Johannesburg mayor Kabelo Gwamanda resigns | News24

Kabelo Gwamanda. (Sharon Seretlo/Gallo Images)

• City of Johannesburg Mayor Kabelo Gwamanda has resigned.
• Gwamanda, a member of Al Jama-ah, was a compromise candidate between the ANC and EFF.
• The new mayor is expected to come from the ANC, with former Johannesburg mayor Dada Morero being one of the potential candidates.

City of Johannesburg Mayor Kabelo Gwamanda has resigned.

In a statement released on Tuesday morning, Gwamanda said he
had submitted his resignation to the council speaker.

“As the youngest mayor of Johannesburg, I am humbled by
the opportunity to have led this City and to have stabilised it financially and
administratively following the collapse of the multiparty coalition
government,” he said.

Gwamanda said he would “continue to serve the people of
Johannesburg as a councillor”. 

The Al Jama-ah councillor announced his resignation ahead of
the ANC’s announcement on the “reconfiguring of government in the City of
Johannesburg” on Tuesday, which is set for 14:00.

The new mayor will come from within the ANC.

News24 understands that the ANC regional executive committee
met on Monday night to decide on its mayoral candidates. Three names were
allegedly picked and, according to a source within the ANC, former mayor Dada
Morero was one of them.

This was after ActionSA president Herman Mashaba said the
party would vote with the ANC on an item-by-item basis if the ANC agreed to
terms that included Gwamanda’s removal.

Mashaba said he did not mind which party the new mayor came from, as long as they were competent. He added that he thought it best that the mayor
come from the party with the most seats – in this case the ANC, which has 91 of the 270 seats
in council.

ActionSA is the third biggest party, with 44 seats, while Al Jama-ah party has only three seats in the council.

Gwamanda was a compromise between the ANC and EFF, which could not agree on who should lead the City.

The ANC and EFF are part of a governing coalition that includes the Patriotic Alliance, African People’s Convention, Cope, African Heart Congress, Pan Africanist Congress of Azania, Good Party, African Independent Congress (AIC) and, more recently, the IFP.

But the ANC cannot always rely on the EFF to vote with it,
so the deal with ActionSA would be an advantage to the party and could help
stabilise governments in the other Gauteng metros.

Gwamanda’s resignation will be effective “from a date to be
determined by the speaker”, Margaret Arnolds from the AIC.

The AIC is part of the governing coalition in Johannesburg, yet ActionSA also required that its council speaker be removed and replaced by an
ActionSA speaker.

News24 understands that the ANC has also agreed to this
condition.