Joburg mayor apologises after telling Tshepisong resident to ‘talking sh**t’

Johannesburg Mayor Dada Morero apologised after he lost his temper and told a Tshepisong resident he was “talking sh**t” during a heated community meeting about electricity problems in the Roodepoort township.

What happened at the imbizo

The incident took place during an imbizo at the Abundant Faith Christian Centre, a meeting led by City Power to address residents’ concerns about electricity supply. Also in attendance were the MMC for the Environment and Infrastructure Services Department, Jack Sekwaila, City Power acting CEO Charles Tlouane and other officials.

Exchange that sparked the apology

According to a video widely shared on social media, tensions escalated when a resident allegedly called Morero a criminal. In the footage Morero can be heard saying, “Don’t call me a criminal… No, I am not a criminal,” and later telling the resident, “You’re talking sh**t. You’re talking sh**t.”

Morero is also heard saying: “If you can’t respect other people, we will also not respect you. We have the same capacity as yours. We started off on the wrong foot because of this man’s comment.”

Apology and reactions

Morero later apologised for his conduct. He said:

“During the course of the meeting, emotions went high between myself and one of the participants and I would like to profusely and unconditionally apologise for my utterances which were made this morning at the meeting. It should not have been done in that fashion, and I do take full responsibility. Over and above, I did have a word or two with the resident concerned and the meeting accepted my apology.”

Opposition parties criticised Morero’s behaviour. The Economic Freedom Fighters said his conduct was unbecoming of an executive mayor and reflected poor leadership. EFF Gauteng spokesperson Dumisani Baleni said community imbizos should be safe, respectful forums where residents can express frustrations without being humiliated or verbally attacked.

Background to the meeting

The engagement followed the initial withdrawal of City Powers technical restoration and maintenance services in Tshepisong. City Power said it took that decision because of low electricity vending rates, widespread illegal connections, vandalism, sabotage, tampering and resistance to its network normalisation process.

The utility said there had been repeated incidents in which community members illegally reconnected newly installed pole-mounted transformers and threw wires onto electricity lines to deliberately trip the network, actions it said placed lives at risk, damaged infrastructure and undermined restoration efforts.