Update

PLETTENBERG BAY NEWS - After recently threatening Bitou Municipality with legal action, the Plettenberg Bay Ratepayers'Association has now launched legal proceedings to nip in the bud what they have dubbed the "unlawful acquisition of luxury vehicles" for Bitou's mayor and his deputy, at a total cost of more than R1,3-million.

This follows after it came to light that the majority of Council voted on 11 June to spend R700 000 on a three-year lease for a new vehicle for Mayor Peter Lobese, and to extend the lease on the vehicle for Deputy Mayor Sandiso Gcabayi. Lobese has one year left of his term as mayor.

The council resolution has since elicited massive criticism from residents, who started a petition calling on Lobese to obtain a cheaper vehicle and use the rest of the money to feed the thousands of Bitou residents who are unable to put food on the table as a result of the Covid-19 lockdown.

Association chairperson Peter Gaylard said the proceedings, launched on 18 August, aim to stop the acquisition of the vehicles. The matter will go before the Cape Town High Court on Wednesday 2 September.

According to municipal regulations, a councillor - including the mayor - may only utilise a municipal vehicle in "exceptional circumstances", "upon good cause shown", and subject to approval of the mayor or speaker. Gaylard said the provision of a vehicle for regular use is therefore not permitted.

"It is a matter of surprise and shock that the council, at the very height of the Covid-19 pandemic, should resolve to spend the community's money to gratify the mayor and his deputy," Gaylard said. "Compare this bounty with the paltry R2-million that was all the council could spend to feed poor residents of our town during the lockdown.

"In these circumstances the fact that the council could elect to incur big-ticket expenditure of so frivolous and luxurious a nature is self-serving, heartless and ultimately immoral."

Compounding the problem, Gaylard stated, was that the mayor and deputy voted in favour of the resolution. "They should have recused themselves in the circumstances and, if they were too blind to see the conflict, they should have been called out by their colleagues," he said.

It is not the first time Lobese faces criticism over his mayoral vehicle. In 2017, the mayor received a backlash after it came to light that ratepayers were forking out almost R60 000 a month for a luxury Volvo SUV for him after he was involved in an accident in his previous mayoral vehicle, a luxury BMW.

In comparison, larger municipalities like George and Knysna were paying only a fraction of the price, between R13 000 and R24 000, for mayoral vehicles at the time.

The Bitou Municipality had not responded to questions by the time of going to print.