Pretoria – Embattled Tshwane Mayor Randall Williams, who headed a volatile Democratic Alliance-led multiparty coalition government in the capital city has announced his resignation.
“I resign today because I believe it is in the best interest for continued stability of the coalition in the city. Being executive mayor of the capital city has not been without its difficulties but I have embraced every challenge that has come my way in the execution of my duties, all of which have allowed my own personal development,” said Williams.
“I resign today not in frustration, resentment or anger but in peace, knowing that I have been given an incredible opportunity and I have fulfilled my duties to the best of my abilities.”
Williams said that when he was elected as mayor at the end of October 2020, the city was in “an incredibly challenging position”.
“We had just removed the ANC administrators who had mismanaged the city and our country was still in a state of Covid-19 lockdown. Having inherited a R4 billion deficit at the time, my immediate goal was to stabilise the city’s finances. At that point, I was leading a DA minority government and, within a year, we would have the local government elections. Thus there was immense pressure to guide the city to those elections and ensure stability in the government which was incredibly difficult,” he said.
“Campaigning and ensuring proper governance of the city is very challenging but I was able to do this with a good team and clear focus on the tasks ahead with our ten-point service delivery plan. In November 2021, I was once again elected as the executive mayor of Tshwane, this time at the head of the city’s first multiparty coalition government.”
Last month, ActionSA national chairperson Michael Beaumont said his party wanted accountability in the City of Tshwane, which is under fire for incurring an adverse audit opinion from the auditor-general for the 2021/22 financial year.
ActionSA, as a partner in the DA-led coalition running the capital city, wanted top officials in the municipality, including the mayor, to face consequences for their actions.
“Let me state from the outset that we are very concerned about this outcome. We, as a political party, are not going to try to sugar-coat this, and say it is less bad than it is. It’s bad and there have to be consequences,” Beaumont spoke to broadcaster Newzroom Afrika at the time.
“By way of example, the figures around unauthorised, fruitless, irregular and wasteful expenditure, in the auditor-general’s report, stand at over R10 billion. We know that in the financial year in question it was actually R1.2bn. That R10bn is an accumulative figure over 10 years. But R1.2bn is far too much.
“There are a lot of things in this report that we are deeply concerned about.”
Beaumont said that while former Tshwane chief financial officer Umar Banda should carry some of the blame for the dismal audit outcome, the political leadership in Tshwane had also failed.
Critics have slammed the DA-led multiparty coalition government for the worst financial performance in the history of the municipality.
A leaked audit report, dated November 2022, came a month after municipal manager Johann Mettler sacked Banda for financial misconduct after he misrepresented the city’s 2021/22 financial statements to the auditor-general.
Banda’s court bid to overturn the decision to fire him was dismissed in the High Court, Pretoria, in December.
