Following the death of former mayor, Geoff Makhubo from COVID-19 complications, City of Johannesburg Finance MMC Jolidee Matongo has emerged as Johannesburg’s new executive mayor.
He was elected after Speaker of the Johannesburg council Nonceba Molwele called a special council meeting on Tuesday.
Political parties were allowed to submit their preferred candidates before the Electoral Commission of SA created ballots for parties to vote.
The newly appointed mayor will appoint a mayoral committee, which is expected to remain the same with the exception of the Finance MMC position. The mayoral committee was dissolved following Makhubo’s death on July 9, 2021.
The ANC’s Greater Johannesburg region confirmed that a new mayor would indeed be elected on Tuesday.
“Today, the Council of the City of Johannesburg (CoJ) will be filling in the post of the executive mayor which was left vacant after the untimely passing of our regional chairperson of the ANC, comrade Geoff Makhubo….in our commitment to keeping our city as the World Class African City and a strategic centre and hub of the African economy”, it decided to elect Matongo.
“The ANC is confident that Comrade Matongo is equal to the task and will be able to steer the city in the right direction to the benefit and satisfaction of the residents of Johannesburg. Comrade Jolidee Matongo has served both the ANC and CoJ selflessly for an innumerable number of years and has demonstrated unquestionable commitment to the well-being of the city and its residents.
“He is a tried and tested cadre of our movement who started participating at a tender age of 13 during the times when it was not fashionable to do so,” read the statement.
Matongo cut his teeth in politics when he first joined the Soweto Student Congress and the Congress of South African Students (Cosas), before moving on to serve as the regional head of communications in the ANC for eight years.
He has been part of the regional executive committee for the past 10 years. The new mayor holds a diploma in public management, a post-graduate degree in public management from Unisa and a post-graduate diploma in Management from Milpark Business School. He is currently running his master’s degree in public management at Mancosa.