The attached assets include six municipal vehicles and a compactor truck. 

The Democratic Alliance (DA) alleged that this was done to recover outstanding funds owed to service providers. 

The DA councillor in the Masilonyana Local Municipality, Sello Putsoenyane, explained in a media statement that the acting Municipal Manager confirmed the default on payments from the municipality, and accused the municipality of not making arrangements with service providers. However, he says that assurance was given to the opposition party that a meeting will be held with the providers to mitigate a way out of this.

ALSO READ: R3 million waste truck handed over to Free State municipality

Late in 2022, the Deputy Minister of Forestry, Fisheries and Environmental Affairs, Makhotso Sotyu, handed over a single waste truck worth R3 million to the municipality. Accompanied by the mayor of Masilonyana, Sotyu said the handover of the truck forms part of the National Yellow waste and landfill management fleet which the department purchased as a waste management intervention to address waste collection services and illegal dumping for selected municipalities across the country. 

"In each and every municipality, we have some members of the youth that we have employed to assist municipalities with the district delivery model that has been introduced by the government early this financial year. So one of their responsibilities is to assist the municipalities in making sure that all this infrastructure, especially from different departments, is being looked after the way it is supposed to be," she said.

The DA is of the view that the recent attachment, which took place on 30 January, could have been avoided had the municipality followed through with the December council resolution to fill the vacant positions of Chief Financial Officer, Municipal Manager, and other managers, to bring stability to the municipality. 

“According to the Municipal Financial Management Act (MFMA) No. 56 of 2003 – on 31 January 2023, the Mayor should have tabled the annual report for the previous financial year. Unfortunately, this did not take place,” the statement read.

It is at the moment unclear if the above-mentioned R3 million compactor truck handed over by Sotyu, is part of the assets which were attached.

OFM News is awaiting a response to an enquiry sent to Masilonyana Municipality’s spokesperson.

OFM News