Chris Hani Community Sets Date for Protest Against Municipality

Frustrated Concerned Chris Hani residents say they plan to march on the Chris Hani District Municipality after what they describe as months of ignored petitions and failed engagements over hiring practices and non-payment of security workers.

According to the residents, they planned peaceful march is going to be on April 23.

Concerned residents’ spokesperson Xola Njokweni said a planned meeting with the office of the MEC for Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs Zolile Williams was called off last week due to “unforeseen circumstances”.

“On Monday we went to submit a notice to the office of the Chris Hani District Municipality for a march where we will be submitting a petition,” Njokweni said.

“We believe that we have been submitting petitions to the municipality but they are ignoring us.”

Njokweni stressed that the dispute is not limited to security or general workers, but is about “service delivery” across the municipality.

He alleged that people have been hired to replace contract workers who served for more than three years, and that “most of the posts were never advertised”.

“We want to say the municipality has been undermining us. They have never allowed us to have a constructive engagement. We had to escalate the matter to the office of MEC COGTA so that we have a trail that we have moved to all offices,” said Njokweni.

According to Njokweni, residents held a virtual meeting with the MEC’s office three weeks ago where it was agreed that they will have a meeting on April 13.

“Officials requested time to engage the Chris Hani municipality on the issues raised, but failed to respond to follow-up emails. The MEC’s office only responded on Friday to postpone the meeting,” he said.

He said a key grievance is the non-payment of security workers linked to municipal tenders.

“What is painful in the issue of security is for the office of COGTA to tell the municipality to stop issuing the tender as the new company will not pay securities as well,” Njokweni said.

“We want to know who is responsible for the non-payment of securities. We want paperwork. We won’t fight with companies, we want the municipality to give us paperwork so that we know who is responsible for the non-payment of securities. Those responsible must face the music,” said Njokweni.

He also raised issues of nepotism and favouritism within the municipality.

MEC spokesperson Pheello Oliphant promised to get back to Komani News last week on Thursday, however, he did not by the time of publishing the article.