We don’t want leaders who lie, cheat – Buthelezi

Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) leader Mangosuthu Buthelezi has called for the scrapping of the e-tolls in Gauteng, adding that an IFP-led government would do exactly that if elected into power in the May 8 general elections.

“We want e-tolls scrapped,” Buthelezi said to a huge applause.

The e-tolls were introduced by the governing ANC as part of the freeway roads improvement in preparation for the 2010 Fifa World Cup. However, Gauteng had since opposed the system as being expensive, deterring the province’s economic growth and hitting the poor hardest.

Buthelezi, 90, who addressed party members amid sweltering temperatures of up to 29°C at the Zola Sports Complex in Soweto yesterday, was unveiling the IFP’s Gauteng election manifesto, which he first read in English and then in isiZulu.

He revealed that the IFP would introduce subsidised unemployment “job seekers’ metro card for Gautrain, Metrobus and Rea Vaya bus transit” as its way to fight joblessness. It promised to create a provincial and municipal database of unemployed persons.

An IFP member at the party’s election manifesto launch in Soweto, 21 March 2019. Picture: Refilwe Modise

Buthelezi said reasonable measures must be taken to redress past injustices and indignities including through land reform.

“The land issue carries the potential to heal the wounds of the past.”

The IFP supported land expropriation but this, it says, remained a debate whether that should be done without compensation.

Buthelezi said they would reopen the debate on the reinstatement of the death penalty because of high levels of crime. It would reprioritise the SA Police Service budget to focus on community policing and police visibility on the streets.

On May 8, the party would ensure to elect leaders who would challenge the government to do the right thing because “we don’t want leaders who lie and leaders who cheat”.

All families would be empowered to have access to an income and women and girls trained in skills that would enable them to participate in the economy.

Buthelezi said he always wished that the Human Rights Day be called Robert Sobukwe Human Rights Day in honour of the late PAC founder and president. But the idea was rejected by the ANC when he suggested it as then minister of home affairs, he said.

The manifesto launch was also attended by IFP national and provincial leaders, parliamentarians and leaders of youth and women’s brigades.

– ericn@citizen.co.za

For more news your way, download The Citizen’s app for iOS and Android.