‘Ulterior’ motives in removal of Joburg mayor Mpho Phalatse, court rules

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City of Johannesburg speaker Colleen Makhubele had an “ulterior purpose” in granting councillors an “unreasonable” 16 hours before voting on the removal of Mpho Phalatse as city mayor and the move was “unlawful”, Judge Raylene Keightley ruled on Tuesday.

At the Johannesburg high court, Keightley also ruled that all decisions taken by the unconstitutionally elected Johannesburg mayor Dada Morero, including the election of his 10-person mayoral committee on 8 October, were “unlawful, unconstitutional and invalid and are reviewed and set aside”. 

The court found Morero was unlawfully elected as mayor on 30 September after the illegal motion of no confidence that removed Phalatse on the same day. 

Morero is from the ANC and Phalatse the Democratic Alliance (DA).  

Phalatse had launched an urgent court interdict of the council meeting, and the expected motion of no confidence against her, on 29 September after Makhubele announced that the vote would happen the following morning. 

Keightley was scathing of Makhubele’s haste in calling for the vote, saying that alerting councillors at 6:06pm that at 10am the following day a motion of no confidence would be held was unbecoming of a speaker who was meant to be impartial.

“A motion of no confidence in the executive mayor is of the utmost significance to all councillors and political parties. To afford them a preparation time of only 16 hours, most of which would be night-time hours, is quite obviously unreasonable,” Keightley said in the ruling.

“Given the extreme haste with which the speaker acted in calling and setting the date for the meeting, as well as the absence of any real justification for the speed with which she acted, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that she acted for an ulterior purpose.”

The removal of Phalatse followed a breakdown of relations between the DA and its former coalition partners, chiefly the Patriotic Alliance, which broke ranks with the DA and accused it of “arrogance”. 

The Patriotic Alliance received only one mayoral position in Morero’s illegal committee; that of the transport portfolio, through the party’s Gauteng leader, Ashley Sauls. Sauls was the city’s health mayoral committee member in the DA-led coalition. 

On the unlawful election of Morero, the judge said that because the convened meeting that removed Phalatse was not lawful “then it could not have had the legal effect of deposing Ms Phalatse as executive mayor”. 

“It follows that the office of executive mayor did not become vacant. It is only when there is a vacancy in the office of executive mayor that the position must be filled,” Keightley added.

“There being no vacancy in the office, the position could not be legally filled by the election of a new mayor, no matter how free and fair that election may have been.”

Reacting to the ruling, Phalatse said in a statement that her successful application should come as a warning to politicians who wanted to “undermine the law”, and “to grab power for the sake of accessing resources”, adding that she will resume her work as mayor. 

“Over the last few weeks, we have been engaging with various political parties and stakeholders who do not want to see service delivery in Joburg collapse under a corrupt government. Therefore, I will call an immediate meeting of the reinstated mayoral committee,” she added.

“The residents of the country’s economic capital deserve a capable and stable government that will repair and rebuild Joburg.”