Helen Zille Is Mayor Of Cape Town 6
Well it was tight right up to the wire but it looks like Helen Zille is the new mayor of Cape Town.
She received 106 votes and the ex-mayor Nomainda Mefeketo received 103. That’s a very slim margin of victory and one that will look even more slim when the next floor crossing window opens.
In the meantime the DA are going to have to do all they possibly can to get some national attention on their achievements in local government in Cape Town. So the Honourable Mayor Zille if you’re listening you need to:
- Sort the power question out. I expect nothing less than you giving Eskom CEO Thulani Gcabashe a major migraine everytime he sees your number on caller ID.
- Get public transport going. Golden Arrow’s bus service is hardly public transport. Metrorail is falling to pieces. Travelling from areas such as Parklands and Durbanville in rush hour traffic is slow torture.
- Get a decent city manager. Wallace Mgoqi has shown he can’t handle it. The aborted jewellery district. Obviously fronted BEE parking companies winning city contracts. N2 gateway housing stalling. The list is embarassingly long.
Do all that and you should be fine…
Update: According to the voting patterns, and DA Mal pretty much confirms it, the ID and ANC are voting together. That might be bad news to De Lille if it causes her voters to question voting ID as an alternate opposition.
Update: Grindrod loses deputy role by one vote – That’s got to sting. The ID have gone from “kingmaker” to needing a “regmaker”. However this minority part alliance is in my opinion very very shaky. While the DA has won the vote for electing officials they could still lose numerous other votes that come before this council.
Update:
Speaking in English, Afrikaans and Xhosa, she said…
Finally! Someone at the DA is listening to my constant harping about making speeches in Xhosa/Zulu/Sotho. Now get Tony Leon into Xhosa Intesive 101 stat!
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This was almost as riveting as Isidingo! To be honest, I had my doubts about Helen getting there. About the “to-do” list, she’s already said that she’s aware that the electricity crisis was helpful to her, and she’s not going to forget it. Heard an interview on SAfm this afternoon with James Ngculu (that his name?). He was, to put it mildly, spraying venom, said this was a ‘brittle alliance” guaranteed not to last, was appalled that the DA was giving positions to those small parties that stuck with them (as if the ANC was above that sort of thing), and disgusted that transformation and delivery to the poor would now be relegated to the backburner .. if I may hazard a guess, there might be some ID floorcrossing to the DA come September 2007, depending … but the acrimony really shocked me. Contrast this with my voting district, Knysna, where not one party had a majority: a “working relationship” between the ANC and the DA, who one learns are imbued with the spirit of friendly co-operation regarding the business of delivery etc. More like it.
hex: I think that ‘working relationship’ in Knysna is just to keep Truman Prince and ICOSA out of power.
Ngculu and Skwatsha on Cape Talk yesterday were sunshine and roses, wishing Helen all the best. That surprised me. They must have been sat on by their party bosses between then and the SAfm interview, and told to remember that ANC reps must always treat the DA as the scum of the Earth.
Well, I didn’t vote for the ID, but my g/f did, and I will be giving her hell for it :-)
The ID has just lost any credibility they had in my books.
Truman Prince? You’re getting Knysna mixed up with Beaufort West! ICOSA didn’t get a single seat in Knysna, where – get this – the nomination for ANC’s Joy Cole as mayor came from the DA, whilst the deputy executive mayor and speaker, both on the DA ticket, were nominated by the ANC.
I see that the floor-crossing period of local/provincial/national government is to coincide in September next year, when the ANC could offer floor-crossers posts in the provincial government, something the DA can’t. Keep your fingers crossed.
hex: Ah sorry my mistake.