JOHANNESBURG - Johannesburg mayor, Dada Morero, said former mayor Herman Mashaba had a role to play in the City's decay.
Morero said Mashaba's leadership style blocked senior officials from executing their duties.
The Joburg mayor has been giving an account of the state of the City's finances before SCOPA.
"The drop that you are seeing today in terms of performance on revenue collection was as a result of the employees throughout the value chain in the revenue department deciding not to do anything anymore because anything you touch you are then accused of corruption by Mashaba," Morero said.
"In fact, Mashaba created weak leadership throughout the City and I must say I didn't want to venture into that debate in this committee. I wanted to give an honest reflection of where we are, but you are now pulling me into the direction where we are entering politics and I would not have loved to enter that space."
Mashaba rubbished Morero's poor leadership allegations.
The former mayor said Parliament needs to compare the financial state of the City during his term of office and where it is now.
"To our Parliament, to our Members of Parliament, because if Members of Parliament are fortunate enough, they've got access to audited financials of the City of Johannesburg during my term," Mashaba said.
"So they don't have to really take it from me. Let them take it from the Auditor-General to really look at revenue improvements during my term of office."