Africa-Press – South-Africa. ActionSA has accused EFF councillors of disrupting a party meeting and stealing polygraph testing equipment.
According to ActionSA national chairperson Michael Beaumont, EFF councillors stormed onto private property on Monday morning where ActionSA councillors were being subjected to polygraph testing.
The tests were to determine which party voted against the party line, which mandated support for DA candidate Cilliers Brink for Tshwane mayor.
Led by the party’s regional chairperson Obakeng Ramabodu, they entered the property, disrupted the testing process, and stole the equipment, Beaumont said.
He added that the party would open a criminal case against the three EFF members for theft and trespassing.
“ActionSA is outraged by the criminal behaviour of EFF councillors in Tshwane who trespassed a private venue, which disrupted the polygraph tests conducted on ActionSA councillors and stole polygraph equipment,” Beaumont said in a statement.
ActionSA was conducting the tests after the election of Cope councillor Murunwa Makwarela as the new mayor at last week’s Tshwane council meeting.
The election was held by secret ballot, and Makwarela was supported by EFF and ANC councillors as well as eight councillors from the DA coalition partnership.
The DA and its coalition partners, ActionSA, DA and the Freedom Front Plus, agreed to investigate to find out which councillors voted against the party line.
Monday’s polygraph testing session was one of the avenues the coalition partners chose as part of the investigation.
The coalition strongly believed some councillors were bribed to vote with the ANC and the EFF.
ActionSA gave its councillors until Sunday to say whether they supported Makwarela.
The party conducted the polygraph testing with some support from its caucus.
Beaumont said the EFF councillor’s actions proved that the party was desperate to stop the truth from emerging.
The EFF criticised the polygraph tests as intimidation against councillors who voted with their conscience.
“The EFF is revealing itself daily as a criminal enterprise willing to perform criminal acts to protect their newfound alliance with the ANC,” Beaumont said.
In a statement on Monday, the EFF said it had “seized” the polygraph testing devices in protection of the ActionSA councillors and their right to a secret a ballot.
“In defence of the constitutional integrity of the municipal council, we have today seized devices used to conduct illegal and unconstitutional polygraph test on some of the councillors who are legitimate members of the municipal council,” read the statement.
The party said it would hand over the devices to Midrand police on Monday afternoon.
“We will do everything in our power to dispel forces outside the municipal chamber manipulating the legal outcome of the municipal council as determined by the majority of councillors,” the EFF said.
Meanwhile, ActionSA councillors, including DA and FF Plus councillors, were absent during a council meeting on Monday, which had been called to elect a new speaker of the council.
Makwarela was the speaker of the Tshwane council and his position has to be filled since his election as mayor.
The council meeting did not meet a quorum because the political parties were absent.
This resulted in a postponement.
The DA and its coalition partners were worried that if they did not figure out which councillors had betrayed the political bloc ahead of the speaker’s election, it would lead to another loss for the coalition.
EFF councillors lamented the absence of the coalition partner councillors, saying that a court had already outlined the importance of councillors’ meeting attendance.
“Today, the very same political parties have disregarded the meeting convened to elect a speaker, but they were insulting the former speaker about his lack of urgency in calling meetings. We want to remind you there is a court order that. Going out and performing polygraph tests is not a good enough reason not to attend a council meeting. They have sabotaged an important meeting meant to create stability,” the EFF said in council.
The ANC labelled the absenteeism as “unconstitutional”.
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