Midvaal mayor Bongani Baloyi was arrested for alleged assault at the weekend.

Baloyi and a member of the public were both taken into police custody after they laid charges against one another on Saturday.

Baloyi was released on bail and will appear in the Vereeniging Magistrate’s Court on Monday.

The DA and the ANC issued contradictory statements of what went down on Saturday morning when Baloyi was in Ward 11 in Savannah City‚ south of Johannesburg‚ for the municipality’s launch of Arbour Day.

The DA said Baloyi opened a case of assault with the intention to cause grievous bodily harm after he was attacked.

“The event started peacefully‚ however when the mayor was about to go to the podium to address the community‚ ANC members approached him and tried to take the microphone away from him. They physically pushed the mayor and hit him with a rock‚” the party said.

The DA added that when Baloyi was making his way to the police station‚ a “key suspect followed him and lied to the police”.

The ANC had a different version of events.

ANC Sedibeng regional secretary Jason Mkhwane said: “The executive mayor organised the event as a Democratic Alliance electioneering programme which turned sour when members of the community rejected the political nature of the event as the DA members wanted the event to be projected as a political delivery machinery of the ruling party in Midvaal.

“The ANC invites members of the public to protest against the abuse of power by Councillor Baloyi who must explain his action of abusing an ordinary member of the public for raising issues of service delivery in a public meeting.