DA leader John Steenhuisen has pulled no punches in asking South Africans to consider voting for the official opposition party as its growth, governance and economic policy track record has positioned it as the only credible alternative to the ANC.
The governing party’s electoral support is expected to dip below the 50% mark for the first time since the 1994 general election in the provincial and national elections in 2024.
Steenhuisen said internal polling of registered voters — which has in recent history been accurate — had shown load-shedding, violent crime and the cost of living in SA had given SA’s middle and working class no good reason to vote ANC anymore.
“The ANC’s decline is terminal, and it’s just a matter now of how fast. If this decline in support can be accelerated up until the election, and then held there as they roll out their squeeze campaign, we will see the end of the ANC in 2024,” Steenhuisen said.
He characterised the EFF as having “empty rage” in support of the alleged patronage and mafia networks in the ANC that are protecting what he described as “rock star ministers” who do not pay for their cars and houses, have two generators at home and are given 24-hour police protection.
“That is precisely why the blossoming alliance between the EFF, ANC and its proxies managed to connive their way back into power in Johannesburg and Ekurhuleni, while the DA’s Cilliers Brink is today the mayor of Tshwane. The lessons we’ve learnt on coalitions are also why our chief whip in the National Assembly, Siviwe Gwarube, is working hard on a number of bills aimed at solving these issues around too many small parties disrupting a coalition government,” Steenhuisen said.
He added that the DA’s experience in governing Cape Town and the Western Cape is that servant leadership and no blue lights allow for better economic and political decision making.
“The DA is the only party fighting for the things that matter,” Steenhuisen said.
He also for the first time acknowledged electoral losses under him in 2021, not just his predecessor, Mmusi Maimane, in 2019 elections. But he says the DA has clawed back support and is not just chasing traditional white voters but positioning itself as the alternative to the ANC, not a nationalist party.
“If we wanted the DA to be effective and relevant, we’d have to learn to pick our issues by the impact they’d have on the lives of ordinary South Africans — and particularly vulnerable South Africans — and then not allow ourselves to become distracted from these issues by the news cycle of the day,” Steenhuisen said.
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