DA leader Mmusi Maimane is frustrated with allies that have been unreliable in municipalities where the party governs through co-operations and coalitions.
Speaking to the Sunday Times this week about his assessment of the co-operation agreement with the EFF that turns a year old next month, Maimane said the arrangement was sustainable but at times difficult to manage. He said trust between the two partners was often a stumbling block.
The DA wrested control of key metro municipalities Tshwane, Johannesburg and Nelson Mandela Bay from the ANC last year because of a co-operation agreement with other opposition parties.
Maimane cited a decision by EFF councillors in Mogale City on the West Rand, centred on Krugersdorp in Gauteng, to vote in favour of the ANC-led municipality's budget. This happened despite an agreement between the DA and EFF to isolate the ANC.
He said the frosty relationship between Nelson Mandela Bay mayor Athol Trollip and his deputy, Mongameli Bobani, of the United Democratic Movement, was another source of frustration in his management of the co-operation agreements.
"Coalition governments are difficult. Other people want different things. For example, you can't always trust coalition partners. We agree with the EFF to say in Mogale, we're not going to vote for the ANC budget. They do it. So you can't always trust them.
"You have a deputy mayor in Nelson Mandela Bay who wants blue-light [vehicles] and sometimes votes with the ANC. That's difficult. And when you're the bigger party you've got to be responsible about governance and often patient with these things because we're building a bigger project.
"We accept that we must be responsible for the national project.
69.69% in 2004
65.90% in 2009
62.15% in 2014
— ANC’S DECLINEAMONG VOTERS
"Those are difficult dynamics, but [solvable] so long as you keep the channels of communication open," said Maimane.
The DA leader said the arrangement with the EFF was teaching his party important lessons in how to better manage possible future co-operation with other parties, with the focus on the 2019 national election, which he said was likely to result in no outright winner.
In such an event the country would be run by a coalition government for the first time at a national level.
"The big lesson is what happens when people don't hold up their end of the bargain. How do you deal with that? You need leaders who can stand together and say when something is inconsistent with our initial agreement, we're going to act against that and I sometimes find that's hard to achieve," said Maimane.
Maimane said the DA was well positioned to lead the possible coalition government in 2019. He said his party's internal polling showed the ANC would not achieve more than 50% of the votes if the 2019 election was brought forward.
But he was cagey on what the polling said about the DA's prospects. He said only that it revealed that the DA would get enough votes to lead a coalition.
"The ANC is declining in numbers. They are below 50%, so it looks very possible ... we are growing [as the DA]," said Maimane.
"2019 must be a question [on] coalition government and my stance is that we must see a post-ANC South Africa in 2019 and I believe that the DA must lead that coalition as we've shown in metro governments."
