Outgoing Tshwane mayor Randall Williams jumped before some in his own caucus and in the governing coalition as well as opposition parties would push him out.
They blamed Randall for several scandals that have cost the municipality millions of rand and damaged its reputation that happened under his watch even though he was not necessarily directly responsible for them.
A member of the coalition speaking on condition of anonymity said they had given the DA in the province an ultimatum either to let Randall go or lose coalition support for him in the motion of no confidence action.
“The AG report had scathing allegations against the CFO, some councillors and some of us felt the CFO was being used as a scapegoat as the coalition was also being blackened. We upped the ante and said we don’t want Randall and made this clear to the DA. Last night we gave them that ultimatum.
Another insider said Williams lost the support of the DA caucus and coalition partners due to the AG report and its findings.
“He had to provide an acceptable level of assurance but failed completely. This is probably the worst mayor in the history of Tshwane it was clear that he would lose the motion of no confidence submitted last week by minority parties,” the second insider said.
Another DA insider agreed that Williams had to take political responsibility even though the issues were technically under the ambit of the city manager’s office.
“He is not necessarily being blamed for the A-G report. It's more a matter of principle, he had to take accountability as the face of the municipality.
“We had to bite the bullet so we can hold on to the mayoralty without the position being threatened. Also we had to get ahead of other parties. If we did not remove him, there was a motion looming where he would have been removed.
“Now that he has resigned we can in possibly still hold on to the mayoralty by putting up another candidate,” said the party member.
ActionSA chairperson Michael Beaumont said while they were surprised by Williams’ resignation they had expected there would be political consequences for the adverse audit report, the R292m lost due to tender irregularities in attempts to upgrade the Rooiwal Water Treatment plant “and a number of other service delivery issues”.
African Christian Democratic Party (ACDP) chairperson in Tshwane Ronald Morake said Williams’ resignation was the “honourable” thing to do, adding his resignation would bring stability to the coalition.
“It cannot be that we’re found wanting with a damning AG report and then we’re only holding officials to account. It cannot be the man in charge of this city is left unscathed. He knows what he was getting himself into and he must take the fall.
“The AG made damning findings. It’s embarrassing to say the least. The mayor is the captain of the ship in Tshwane. If the ship goes down then the captain takes responsibility. It has been our sentiment as the ACDP that the mayor must go, not because he’s wrong but because they created a wall,” he said,
Despite being members of the coalition, the ACDP doesn’t hold a mayoral committee position, something Morake said needed to change.
“There should be a reshuffle and form part and parcel of the mayoral committee. We can’t always be told after the fact. The mayoral position remains a DA position,” he said.
An official with inside knowledge of Tshwane said the city’s cash flow was not good.
“There’s not enough cash to comfortably do what the city is meant to do and that’s the main problem. We’re still managing to pay everything that needs to be paid, such as SARS, salaries and medical aid but we do need to count things in terms of service providers. People aren’t paid every 30 days. We pay Eskom 45 days after we’re meant to pay them. The city is not bankrupt. We’re not there yet but it’s not ideal for a metro to pay service providers 45 days late,” the insider said.
— Additional reporting Fikile-Ntsikelelo Moya
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