The Democratic Alliance (DA) in uThukela District Municipality, has today formally filed a Notice of Motion, demanding the immediate suspension of Municipal Manager, Mr LS Jili (view here).
We have placed before Council a clear and damning record of his repeated financial misconduct and gross dereliction of duty as Accounting Officer.
This includes:
• Secretly entering a R137 million High Court consent order with RASP Consultants without any Council approval;
• Failing to pay the R3 million instalment despite sufficient monies sitting in the bank; triggering R31 million in punitive interest;
• Lying twice to Council in official reports; deliberately understating emergency loans routed through the UEDA account;
• and consistently refusing to answer legitimate questions from councillors.
These failures have directly caused the freezing of our bank accounts, placed salaries and creditors at risk, and plunged basic service delivery into collapse.
uThukela residents, in both urban and rural communities, are suffering daily with dry taps, burst pipes, unreliable water supply and factories such as Dunlop forced to halt production. As the DA we cannot and will not allow this to continue.
We therefore extend a sincere and urgent invitation to every Councillor – regardless of political party – to come together at the 27 March 2026 Council meeting and support this motion.
This is not about party politics. It is about justice, accountability and the basic rights of the people all over uThukela that we all represent. Together we can put an end to the suffering and restore proper governance.
Yesterday, the DA also wrote to Speaker T Y Nqubuka demanding that the ordinary Council meeting scheduled for 27 March 2026 be held in-person and fully open to the public and the media. This follows the clear commitment given by Minister Velenkosini Hlabisa during his recent visit, that closed virtual meetings are now a thing of the past. Should the Speaker refuse to comply, we will have no hesitation in escalating the matter to the MEC.
The people of uThukela have an absolute right to see for themselves how the IFP administration under Mayor Inkosi Ntandoyenkosi B Shabalala has mismanaged their municipality and their money.
The DA will not back down. Accountability is demanded. The residents we serve deserve nothing less.