Thursday, 14 May 2026

The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) has instituted legal proceedings in the Gauteng Division of the High Court in Johannesburg challenging the unlawful and unconstitutional adoption of the 2025/26 Adjustment Budget of the City of Ekurhuleni by the Speaker of Council and the Executive Mayor on 10 March 2026.

This application follows serious constitutional and procedural irregularities committed during the council sitting in which the Adjustment Budget was tabled and purportedly adopted. The EFF maintains that the process followed by the Speaker and the Executive violated the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, the Municipal Structures Act, and the Standing Orders By-Law of the City of Ekurhuleni.

At the centre of this matter is the unlawful declaration by the Speaker that the Adjustment Budget had been adopted through a voice vote, despite the constitutional requirement that budgets and other matters listed under section 160(2) of the Constitution must be passed by a majority vote of all councillors in council.

Section 160(3)(b) of the Constitution is explicit that decisions concerning municipal budgets cannot be adopted through vague, manipulated, and unverifiable voice processes that conceal the actual numerical support for the resolution. Such matters require transparent voting mechanisms capable of objectively demonstrating whether a majority of councillors voted in favour of the budget.

The EFF’s court application therefore seeks a declaration that:

• The tabling of the 2025/26 Adjustment Budget by the Executive Mayor on 10 March 2026 was unlawful and void from the beginning;

• The declaration by the Speaker that the Adjustment Budget had been adopted is unconstitutional and invalid;

• The Standing Orders By-Law 2023 of the City of Ekurhuleni is constitutionally defective because it fails to provide adequate voting mechanisms that comply with section 160 of the Constitution;

• Rule 78(1) of the Standing Orders By-Law is unconstitutional because it permits matters requiring a majority of all councillors to instead be determined by a majority of councillors merely present in the meeting; and

• Rule 80(2) of the Standing Orders By-Law is unconstitutional because it obstructs councillors from demanding a formal division and recorded voting process unless there is multi-party support.

The EFF is further asking the Court to compel the City of Ekurhuleni to amend its Standing Orders By-Law within 60 days in order to ensure constitutional compliance and prevent future manipulation of council voting processes. In addition, the application seeks the review and setting aside of the Speaker’s decision to invoke Rule 75(2) and declare the Adjustment Budget adopted through a voice vote process that fundamentally violated constitutional principles of accountability, transparency and legality. What transpired in Ekurhuleni on 10 March 2026 represents a dangerous assault on democratic governance in local government. Municipal budgets determine how public resources are allocated, how infrastructure is maintained, how communities receive water and electricity services, and how developmental priorities are financed.

The conduct of the Speaker and the Executive Mayor in this matter reflects the growing crisis in coalition-run municipalities where constitutional obligations are increasingly sacrificed for political survival and narrow factional interests. Across the country, municipal councils are being reduced to sites of procedural abuse, instability and manipulation while communities suffer collapsing service delivery, corruption and financial mismanagement.

The EFF will continue to defend democratic accountability in municipalities and oppose all attempts to undermine lawful governance through procedural abuse and political opportunism.