Both the ANC and the EFF have written to Tshwane council speaker Katlego Mathebe imploring her to allow the parties' respective motions of no confidence in Mayor Stevens Mokgalapa to go ahead or face legal action.
In a lawyer's letter, seen by News24, the ANC instructed Mathebe to allow its motion to be heard in the council.
The letter states the ANC's motion satisfies all rules and orders of the council and should be presented to it for a vote.
The EFF in Tshwane tabled its own motion of no confidence in Mokgalapa on Tuesday.
In it's lawyer's letter, the EFF explains that its motion does not violate the rules of council, after the speaker informed the party verbally that the motion is not compliant with the City’s rules, orders and bylaws.
The letter also pointed out the rules and said the motion complied with all the sections.
"We therefore write to demand that when the motion arrives, the speaker should table it for consideration by the council or we will have no choice to approach the court on an urgent basis and will request the court to order the speaker to pay personal costs," the letter reads.
Earlier, both the ANC and EFF asked the speaker to step aside and allow the deputy speaker to run the sitting, accusing her of frustrating the process of council and using delaying tactics to stall getting to the parties' respective motions.
The ANC's letter further warns Mathebe that if she fails to present the motion to the council, the ANC will be left with no option but to approach the high court on an urgent basis to get an interdict against her "unlawful" conduct.
Much of the council sitting on Thursday has been used to argue about semantics, including whether Mokgalapa was in fact on leave.
The ANC and EFF both argued that the mayor's leave was not granted by the council as he indicated he was on special leave, while the DA chief whip informed the council he would be on normal leave for the next two months.
After a multiparty caucus, it was agreed that Mokgalapa's leave would be cancelled and he would have to reapply for it.
This also brought further confusion as to who the current sitting mayor is as MMC Abel Tau was appointed as acting mayor before Mokgalapa took leave. His leave was originally set to start on Thursday and expire on January 27, 2020.
