The DA has dismissed claims by Lesego Makhubela, spokesperson for the ANC in Gauteng, that it has tried several times to woo the ruling party into forming coalitions in metros in the province.
Party leader John Steenhuisen told the Sunday Times that Makhubela’s assertions were groundless. “I have no idea of any deal, imagined or otherwise, that [you] are talking about.”
The DA’s Gauteng provincial leader, Solly Msimanga, said the statements by Makhubela at a media briefing on Friday were lies.
“We can say it categorically that the DA, in Gauteng or at a national level, has never had any meeting with the ANC to discuss power-sharing in the municipalities,” Msimanga said.
“They are lying. If they’ve met, they must say who did they meet with, where did they meet with that person, and they must disclose what was the agreement.”
They’ve been knocking on your doors … asking that we form a coalition. They’ve done that, they’ve done it many times
— Lesego Makhubela, ANC spokesperson in Gauteng
Makhubela said on Friday the ANC in Gauteng had been inundated with requests from the DA to form a coalition government. The DA, he said, had offered to let the ANC run Johannesburg and Ekurhuleni while it would keep control of Tshwane.
“They’ve been knocking on your doors … asking that we form a coalition. They’ve done that, they’ve done it many times,” he said. “The DA says ‘OK, take everything’, that’s what they are saying, ‘just give us Tshwane’.”
Makhubela said it would be impossible for the ANC to get into bed with the DA after the 2024 national elections. “They represent everything that is repugnant with our society. We don’t see ourselves entering into a coalition with them,” he said.
Steenhuisen, at the DA’s national congress earlier this month, ruled out any possibility of forming coalitions with the ANC. Instead, he proposed a “moonshot pact” between opposition parties that would prevent the “doomsday” scenario of the EFF partnering with the ANC in a national government after the 2024 elections.
He said on Saturday at least six parties had accepted his “moonshot” invitation, including the IFP, ActionSA, FF+ and the NFP. The UDM and ACDP were among those who had rejected the proposal, and others had yet to respond.
In Johannesburg, opponents of the ANC/EFF alliance are girding for a new attempt to oust mayor Thapelo Amad.
ActionSA, part of a coalition that includes the DA, says the Patriotic Alliance (PA) has agreed to back a fresh motion of no confidence against Amad this week.
ActionSA national chair Michael Beaumont told the Sunday Times Politics Weekly podcast that should the motion succeed, the anti-ANC/EFF parties would need to reconfigure their own coalition agreement.
Should Amad be ousted, Johannesburg would follow Tshwane as the second metro to fall from the grasp of the the ANC/EFF-led coalition. The DA’s Cilliers Brink was elected mayor of Tshwane last week.
Amad’s ouster would also cement the PA’s split from the ANC/EFF grouping.
PA leader Gayton McKenzie has accused the bigger parties of disrespect after their coalition took all 10 seats on the mayoral committee in Ekurhuleni. The African Independent Congress’s Sivuyile Ngodwana was named mayor to replace Tania Campbell of the DA, following her ouster in a no-confidence vote at the end of March.
Amad has come under fire for an incoherent television news interview in which he discussed plans to take up a R9bn unsolicited loan from a private entity that he did not identify. Viewers were left fuming after Amad revealed the loan, but displayed little knowledge of its structure, or what it would be used for.
After the interview McKenzie said his party would join efforts to unseat Amad, and he was willing to give up his mayorship in the Central Karoo district and make himself available as a replacement for the ANC/EFF-backed mayor.
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