Who runs municipalities during 14-days in which local governments are formed?
"... we are sitting with 81 coalitions, 47 of those 81 coalitions are stable coalitions," said Lance Joel of the South African Local Government Association.
Vicky Stark
A woman casts her ballot at a polling station as South Africans are urged to vote in local government elections and hold elected representatives accountable for service delivery. (Picture credit: ververidis/123rf)
ververidis/123rf
The majority of South African voters will go to the polls tomorrow, and the declaration of the result could happen on Saturday or Sunday. Local governments need to be formed within 14 days of that announcement. But who will govern in that interim two-week period?
702/CapeTalk’s Africa Melane interviewed Lance Joel, the Chief Officer for Intergovernmental Relations and Municipal Resilience at the South African Local Government Association.
Joel said there's a lot of reliance on the city manager and staff who are working according to budgets that have already been approved until the end of the financial year.
“While the city manager is always in charge administratively... However, doing so under the guidance of the council itself and the executive leadership in the council.
“So, what will be absent for that 14-day period, is the council itself in terms of an executive mayor, a speaker, and a whip of council. But otherwise, councillors will be there.
“And if there's a need for any decision to be taken, the municipal manager could convene the council to do so,” said Joel.
What happens in a situation where no council can be established within those 14 days after the declaration of the results?
Joel said it wouldn’t be the first time.
“We have had, in the outcomes of the 2016 elections in KZN, where a municipality could not convene within the 14 days... they struggled to form a government. And ultimately the MEC (for local government), using Section 139 of the Constitution, dissolved that council. It went for new elections, fresh by-elections, and only thereafter could they convene within the 14-day period after the by-election.”
How are coalition governments performing?
“As a direct result of the 2021 elections, we are sitting with 81 coalitions; 47 of those 81 coalitions are stable coalitions. So, it's a minority of coalitions that are politically unstable.
“So coalitions are not necessarily a bad thing because the facts show that... a majority of them are stable. Where they are unstable, we believe it's because of political arrangements and no regulatory framework.”
Joel believes that the bill that has been introduced to regulate coalitions will go a long way in ensuring a bit more political stability.
“Rather than leaving it to political arrangements by the coalition partner.
“So, by all means, not a bad thing; perhaps from an oversight point of view, it is better for a democracy,” said Joel.