The Sunday News
Vusumuzi Dube, Senior Municipal Reporter
THERE was chaos at the Bulawayo City Council chambers on Wednesday afternoon after former deputy mayor, Tinashe Kambarami turned up for a full council meeting.
The embattled former deputy mayor had to be ejected from the chambers by BCC security personnel.
The Supreme Court reinstated the former Ward 3 councillor as Bulawayo’s Deputy Mayor last week but the ruling was of no effect as he was recalled by the MDC-T.
Mr Kambarami however, turned up at the full council meeting claiming that the Supreme Court judgement effectively reinstated him as the city deputy mayor.
Deputy mayor, Councillor Mlandu Ncube left his designated seat in the council meeting as Mr Kambarami moved to occupy it, claiming it was rightfully his place.
“I have been reinstated, you all have the judgement, I am back in office. You are all not above the law. The judgement was saved to the Chamber Secretary (Mrs Sikhangele Zhou), she is aware of it, I am not going anywhere,” Mr Kambarami could be heard shouting.
The mayor, Clr Solomon Mguni and the town clerk, Mr Christopher Dube could be heard in the background saying Mr Kambarami no longer had any standing in the local authority.
“I think there is an intruder in the house, I will ask the chamber secretary to ask the colleague or the gentleman outside the room before we proceed, council has not received anything to the effect that he must be in attendance.
“Whatever issues he has will be resolved outside the meeting. Chief security officer can you remove him before we proceed,” said Clr Mguni.
During the fracas, while councillors observed silently, ward 24 councillor, Arnold Batirai was the only one vocal saying Mr Kambarami had every right to attend the meeting.
“You cannot call the deputy mayor an intruder. You do not need to be served with any papers Your Worship because the judgement was clear, our Deputy Mayor has been reinstated,” said Clr Batirai.
Mr Kambarami was later ejected from the council meeting by seven council security officers.
Contacted for comment, Kambarami hit back saying his case was different from the six other councillors that were recalled by the MDC-T.
“This is a simple matter, anything else that happened after the Justice Mabhikwa judgement to nullify my election as a council, was a non-event, even the Clr Ncube election as deputy mayor was not supposed to happen until my case was finalized.
“If Clr Mguni is a genuine lawyer he knows how the law is interpreted and should advice accordingly, honestly how do you recall someone who is not there, everything should have been halted until the finalization of my case,” said Kambarami.
He revealed that they will now be inclined to approach the courts if they did not want to effect the judgementy.
The local authority had to cut the Facebook live feed as the chaos continued.
