The group arrived at the Oliver Tambo House with posters, demanding that their plight be heard.

Their protest action comes just a day after national government announced their intervention at the metro. The municipality has been under provincial administration since 2019. National cabinet decided that the municipality still did not show enough progress and has thus decided to put it under national administration.  

According to one of the picketing members, Dihedile Motse, they are frustrated with the lack of urgency from the metro with regards to the group of 100 members who have been without a stipend since December 2021, and without jobs since completing the training.

“We finished our training on 15 December 2021 and since then we have been at home and have not heard anything from the metro as yet. We have sent a memorandum to the mayor and we still don’t have any answers. We have now decided to escalate the matter to the premier and we hope to have a response soon,” she said.

Plans for the Mangaung Metro police were put on halt after National Treasury intervened. Several public pressure groups – including the Mangaung Concerned Community (MCC) and the Mangaung Service Delivery Forum (MSDF) – have protested against the plans criticising appointments and how the budget was being spent.

Several ministers have visited the metro since Monday as part of the Pre-presidential Imbizo Build-up Programme ahead of President Cyril Ramaphosa's Presidential Imbizo that will be held in Mangaung this coming Saturday. Ramaphosa is expected to visit several projects undertaken by the municipality and the provincial government in the municipal footprint.

OFM News' Cathy Dlodlo and Bloemfontein Courant's Justine Fortuin