Maphefo Sarah Mogale-Letsie, also known as Sarah Madinge-Letsie, is a South African politician who has represented 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) in the

Gauteng Provincial Legislature The Gauteng Provincial Legislature is the legislature of the South African province of Gauteng. It is a unicameral body of 80 members elected every five years. The current legislature, the seventh, was 2019 Gauteng provincial election, elected on ...

since 2021. She was formerly the Mayor of Merafong City from 2011 until March 2021, when her party removed her from office after she was implicated in the VBS Mutual Bank scandal.

Mayor of Mogale

From 2011 to 2021, Mogale-Letsie was Executive Mayor of

Merafong City Local Municipality Merafong City Municipality (; ; ; ) is a local municipality in the West Rand District Municipality, in the Gauteng province of South Africa. Its boundaries encloses some of the richest gold mines in the world. It is situated about 65 km fro ...

; she was re-elected to a second term in the office after the 2016 local elections. In addition, in July 2018, she was elected Regional Chairperson of the ANC's branch in the

West Rand The West Rand is the urban western part of the Witwatersrand that is functionally merged with the Johannesburg conurbation. This area became settled by Europeans after a gold-bearing reef discovered in 1886 and sparked the gold rush that ga ...

. During her tenure in office, the municipality invested R50 million in

VBS Mutual Bank VBS Mutual Bank was a South African mutual bank. In 2018 it was declared insolvent and bankrupt and placed under curatorship, with South African citizens and taxpayers defrauded out of roughly R2 billion. It was formed as Venda Building S ...

, in contravention of laws prohibiting such investments by municipalities. The internal Integrity Committee of the ANC's Gauteng branch investigated her involvement. In August 2020, the committee reported that it had not found evidence of corruption but nonetheless recommended that Mogale-Letsie should " step aside" because of her "failure to take action" against municipal officials involved in corruption. She was instructed to resign as mayor and decline any further nomination to public office. The ''

Mail & Guardian The ''Mail & Guardian'', formerly the ''Weekly Mail'', is a South African weekly newspaper and website, published by M&G Media in Johannesburg, South Africa. It focuses on political analysis, investigative reporting, Southern African news, loca ...

'' said that she and Boyce Maneli, the former West Rand Mayor who was also asked to step aside, were "considered the fall guys for the ANC". Both Mogale-Letsie and Maneli refused to follow the Integrity Committee's recommendation and sought to appeal the decision, but, on 31 March 2021, the Mogale council removed Mogale-Letsie from her position as mayor. The opposition Democratic Alliance said that her removal, which had been supported by the ANC's majority caucus, had not been effected according to proper procedure.

Provincial legislature

Mogale-Letsie remained an ordinary local councilor in Merafong until 7 September 2021, when she resigned from the council. Later the same afternoon, she was sworn into the Gauteng Provincial Legislature under the alias Sarah Madinge-Letsie; she filled a casual vacancy in the ANC caucus. In February 2022, the ANC's National Dispute Resolution Committee cleared Mogale-Letsie of wrongdoing in the VBS saga, overturning the earlier order for her to step aside. In contradiction to the provincial Integrity Committee, the national committee found that Mogale-Letsie, while mayor, had acted swiftly to investigate and respond to the VBS allegations.

References

External links

* {{Gauteng MPLs African National Congress politicians Living people Year of birth missing (living people) Members of the Gauteng Provincial Legislature 21st-century South African politicians Mayors of places in South Africa