MEDIA RELEASE 22 November 2006 Allegations against councillor are without foundation The Chief Whip of the Joburg Council, Clr Bafana Sithole, has described this Wednesday's shooting incident between a ward Councillor and the community at Region G, Orange Farm area at south Johannesburg as unfortunate. "Whatever cause of the confrontation and subsequent shooting is something our community should bow heads and be ashamed of. It seems that eleven years after our democracy, we still have not understood processes to be followed in managing challenges faced by our society," said Clr Sithole. The media reported that a confrontation between community members and ward councillors at Orange Farm ended tragically when a member of the community was injured after a shooting incident and a ward councillor being treated for injury and his other colleague arrested for the alleged shooting incident. "The Office of the Chief Whip in the Joburg City Council would like to place it on record that all efforts are being made to ensure that councillors abide by the Code of Conduct, which guides their actions. Anybody alleging wrongdoing against councillors should report and produce evidence to my office so that prompt investigations can conducted and necessary corrective action taken," said Clr Sithole. On the cases in point, the Chief Whip said his office has started discussions with all parties involved with the aim of finding an amicable outcome that could lay a good foundation for an environment that will not comprise the work of ward councillors and interrupt development and service delivery. "We acknowledge that the legacy of apartheid over decades of years does not make a number of service delivery challenges easy to overcome overnight. But despite this, all stakeholders in our transformation of society must make an extra effort to find a common ground in steering a way forward. My office and the City administration are committed to engage with everyone – including Orange Farms residents - in dealing with challenges related to service delivery," added Clr Sithole. The situation is reported to be calm in the area and the office of the Chief Whip is doing everything in its power to provide a long lasting solution to the problems in this area. Among other things in this effort, is to get all the parties concerned to resolve their differences in an amicable way that can ensure that the development programme is back on track. According the local community, a ward 6 councillor in Joburg's Region G and his chairman were involved in a confrontation at the gate of a local school were they were being prevented to enter. They were accompanied by project service providers and planning to give an update on the provision of houses in the area. A heated urgent started and the councillors were allegedly attacked with assortment of weapons. One of the councillors collapsed and was taken for medical treatment and his colleague chased and cornered. Shooting took place and one of the alleged attackers was wounded and taken to hospital. ENDS Issued by: City of Johannesburg