Eastern Cape in collapse while culture of impunity continues

When I read News24’s article titled “The Eastern Cape is broken: 7 municipalities at risk of collapse within a month,” I wasn’t shocked, I was angry.

Angry because this collapse was avoidable.

Angry because the people of this province are paying the price for the ANC’s political bankruptcy.

And angry because those responsible continue to draw salaries and hold office while communities crumble around them.

Let us call a spade a spade: the Eastern Cape’s local government system has failed.

Seven municipalities are on the brink of collapse, several already under administration, and only six out of 39 received clean audits in the last financial year.

That means more than 80% of municipalities cannot even properly account for how they spend public money.

Yet, despite this devastating record, there is no accountability — not one mayor, not one municipal manager, not one political leader has been held responsible and not one has been held accountable with the commensurate sanction.

I know things can be done differently because we’ve done it before.

When I served as mayor of Nelson Mandela Bay, our administration managed to spend every cent of our capital budget — properly, transparently, and with measurable impact.

We cleaned up our finances, rooted out corruption, and delivered visible improvements in infrastructure and service delivery.

National Treasury recognised that effort and rewarded it with additional “windfall” funding because we proved a simple point: good governance is not impossible; it merely requires leadership, integrity, and accountability.

What has happened since then is a tragic reversal.

Nelson Mandela Bay has become a case study in how quickly progress unravels when political stability gives way to factionalism and greed.

The same pattern plays out in Buffalo City, where the ANC has a majority, where mismanagement and mediocrity have become the norm.

These two metros were meant to be the economic and administrative beacons of the Eastern Cape; instead, they stand today as symbols of decay and lost potential.

This collapse does not happen by accident.

Municipalities don’t go bankrupt by accident; they go bankrupt because the people in charge make conscious choices.

They choose patronage over professionalism, politics over service, and self-interest over integrity.

And those choices have consequences: broken infrastructure, water shortages, sewage spills, unpaid creditors, demoralised officials, and disillusioned communities.

Former deputy finance minister Mcebisi Jonas called for the construction of a new town in the Eastern Cape to “stimulate economic growth and attract investment”.

His vision is ambitious, but that sort of vision requires the very thing the ANC has failed to provide for decades: competent, corruption-free governance.

What’s more is that they haven’t maintained the cities and towns that exist, they’ve destroyed them.

You cannot build a new town on broken governance.

You cannot attract investors to municipalities where tender corruption, administrative paralysis, and service collapse have become institutionalised.

The tragedy is the Eastern Cape does not lack potential, it lacks leadership.

Vision without integrity is just rhetoric, and the province has had far too much of that.

In SA, a person who is an unrehabilitated insolvent is barred from holding public office.

Yet political parties that have bankrupted municipalities, provinces, and even state-owned enterprises are allowed to continue in government and are even promoted.

Parliament is full of people who’ve destroyed cities and state owned entities. It is a moral and constitutional absurdity.

If a bankrupt individual cannot be trusted with public money, how can a bankrupt political party and its representatives responsible for this bankruptcy be allowed to govern?

The ANC’s financial troubles are well known.

The governing party has repeatedly failed to pay its staff, creditors and reportedly owes millions to Ezulweni Investments, among others.

The truth is the ANC is not just politically and morally bankrupt — it is financially insolvent too.

And just as it has failed to manage its own affairs, it has bankrupted municipalities across the country.

The Enzulweni debt is not just a financial issue; it is a metaphor for the state of the ANC itself — a party drowning in the consequences of its ineptitude, corruption, and its own debts while dragging SA down with it.

The president often speaks about accountability, yet his actions in this regard do not match his lip service.

The culture of impunity starts at the top.

When national leaders protect corrupt colleagues, that message filters through every layer of government — from the Union Buildings to the smallest local council.

The result is reflected in the lamentable state of governance in the Eastern Cape province and a country where corruption is so commonplace excuses are rehearsed, and accountability is non-existent.

The Eastern Cape does not have a funding problem; it has a leadership problem.

The people of this province are some of the most resilient in the country.

They have endured droughts, unemployment, collapsing infrastructure, and failing services, yet they still pay their rates, they still vote, and they still hope for change.

They deserve a government that matches that resilience with responsibility.

Elections are the people’s instrument of accountability, and when political parties bankrupt municipalities, voters must bankrupt those parties at the ballot box.

It is time to stop normalising failure and to stop rewarding those who destroy what others built.

We must restore competence, integrity, and pride in public service.

The Eastern Cape deserves leadership that understands one simple truth: public money is not party money — it belongs to the people.

In this regard, I believe ActionSA president, Herman Mashaba, Tshwane mayor Nasiphi Moya and myself have shown this in local government leadership and we will offer others like us to represent those that have been so badly neglected by ANC administrations.