Enoch Mgijima Municipality vehicles and assets went under the hammer in Komani yesterday and were sold for R6.5-million, with a grader fetching R625000.
A TLB went for R460000 while Ziyanda Mjiba of Ilinge township is the new proud owner of the BMW X5 that belonged to council speaker Mzoxolo Peter after she outbid everyone and forked out R405000 for the luxury car.
The three items alone went for R1.4-million while the 32 other vehicles and assets that were also auctioned off, fetched a combined R5.1-million.
The auction came after the cash-strapped local authority failed to pay its R58-million debt to Milowo Trading Enterprise for the community hall it built in Sterkstroom in 2012.
Last month the sheriff attached 18 trucks, 14 bakkies, two TLBs (tractor, loader, backhoes), a roller, a grader and 10 cars.
Municipal bosses and a businessman tried and failed to interdict the auctioning of its assets.
Municipal leaders and the contractor’s lawyers also failed to reach an agreement yesterday as the council launched a last-ditch attempt to prevent the auction from going ahead.
The auctioning of the vehicles which were used for service delivery means service delivery, which is at an all-time low at the Komani-based municipality, will take another knock. And it is not over yet as the contractor has threatened to have more assets attached.
Milowo Trading’s attorney Lionel Trichard said: “We are going to come back and attach immovable assets like the offices and halls. There are more things that we will be attaching.”
Robert Goss of Milowo Trading Enterprise said he was going to meet with his lawyers to discuss when they would be attaching more municipal assets.
Mjiba said she was happy with her new BMW X5, saying she had targeted it after viewing it on Thursday.
DA councillor Zuko Mandile said they were locked in a meeting with Milowo’s lawyers from 9am to noon when the auction started.
“We had hoped that the auction will be stopped as we tried to assist the municipality. The meeting was attended by local businessman Ken Clark, [municipal manager] Chris Magwangqana and councillor Chris de Wet. We tried our best but unfortunately we failed,” he said.
Mandile said the political leadership failed them as they tried to call the speaker Peter, mayor Sisisi Tolashe and chief whip Funeka Sopapazi-Lungisa whose phones he said were off.
They wanted them to call a special council meeting.
“The municipality’s troika has failed us and does not care about this municipality. We even tried to get assistance from the cooperative governance and traditional affairs department and the provincial treasury which committed R7-million but that arrived late as the auction had started,” he said.
He said they had never discussed the debt to the contractor in council.
Trichard said they had tried everything in their power to stop the auction but the municipality failed to meet them halfway.“We were ready to negotiate and go to another settlement but they did not meet us halfway. Working with the provincial treasury and the provincial leadership we tried our outmost best to avoid this situation,” he said.
“We wanted this to be resolved because even if the auction went well that will not cover the R21-million [plus R37-million interest accumulated in six years] they owe us,” he said.
Municipal spokesman Fundile Feketshane said the matter was still in court.
“We are still waiting for the judgment as we went to court to avoid for the vehicles to be sold,” he said.
Magwangqana and Tolashe could not be reached for comment as their phones were off.
UDM councillor Mthuthuzeli Hokolo said it was clear that the ANC had failed to rule.
“This is a disgrace that we could lose 40 vehicles. We are worried about the services delivery, it was difficult to deliver services with these vehicles, how much more will it be when they are not here?” — tembiles@dispatch.co.za..