Endumeni Local Municipality. Picture: Facebook/Endumeni Local Municipality
Durban — Dundee residents on the north-west of KwaZulu-Natal will finally have a mayor after more than a week of uncertainty.
There has been a leadership vacuum in the Endumeni Local Municipality after the Mayor Siyabonga Ndlovu resigned last week.
Speaker Andile Nsibande told the Daily News on Monday that he had called a council meeting to sit on Thursday to elect the new Mayor.
“Our meeting is scheduled for Thursday and all items including the election of the new mayor and the motions against me as the Speaker will be discussed,” said Nsibande.
Besides electing a mayor, the council will also debate a motion of no confidence which was filed by the ANC. Although he did not reveal who the new mayor will be, the paper understands that the IFP has chosen Mcebo Mkhize, the local youth leader to take over as the new mayor. Mkhize is currently heading a youth desk in Umzinyathi District Municipality under mayor Petros Ngubane. Mkhize is expected to be elected easily with the assistance of the two councillors from the DA. The DA caucus leader Saleem Abdul told the paper that his party will support its IFP candidate, hoping the new mayor will bring stability to the council.
The tiny municipality was one of many municipalities that became hung after no party won the majority in the 13 seat-council. IFP and ANC got five apart while DA obtained two. Philani Mavundla’s Abantu-Batho Congress got one. IFP teamed up with the DA to govern while ABC always voted with the ANC.
Ndlovu, an Inkatha Freedom Party councillor, allegedly resigned due to the DA’s mounting pressure. The DA filed for a motion of no confidence against Ndlovu. The situation was compounded by the fact that it never had a deputy mayor since the establishment of the council after the 2021 local government elections. It was the DA that turned down the offer although it assisted IFP to govern the municipality, however, it is unclear whether the DA will accept the deputy mayor’s position.
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