The DA will perform better in the forthcoming national and provincial elections because it is much more stable, stronger and policy certain than it was in 2019.
This is the assertion made by the party’s deputy federal chairperson and national spokesperson Solly Malatsi, who was speaking to Sunday World Engage this week.
According to Malatsi, the DA performed poorly in the previous national and provincial elections because there was confusion and instability when Mmusi Maimane was at the helm. Maimane has since left and is now the leader of Build One SA.
Malatsi said the DA had taken several steps to save the blue ship from capsizing and was positive that interventions would bear fruit.
Maimane resigned as DA leader following the 2019 polls, where the DA saw flames, with declining electoral support, and a review was commissioned which apparently fingered him for being an inept leader.
Among other weaknesses the DA showed during Maimane’s stewardship was lack of ideological and policy clarity, said Malatsi.
As if that was not enough, he went on, there was no order in the running of the DA caucus in the National Assembly as well as well as the general running of the party.
The review had also found that Maimane was an aloof leader, detached from the day-to-day operations of the DA.
“The previous national and provincial elections was a very difficult time for the party. The leader (Maimane) initiated the review and out of the review question marks started about the leadership of the party. It was during that leadership that we suffered the first electoral setback.
“The review raised the issue of policy certainty and that it was a weakness -towards our campaign in 2019.
“Another thing was around decisive leadership in terms of internal management of parliamentary caucus or different structures of the party.
“It went further in terms of how we review the process of decision-making in terms of the daily operations of the organisation to have the political leadership much more involved in the daily management of the party.”
Another weakness that arose out of Maimane’s leadership was forcing the DA to go to bed with the EFF. He said the DA had since corrected that by declaring the EFF its enemy number one.
The review had apparently found that the DA had no business partnering with the EFF post the hung 2016 local government elections without anything signed on the dotted line.
What that situation, which Maimane championed, had created was an EFF pushing its socialist policies through councils using DA numbers.
“They wanted outcomes of government intervention without fully being a part of it and you know that on core policies we stand on different ends with the EFF. The opportunity to govern at that time was too tempting to turn down and, in that process, we didn’t frame a core governing agreement with very clear areas of what we can do with the support (of the EFF).”
Malatsi said DA polling, of which he refused to go into detail, showed signs of the party coming out of the Maimane confusion.
“In 2019, we suffered that setback, and we don’t like comparing as we’ve said in the conversation but when you look at the performance of 2021 there was stability,” Malatsi said. “And right now I think we are generally in a very healthy state as an organisation. That’s why we are encouraged by our internal polling, which says we are much stronger than we were in 2019 and it indicates a positive upward growth, from our performance in 2019.”
- For the full interview please visit www.sundayworld.co.za
