Get going on appointing metro chief

E-mail your letter to The Herald

REGARDING the article, "Bid to extend Hani’s contract resisted” (July 27), when Themba Hani came to the metro many of us were happy as we saw that he was prepared to take action. Startlingly, it appears that he only wanted to act on Sithembele Vatala.

Council should release him and forget about the protocol of local government that does not seem to be based on reasoning.

He also acted promptly on the Kabuso Report, but I was shocked few days later to read two pages of a response from Africorp. Although The Herald did a good thing by making the report public, Hani was still duty-bound to study the report correctly and in doing so apply his mind prior taking action.

The response from Africorp was a clear sign that Hani is not a proper replacement for Graham Richards (although he is in an acting capacity). I am sure Richards could have applied his mind before acting on a contract instead of acting without checking what was contained in the contracts and other relevant facts.

I also do not understand how the MEC seconded Hani. In his comprehensive CV I do not pick up anything that shows he understands local government.

Working in provincial government does not mean that you are fit to run a metro, which is no child’s play. You cannot expect a person who has been running a directorate with less than R100-million budget to run a metro with an arguably R9-billion budget, this is insanity.

I am a previous disadvantaged individual myself and I support redress 100%,but it is unjust for anyone to be recommended for a position of this nature without having worked in a similar environment. I do not believe our provincial government has anything to offer in our metro – if there was something right with our provincial administration, why do we have such problematic municipalities?

As society we need to stand strongly and oppose injustice. It is unjust for our government to starve its residents of all the benefits a good administration can offer should our leaders put the interest of the residents before anything.

Our municipalities need energetic managers, not what we have. If every manager was doing his bit, we could become like a mini-New York City one day.

The Bay metro is well placed. It can grow, but as residents we need to demand commitment from our government.

Hani is not up to it in terms of assisting the metro. He needs to admit that he is not the captain the metro needs.

How do we as the Bay metro explain losing two senior officials to Cape Town Municipality? If they can be appointed in Cape Town it means they are competent, why could they not prove their competency here – surely there are structural and organisational problems?

If our mayor, who sits in a position of a chairman in a company, cannot persuade council of a quick and proper way to turn things around by December, he also needs to do the honourable thing and leave. Again, if the political parties are unable to produce proper and fit persons to run our government, we need to change the way we elect our leaders.

I was startled by what the mayor said in justifying failing to go to tender for the IPTS. I immediately looked for the clause he quoted in the supply chain management policy – the clause is right, but it seems to be at odds with important pieces of legislation. They may need to revisit it.

The residents of Walmer were very unhappy recently on issues of delivery. The managers who have managed to beat the system and get themselves overpaid, if they are as good as they think they are, why did they not have a plan for problems like Walmer and other similar areas?

If you link the confusion over Hani’s stay in the metro, the Walmer problems, and the exorbitant and unlawful salaries, clearly we have a problem. We need to clean the municipality and bring people who will lead with passion, people who will be bothered when they see a cracked house being shown on SABC by an old person asking for help from what is termed "Touching Lives”.

There is so much mess in our municipality. Hani needs to leave and an administrator appointed to oversee the appointment of a proper and fit municipal manager, black or white, as long as he can take this metro to the level it deserves to be at.