Enoch Mgijima Municipality () is a local municipality within the

Chris Hani District Municipality The Chris Hani District Municipality () is a landlocked district municipality situated in the centre of the Eastern Cape province of South Africa and is made up of eight local municipalities. Most of the communities are in rural areas. The land ...

, in the

Eastern Cape The Eastern Cape ( ; ) is one of the nine provinces of South Africa. Its capital is Bhisho, and its largest city is Gqeberha (Port Elizabeth). Due to its climate and nineteenth-century towns, it is a common location for tourists. It is also kno ...

province of

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

. It was established after the August 2016 local elections by merging the Tsolwana, Inkwanca, and Lukhanji local municipalities.

Politics

The municipal council consists of sixty-eight members elected by

mixed-member proportional representation Mixed-member proportional representation (MMP or MMPR) is a type of representation provided by some mixed electoral system, mixed electoral systems which combine local Winner-take-all system, winner-take-all elections with a Compensation (el ...

. Thirty-four councillors are elected by

first-past-the-post voting First-past-the-post (FPTP)—also called choose-one, first-preference plurality (FPP), or simply plurality—is a single-winner voting rule. Voters mark one candidate as their favorite, or first-preference, and the candidate with more first- ...

in thirty-four wards, while the remaining thirty-four are chosen from

party list An electoral list is a grouping of candidates for election, usually found in proportional or mixed electoral systems, but also in some plurality electoral systems. An electoral list can be registered by a political party (a party list) or can c ...

s so that the total number of party representatives is proportional to the number of votes received. In the election of 1 November 2021 the

African National Congress The African National Congress (ANC) is a political party in South Africa. It originated as a liberation movement known for its opposition to apartheid and has governed the country since 1994, when the 1994 South African general election, fir ...

(ANC) won a majority of forty-four seats on the council. The following table shows the results of the election.

Maladministration

In October 2021, a sports facility costing R20 million was opened. Originally intended as a floodlit stadium with ablutions, borehole and water reticulation, the final deliverable was far removed from this. The facility is derelict, and has never hosted a sports event. In 2020, the Art Centre closed down. It is now a vandalised rui

In April 2021, the Chris Hani Craft Hub burned down under suspicious circumstance

In October 2021, the Heritage building burned down under suspicious circumstances

In January 2022, the Historic Komani Town hall mysteriously burned down under suspicious circumstance

In January 2023, an unknown figure known as "Mr. Lazola" founded the movement called Komani Protest Action which roused the people of Queenstown, South Africa, Komani to protest against the municipality's leaders. The protests lasted for at least 2 weeks and gained national attention, causing a city wide shutdown which had not been done since 1986. The municipality promised to deliver change as per the requests of the people of Komani, but never did. After an internal leadership dispute and legal action from the municipality and businesses in the area, the leadership of the movement split up and is now led by Mncedisi Mbeng

As of January 2024, the municipality is under administration, one of 32 in the country, and three in the

where the provincial executive has intervened due to maladministration As of 21 February 2024,Shereen Noble of the Auditor General of South Africa dubbed Enoch Mgijima Municipality as the "worst run municipality in the country" , citing the fact that the municipality is in debt of R1.4 billio

Noble highlighted R220.5 million of expenditure was deemed fruitless and wasteful and total current liabilities exceeded total current assets by R984 million. The municipality suffers from constant power outages due to consistent substation faults. These occasionally go from ward to ward, are daily and last for weeks to months depending on the ward. The municipality suffers from some of the worst roads in the country, with the R140 between Komani and Lady Lady Frere, Frere being dubbed as "one of the most dangerous in the country". A good 70%-85% of the municipality is without functional streetlights.

References

{{Municipalities of the Eastern Cape Local municipalities of the Chris Hani District Municipality