Many residents living in the Laudium/Erasmia area have expressed outrage concerning the continuous calls by local politicians for residents or businesses to fund projects or buy equipment for Council owned properties or that which are in fact the responsibility of the ANC/ActionSA led Tshwane Council.
The residents say that Ward 61 has two actively known Councillors in the area, who both belong to the joint ruling parties of the Tshwane Council. Ward Councillor Naeem Patel of the ANC and Prajay Ramjee of ActionSA who both serve in Ward 61, have on many occasions called on local businesses and residents to fund much needed projects in the area, which should have been the responsibility of the Tshwane Council and not the community. Some residents believe that these two Councillors are hiding the incompetence of their respective political parties in efficiently running the Tshwane Council, which is unable to serve the community with basic service deliveries, so instead of exposing their respective political parties’ incompetency in service delivery, the two run to the community to fund many of the much needed projects and save their political parties from embarrassment. Cllr Patel is known to frequently burden the community and businesses each time there is a crisis in the area, such as a water crisis and assisting residents from Itireleng when shacks are burned. This despite the Council having a budget for disaster management and instead of calling his political party in Council to assist.
In one of the latest of such calls, Ward Cllr Naeem Patel approached two local donors for a 1000 chairs for the Council owned Laudium Civic Centre. This follows Naeem’s own admission in which he stated, “For years our community has been using the old orange chairs at the Civic Centre, which have become warn out and no longer suitable for hosting weddings, parties and other functions. I approached the owners of Rashida Plastics (Javed Gani and Nizaam NM Ayob) and Unica Plastics (Mohammed Asif and Abid), requesting a donation of chairs to benefit our community…. Without hesitation, both companies kindly sponsored 500 chairs each…. Thank you once again to Rashida Plastics and Unica for their kindness and commitment to our community.” Cllr Prajay Ramjee of ActionSA who runs a private security company in the area, has on numerous occasions called on the residents to donate towards various ‘clean up’ and ‘beautify our town’ projects, amongst others. He also recently called on residents to contribute in keeping the electricity substation on Cuprene Str safe. Residents say that even if businesses or individuals, for whatever reason, are prepared to cede to both councillors request to donate, the two should think for themselves that it is not correct to burden local businesses who pay rates & taxes to donate towards these projects, which is n fact the council’s responsibilities. Furthermore some residents say, the least the two councillors should have done is to then ask Council in lieu of the donations made by the community, to reduce service fees for some of the recreational services provided by Council in the area, such as waving or reducing the fees to use the Laudium Swimming Pool. Concerns were also raised as to who keeps the records of ALL the donations received, including cash, from residents and businesses and what checks were in place as to ensure that none of the donations received were used by the Councillors for their own benefit. It was also asked who would be the owners of the donated goods, once donated, as the Council does not have records of the donations.
Resident Altaf Hoosein told the Laudium Sun, “I have heard many times our Councillors asking people or businesses for donations for many things. Where is all these donations recorded? Is the Council informed of the donations that both Naeem and Prajay collect from the community? Do they collect cash from people for these so called community projects? Surely there should be some policy for Councillors collecting anything even if it is for the benefit of the community, so as to deter any possible abuse?
While both Naeem and Prajay may be doing a good job as Councillors, there should be checks and balances, not only for them, but anyone in public office.” Another resident, Ronnie Pillay told the Laudium Sun, “It seems that our local politicians do not have the balls to stand up against their political masters, who are in control of the Council.
They should be insisting that the basics needed in the community should be provided by the Council. The Council keeps on saying that they have no money, but yet they waste millions in giving out tenders without receiving value for it. We as ratepayers and residents are entitled by the constitution in living in a safe and healthy environment. We should not be burdening the community in donating items or money for services that is supposed to be provided by the Tshwane Council. I do not believe that in the former white areas, the community is asked to donate chairs for the Council owned hall, or build walls and erect lighting for their cemeteries or even organising private water tankers during water cuts, these areas are privileged and it is time that we as a community led by our Councillors demand the same services as those in Waterkloof or Menlyn are receiving.”