Who and what is AfriForum?

AfriForum is an Afrikaans civil rights organisation that protects the rights of minority groups at national as well as provincial level, and anyone who can identify with AfriForum’s principles and objectives may join the organisation. AfriForum’s community plan focuses on mobilising communities to thus take control of their own streets and neighbourhoods again. AfriForum ensures that your constitutional and civil rights are recognised and protected at national level.

Wie en wat is AfriForum?

AfriForum is ’n Afrikaanse burgerregteorganisasie wat die regte van minderheidsgroepe op sowel nasionale as provinsiale vlak beskerm, en enigiemand wat met AfriForum se beginsels en doelstellings kan identifiseer, mag by die organisasie aansluit. AfriForum se gemeenskapsplan fokus daarop om gemeenskappe te mobiliseer om só weer beheer terug te neem oor hul eie strate en woonbuurtes. AfriForum verseker dat jou grondwetlike én burgerregte op nasionale vlak erken en beskerm word.

AfriForum calls for implementation of court order while mayor holds tea party in waterless Parys

AfriForum today brought an application in terms of section 18(3) of the High Courts Act (10 of 2023) in which the organisation requests that a court order against the Ngwathe Local Municipality be implemented pending their appeal application. This court order was obtained on 20 June this year in the High Court in Bloemfontein where the court found that the Ngwathe Municipality is not fulfilling its constitutional, legal and administrative obligations towards the residents of Parys, Heilbron, Koppies and Vredefort, among others.

The court, as part of a structured interdict, ordered that the municipal council be dissolved and that the Free State provincial government must immediately intervene with the Ngwathe Municipality. The Ngwathe Municipality’s application for leave to appeal was dismissed and they are now seeking to have this decision overturned in the Supreme Court of Appeal. AfriForum is requesting that the court order, pending the municipality’s appeal process, be implemented in its entirety in the meantime. Alternatively, the organisation proposes that the order be implemented without the council’s dissolution.

Meanwhile, the mayor, Victoria de Beer-Mthombeni, and the female employees of the Ngwathe Municipality are holding a tea party in the Mimosa Gardens. This is while most of Parys’ residents have to make do with little or no water and without power.

A tender was even sent out for 1 000 gift bags for this event. It is not yet known what the total cost of this event was. However, photos of it were posted on social media where it could be seen how the food, water bottles and even alcoholic drinks were on the tables. According to AfriForum, the money spent on this could have been used to solve some of the municipality’s problems.

A further tender has been issued for microphones and camera equipment usually used for podcasts. This equipment amounts to almost R20 000. The Ngwathe Municipality’s plans with this equipment are still unknown.

“It is enough to upset any person that taxpayers’ money is being handled in this way. This while the same taxpayers are left without water and electricity, with sewage even flowing through the streets in places,” says Alta Pretorius, AfriForum’s district coordinator for the Mooi River. “It is clear that service delivery is not as important to this municipality as a nice party.”

According to Schalk Burger, AfriForum’s branch chairperson in Parys, the council and the mayor must look into the real need in Parys that residents have to experience every day. “We who deal with these problems every day and have to find solutions on our own, are stunned by this. We cannot turn to the municipality to ask them to do their job because they are too busy with other things, in the meantime the town is falling into a state of decay.”