DA leader, John Steenhuisen speaks to the media after he and Tshwane Mayor, Cilliers Brink conducted a site visit of the BMW factory in Rosslyn, 11 July 2023. They were there to highlight the importance of this sector in the AGOA ( African Growth and Opportunity Act). Picture: Neil McCartney / The Citizen
The Democratic Alliance’s (DA) John Steenhuisen vehemently denied allegations regarding a coalition with the African National Congress (ANC).
Speaking on eNCA, Steenhuisen said the DA has absolutely no intention of partnering with the current ruling party.
This after the two-day National Coalition Dialogue was held at the University of the Western Cape and led by ANC Deputy President Paul Mashatile.
Steenhuisen rejected the charges made by smaller parties about the DA aligned with the ANC to establish a grand coalition.
He described the allegations as “absolute nonsense”, saying the DA is not interested.
He added that smaller parties must “rethink their stance” and instead join the Moonshot Pact.
“I want to be absolutely abundantly clear, as I have been since announcing the Moonshot Pact in April. There is no plan for the DA to go into any form of grand coalition with the ANC”.
The event concluded on Saturday, leaving quite a few political tensions unsettled.
During the National Coalition Dialogue, Mashatile sought to allay the concerns of smaller parties, and he too emphasised that no deal exists between the ANC and the DA.
He called on smaller parties to “remove suspicions”, adding that the NCD won’t succeed if political parties are suspicious of each other.
With the dialogue now concluded, the drafting team will finalise the declaration in a move toward legislating coalition governments.
The proposal regarding the threshold, however, continues to unsettle smaller parties, highlighting an ongoing challenge in reaching a consensus.
READ: Political music chairs: ‘Coalitions need to end conflicts’
The Citizen‘s Eric Naki reported earlier that coalitions are not based on ideology, but rather on the situation on the ground.
Dr Levy Ndou from Tshwane University of Technology said ideologies did not matter and parties do cooperate even when they were ideologically apart.
Based on that framework, he said the ANC and the DA could cooperate to establish a national coalition after the election results were known, despite having different ideologies.
READ: A neoliberal affair? ANC ‘may go for DA as partner’
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