it intentionally constrained their powers. That’s just a hunch. Let’s not fight, comrades.
This is where the problem of leadership instability quickly snowballs. When the politicians cannot keep each other onside, this means that every item that must be discussed and voted on at Council opens up an opportunity for bargaining.
What do you think happens when a coalition is constantly at each other’s throats? The managers end up managing affairs without engaged, focused and consistent political leadership. This steadily leads to the undermining of the authority of the duly elected political leadership because administrators start fairly believing that “you may not even be here next month”, and thus begins the tyranny of the unelected technocrat.
Once that view takes hold in the corridors of the administration, best of luck to you MMC, MEC, and Minister. You will find an increasingly stubborn and uncooperative cohort of unelected technocrats that you “lead” in name only, but not substance. Substantively, they take direction from elsewhere and that is where the real danger lies because then whose agenda are you executing daily? Your own? The one you campaigned to be elected for? Or another one that has been spirited in because you have been preoccupied with tangential business?
This is not good for our democratic project. Why? Because the elected leadership is the embodiment of society’s aspirations, whether you like this or that group that is in power. If we are to deepen democracy, we need them to be able to at least attempt to deliver on the agenda they promised at the polls, unobstructed by unelected technocrats. They must live or die by their ability to improve our material conditions.
How do we fix this?
It certainly will not be easy. Something simple would be to say let’s get new leaders. Of course, that is partially correct. Of course, there are many incompetents and deplorables walking the corridors of power. There are equally many exceptional leaders, too, but they often get drowned out by the others. Another problem is often that those who imagine themselves competent either have no appetite for electoral politics or simply do not have the courage of their convictions. Thus, we are here.
If I must be brief, I’d say we need;
1. An overhaul of the local government regulatory framework in terms of who does what between Council, Mayoral Committees and Senior Managers.
2. An overhaul of the regulatory framework to specifically deal with coalitions.
3. Competent leaders who understand the system.
Alright, that’s it for today. Be back soon and, if no one else has told you, I love you.
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