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Mogalakwena Mayor Taueatsoala Embarks on Enhancing Community Lives by Turning Things Around




Mayor Taueatsoala leading by example.


The Executive Mayor of Mogalakwena Municipality Cllr Ngoako Saggie Thulane Taueatsoala has embarked on rooting out corruption, accelerating service delivery and enhancing the lives of the community by turning things around speedily without trepidation.

 

Taueatsoala already is cracking whip by leaving no stones unturned practising what he sermonizes through his mottoDilo di tŝhentŝhitŝe” (business unusual) which is geared to ensure that the municipal state purse is not being used by unethical officials’ remote controlled by crooked politicians to achieve their selfish shady agendas in the name of entitlement tendencies.

The municipality has been in the news for wrong reasons for more than 10 years following serious allegations of political instability, corruption, malfeasance which gave birth to calamity which affected service delivery. 

Mayor Taueatsoala said: “In one of my many speeches, I did mention that our municipality owes the people of Mogalakwena 10 years’ service delivery. Since 2011, this municipality was unstable politically and as a result, in 5 years from 2011 to 2016, the municipality had 4 Mayors and from 2016 to 2021 the municipality was ravaged with allegations of corruption and malfeasance, thus affecting service delivery.  There are projects that were reported to be completed and paid for, whilst the physical report indicates a contrary situation and the municipality was put under section 139, and politicians, officials and service providers were eventually arrested. It remains a matter of the courts to either find them guilty or not guilty. The situation as mentioned necessitated us to change how things are done."

 

“The Municipality had reached a state of dysfunctionality, thus being unable to fund its budget and this situation is fast changing and SALGA will give a report on it at the appropriate time. We are doing this, so that our people can know the other side of the story which is the truth.  We are committed never to betray our people in exchange for laziness, corruption and malfeasance.  We understand that a culture of impunity had reigned supreme in this municipality, where junior officials saw no need to undermine the seniors and where officials behaved as if they were politicians.  We draw a line in the sand and wish to notify all and sundry that "dilo di tŝhentŝhitŝe.”

 

The municipality depended on grant funding to implement some of the projects and the funding is structured as follows:

 

1. Municipal Infrastructure Grant [MIG]

2. The Electrification Grant 

3. Water and Sanitation Grant 

4. Regional Bulk Infrastructure Grant 

5. SLPs from our two mining houses. 

 

As part of his mission to change things, the Mogalakwena Municipality under Mayor Taueatsoala dismissed Jabulani Mashamaite, one of its managers responsible for Corporate Services.

This follows after he was implicated in the reports of the Special Investigating Unit and the Public Protector relating to the illegal appointments of more than 400 workers as well as tender irregularities.

Meanwhile, Victor Mokonyane, an employee at the Mogalakwekana Municipality accused his employer of corruption.  Mokonyane claimed that more than R600 million has been irregularly spent. He said some funds were spent on painting the water reservoirs and legal bills amongst others.

Mokonyane alleged: "Corruption is rife in Mogalakwena local Municipality. The corruption is so rife that everything in Mogalakwena Municipality is on a rental basis. Painting of dams costs R78-million and this is not for construction. Legal fees have cost more than R67-million. So far, the Municipality has spent a total of R632-million in less than 16 months.”

However, Mayor Taueatsoala dismissed Mokonyane’s allegations with contempt.

“All reservoirs that we are refurbishing, the Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS) is there with us. Each and every payment that we are doing, the DWS is there. There is no way that we can make any payment [without DWS].

“Those are just unfounded allegations. If the allegations that were raised by one of our employees exist, they would have appeared based on the findings of the Auditor General,” Mayor Taueatsoala said.

Mayor Taueatsoala enhancing the lives of the community.


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