City of Tshwane Executive Mayor, Cllr Cilliers Brink announces new Mayoral Committee – media briefing.
Office of the Executive Mayor
31 March 2023
Greetings and acknowledgments
Ladies and gentlemen,
All multi-party coalition members present, Incoming MMCs, City officials, councillors, and members of the media.
A very good morning to you all.
I want to thank the members of the media for honouring our invite. I know, we’ve seen a lot of each other in recent weeks, and therefore we plan to make this a short and precise briefing.
We have invited you to announce the new members of the Mayoral Committee that will work alongside me to build a Capital City that works for all its people. I am pleased that as coalition partners we were able to consult and work together to form a strong team in a matter of days.
This should demonstrate our urgency and commitment in fixing the challenges that are facing Tshwane.
Ladies and gentlemen, as I stated during my acceptance speech in Council, it is indeed a great honour to have the opportunity to serve the people of Tshwane through the Office of the Mayor.
However, as you may be aware I did not make it here on my own, in fact it was quite a battle! But by working together as a coalition we made it.
Despite the recent disruptions and challenges in the Tshwane Council our multi-party coalition is strong and ready to get to work in delivering services to the residents of Tshwane.
Now, before I introduce the team, it’s important that I briefly outline our my five core priorities that will ensure we fast track service delivery for all. These include:
- Prioritise the City’s finances and stability by devising and implementing a bold recovery plan that focuses on the core functions of the municipality.
- Reduce the number of unscheduled water and electricity outages, invest in our core infrastructure and mitigate the effects of load-shedding.
- Improve basic services pertaining to pothole repairs, street light maintenance, grass cutting and public cleaning.
- Secure infrastructure assets, main roads and business nodes against criminals by improving the focus and functioning of the Tshwane Metro Police Department.
- Instill high levels of productivity and professionalism in City officials through appropriate performance management systems.
These five priorities are drawn from our coalition agreement and represent the areas which I know that we must focus on as a team. However, to do this properly requires that we must have a strong team in place.
With that it gives me great pleasure to introduce to you the team of MMCs that will work with me to fix Tshwane. Some of the MMCs you know while others will be a bit new.
Here they are, I would ask that they each step forward and raise their hands as I call them out.
MMC for Corporate and Shared Services – Cllr Kingsley Wakelin (DA)
MMC for Economic Development and Spatial Planning – Alderman Hannes Coetzee (ActionSA)
MMC for Utilities and Regional Operations – Cllr Themba Fosi (DA)
MMC for Environment and Agriculture – Cllr Ziyanda Zwane (IFP)
MMC for Finance – Alderman Peter Sutton (DA)
MMC for Roads and Transport – Alderman Katlego Mathebe (DA)
MMC for Community Safety – Alderman Grandi Theunissen (VF+)
MMC for Social Development – Cllr Peggy De Bruin (Action SA)
MMC Human Settlements – Cllr Ofentse Madzebatela (DA)
MMC for Health – Cllr Rina Marx (VF+)
I’m pleased to introduce this strong team of individuals that are fit for purpose, ethical and ready to serve the people of Tshwane. It’s important that we have a competent team that can hit the ground running.
Being an MMC is incredibly difficult, you are on call all the time, 24/7. You must also walk a fine line in terms of ensuring that the administration does what they are expected to do without overstepping.
The fact is that politicians are often placed in position where they must account for poor decisions or performance by officials, this is why MMCs must ensure they critical oversight over the work of their departments.
We have tight deadlines such as the Adjustment Budget and the Draft Budget for the 2023/24 financial year. So, we must stay focused and put the interests of Tshwane residents ahead of everything else.
As we stand before you here we are going to get straight to work. As soon as this briefing is done we will be heading upstairs to engage on the Adjustment Budget and we have already planned the budgetary workshops for next week as well.
I have kept my introductory remarks short to allow time for questions.
Let me once again congratulate the team of MMCs and thank you all for being here.
Media inquires: Siphost@tshwane.gov.za
