NATIONAL NEWS - “You are not a DA speaker, you are a speaker of a council made up of nine parties – you must not be irritated,” Nelson Mandela Bay speaker Jonathan Lawack was this morning told by an EFF councillor.

The council is holding another special council meeting that will primarily deal with the removal of executive mayor Athol Trollip through a motion of no confidence. The meeting collapsed last week, and was postponed.

Lawack was heckled by councillors from both the ANC and EFF when he ruled that only three minutes would be allocated to pay homage to fallen struggle stalwart Winnie Madikizela-Mandela. The EFF insisted that parties should receive five minutes, as “we also have Solomon Mahlangu and Chris Hani”.

DA councillor Nqaba Banga told the other councillors they were trivialising the matter. Yoliswa Yako of the EFF said what was trivialising the matter was that the DA-led administration had failed to observe a moment of silence before the meeting resumed and that flags did not fly at half-mast. The party said they would also use today’s tributes to “remember the arrival of those who stole our father’s land in 1652” and called for expropriation of land.

Read more on the Caxton publication, The Citizen.