Joburg mayor will face another vote of no confidence next week

16th November 2022 By: News24Wire

 Joburg mayor will face another vote of no confidence next week

Johannesburg Mayor Mpho Phalatse

Johannesburg Mayor Mpho Phalatse will face a second vote of no confidence in less than two months.

The latest vote of no confidence in Phalatse will take place next week after the programming committee heard two requests for motions of no confidence in the mayor on Monday.

The committee is headed by the council speaker and meets to discuss and set down the agenda of council meetings.

The City of Johannesburg council will meet on 23 and 24 November for an ordinary sitting. The no-confidence motion will be heard on one of the two days.

According to a source within the committee, members discussed two votes of no confidence at the meeting.

The minority opposition parties brought one. At a briefing last week, the parties said they were concerned about what they called a "financial crisis" within the City. They indicated that they would be requesting a motion of no confidence in Phalatse.

It is still unclear which party brought the second request for a no-confidence vote.

There was also a request for a motion of no confidence in Johannesburg speaker Colleen Makhubele.

The programming committee rejected this as a similar request was currently before the Section 79 Rules Committee.

The City of Johannesburg has 270 council members. For a motion to pass, it needs 136 votes or more.

Last week, Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) leader Julius Malema said the party would vote in defence of the Democratic Alliance (DA) in Johannesburg until the African National Congress (ANC) agreed to back the EFF in Ekurhuleni.

This came after the ANC and EFF disagreed on who should govern in Ekurhuleni after Tania Campbell was axed in a motion of no confidence last month.

Campbell, a DA leader, was reinstated following a vote in the council because of this disagreement between the EFF and the ANC.

The EFF has 29 councillors in Johannesburg, and if they were to back the DA, it would likely give the DA-led coalition the majority needed to keep Phalatse in power.