Joburg Crisis Alliance calls for SIU probe into Floyd Brink's reappointment

The Joburg Crisis Alliance on Wednesday said it was outraged by the Johannesburg council’s secretive reappointment of Floyd Brink last week as city manager. 

The alliance said this flouted the Johannesburg high court ruling on November 7 that the council's previous appointment of Brink in February on a five-year contract was unconstitutional, unlawful and invalid.

The alliance called on President Cyril Ramaphosa to proclaim, as a matter of urgency, a Special Investigating Unit investigation into the circumstances of Brink’s appointment and all decisions and authorisations made by him as city manager, including those after his questionable reappointment. 

“Any losses which the city now suffers due to any decisions made or authorised by Brink, including contracts signed and fruitless legal cases, should be claimed from the councillors who voted in favour of rehiring him in their personal capacities and they should face charges.” 

The alliance comprises the Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse, the Ahmed Kathrada Foundation, the Johannesburg Inner City Partnership, Action for Accountability and Defend Our Democracy. 

On November 29, it said, the spokesperson for mayor Kabelo Gwamanda’s office announced the council had re-tabled and approved its previously adopted report to appoint Brink as city manager.

That decision followed the high court judgment which declared the council had failed to follow its own procedures in relation to urgent matters requiring council consideration and approval. 

The spokesperson said to fix that problem, the closed council meeting “resolved to retable the report on the appointment of the city manager and to ratify the areas identified by the court as rendering the appointment unlawful, invalid and unconstitutional”.

The alliance said this report has not been made public. 

“The Joburg Crisis Alliance is astonished that the council thinks it can fix its blatant trampling over procedures by retrospectively ratifying its own illegal behaviour.” 

Brink’s reappointment did not appear on the council agenda for the November 29 meeting. This indicated an intention by the council to avoid any challenge to its deliberations during the closed session dealing with this item, the alliance said.

It said the high court judgment outlined the chaotic and questionable way the council had operated in appointing Brink. 

“The Joburg Crisis Alliance believes the appointment of the city manager — a crucial position — was deliberately drawn out at the expense of city governance to enable the current coalition government to get their preferred candidate, Brink, into the position.” 

The alliance said it was appalled by the city's response to the high court judgments. 

It said the council might not like the high court’s dismissal of its application for leave to appeal on November 27, but the way to deal with that is to file an application for leave to appeal with the Supreme Court of Appeal, not to simply publicly announce the court was wrong and hijack the council processes.

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