There is a price tag that comes with everything the government does. And the invoice is paid with money from tax and ratepayers.
In return, the government is supposed to render efficient, effective basic services so that everyone can live with their health, safety and dignity intact.
Built into the constitution is a guarantee that the government will be accountable to the people it serves.
It is supposed to be able to show how it used public money for the public good.
Accountability is so deeply entrenched in our supreme law that it is mentioned no fewer than 22 times, starting in the founding provisions and working its way down through its requirements on every tier of government and the judiciary.
At the core of everything is a requirement for “effective, transparent, accountable and coherent government”.
Parliament, provincial legislatures and councils are tasked with oversight to ensure executive accountability and transparency.
Their job is certainly not to lock out the public and prevent scrutiny.
The constitution was supposed to provide a clean break from the opaqueness of the apartheid government.
Behind that veil of secrecy lay state-sponsored hit squads, kidnappings, murders in detention, theft, fraud and all sorts of other horrors.
The constitution provided a “reset” that would ensure that never again happened.
And yet, our councils regularly and inexplicably hide their activities from public scrutiny by putting matters on the confidential agenda.
The confidential sections of Buffalo City Metro’s agendas bear scrutiny.
The latest “secret” the metro’s ANC councillors want kept is the debate on a report detailing more than R166m in legal costs over four years which was pulled from a public council meeting after ANC councillors objected to it being discussed in an open session. Why would that be?
We are told the report contains “very sensitive information and people’s names”. What does that even mean?
The litigation register is supposed to be in the public domain.
Hiding it leaves the public feeling suspicious and cheated.
Are the BCM’s lawyers charging too much?
Does the majority party in BCM want to hide the extent of the litigation its negligence is causing?
Is it hiding its contingent liability should judgments sounding in money be granted against it?
Why is BCM making such extensive use of external lawyers when it has its own legal advisers?
These are all legitimate questions the answers to which will now remain secret.
The ANC councillors are failing the public by hiding the truth.
And doing so just months before a local government election reeks of bad faith.
The public has the right to scrutinise its council’s actions. Our constitution says so.
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