The Buffalo City Metro council is making little progress in trying to identify union members and BCM employees who have disrupted council meetings.
Council meetings in April, May and June last year were held at East London’s King David Hotel, where ex-mayor Zukiswa Ncitha reportedly began action aimed at suspending the metro’s accounting officer, Andile Fani.
The meetings were disrupted by angry members of the South African Municipal Workers’ Union (Samwu), who were against the removal of Fani.
The meetings were so volatile council members called the police. Now, in a bid to identify employees behind the “disruptive demonstrations”, council has been trying to obtain video footage.
The Dispatch has seen a confidential council report tabled during last Wednesday’s council meeting, in which complaints are made that the King David Hotel management and police are ducking and diving over the handing over of the footage. In the report, tabled by then-acting municipal manager Nonceba Mbali-Majeng, it is claimed a bid to identify the protest leaders was thwarted by the unavailability of the footage.
On June 24 council resolved to obtain a list of all staff members who participated in the demonstration, so that they could face a disciplinary hearing.
A memorandum to all metro directorates requesting lists of all staff involved was issued. Only the directorate of health and public safety provided a list of 15 employees accused of being in the crowd. Other directorates either did not respond, or stated that none of their staff members were involved. This prompted the council to instruct the directorate of corporate services to seek the footage from the hotel and police.
Mbali-Majeng told the council that the hotel responded on September 9 last year, saying they were “unable to extract the video footage due to their DVR system, which only stores footage for a month”. Pleas to police to provide the footage they took at the meetings were not answered. — asandan@dispatch.co.za
BCM council battles to identify union protesters
Council meetings in April, May and June last year were held at East London’s King David Hotel, where ex-mayor Zukiswa Ncitha reportedly began action aimed at suspending the metro’s accounting officer, Andile Fani.
The meetings were disrupted by angry members of the South African Municipal Workers’ Union (Samwu), who were against the removal of Fani.
The meetings were so volatile council members called the police. Now, in a bid to identify employees behind the “disruptive demonstrations”, council has been trying to obtain video footage.
The Dispatch has seen a confidential council report tabled during last Wednesday’s council meeting, in which complaints are made that the King David Hotel management and police are ducking and diving over the handing over of the footage. In the report, tabled by then-acting municipal manager Nonceba Mbali-Majeng, it is claimed a bid to identify the protest leaders was thwarted by the unavailability of the footage.
On June 24 council resolved to obtain a list of all staff members who participated in the demonstration, so that they could face a disciplinary hearing.
A memorandum to all metro directorates requesting lists of all staff involved was issued. Only the directorate of health and public safety provided a list of 15 employees accused of being in the crowd. Other directorates either did not respond, or stated that none of their staff members were involved. This prompted the council to instruct the directorate of corporate services to seek the footage from the hotel and police.
Mbali-Majeng told the council that the hotel responded on September 9 last year, saying they were “unable to extract the video footage due to their DVR system, which only stores footage for a month”. Pleas to police to provide the footage they took at the meetings were not answered. — asandan@dispatch.co.za
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