DA walks out of council meeting

Video

GRAAFF-REINET NEWS AND VIDEO - On Monday, 26 February, the DA Caucus in the Dr Beyers Naude Municipality in Graaff-Reinet took the decision to walk out of a Special Council Meeting in order to express their dissatisfaction at having received their agendas for the meeting late once again.

This has been an ongoing gripe of the Caucus, raised at every meeting and ignored at every subsequent one.

Prior to walking out, the Whip of the DA, Cllr Eldan Carolus, addressed the Speaker to advise her as to the reasons for the walkout, which were as follows:

The Standing Rules and Order of Council stipulate that notice of an Ordinary Council Meeting must be given seven days prior to the meeting. Notice of a Special Council Meeting must be given no less than 48 hours prior to such meeting. In the case of this meeting, notice was given a week prior to the meeting. However, the notice did not include the supporting documentation in the agenda.

This was only provided on Thursday night to some Councillors, with others receiving their agendas on Friday night and Saturday afternoon. Of the agenda items, one was the Adjustment Budget. Receiving this document on a Saturday afternoon and being expected to interrogate it on Monday at 12:00 is not acceptable.

This has been an ongoing complaint of Councillors and yet the Speaker's Office and Administration do nothing to rectify the situation. The DA Caucus were of the opinion that a clear message needed to be sent that this will no longer be tolerated.

An Exco Meeting was called on the same day as the Special Council Meeting.

Although scheduled three hours apart, the Exco Meeting ended after the stipulated starting time of the Special Council Meeting. This meant that the two DA Councillors who serve on the Exco, Cllrs Loock and Graham, could not meet with their Caucus prior to the Special Council Meeting to provide feedback from the Exco Meeting. Cllr Loock is the Portfolio Councillor for Budget and Treasury and the Adjustment Budget falls under that Department. His input to the Caucus is critical.

A further objection provided was that the Adjustment Budget should have been presented to the Budget and Treasury Standing Committee before the end of January in order for it to have been interrogated by that Committee. A report should have accompanied the Adjustment Budget from that Committee to the Exco and to Council. This was not done.

Watch a video below.