Mashaba urges DA to ‘swallow pride’ and support ActionSA mayoral candidate

ActionSA president Herman Mashaba says the Democratic Alliance (DA) should demonstrate how serious they are about the moonshot pact by supporting their Gauteng chair Funzi Ngobeni as the new Joburg mayor on Friday.

Mashaba was speaking in Soweto on Thursday where he led a delegation to the Jabulani police station to call for better policing in the area.

The Joburg council is expected to elect a new mayor on Friday after the council collapsed on Tuesday when a mayor was expected to be elected.

The DA is expected to field former mayor Mpho Phalatse, while it is still unclear who the coalition led by ANC-Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) will field.

Mashaba said the DA had an opportunity to remove the ANC-EFF-led coalition by supporting their candidate and swallowing their pride and work with the Patriotic Alliance (PA) to gain numbers.

“John Steenhuisen stood in front of the nation and spoke about the moonshot pact so that they remove the ANC and EFF from government in 2024,” he said. “Today they are sitting with an opportunity to demonstrate to the people of South Africa that they are serious about the moonshot pact. You cannot talk about 2024 when you are unable to resolve the same issues today.

“The PA is ready to support us but without the DA support, we do not have the opportunity. The switching of PA [to the ANC-EFF led coalition] has nothing to do with the PA but was because of the abuse the DA insulting them that they eventually walked away.”

Mashaba also dispelled talk of infighting about their coalition with the DA. “We put our position forward, it is up to the DA to support it or not, it is not infighting.

“The people of South Africa are not stupid enough to see what is really happening. To me, whether the DA sabotages our efforts to remove the ANC, one thing for sure is the voters are watching.”

Asked what stops ActionSA from working with the EFF, as he has on many occasions said he has a great working relationship with the party during his tenure as Joburg mayor, Mashaba said they were happy to work with the red berets at the local government level.

“At the national level, there’s no way we can work with the EFF because at the local government level, it’s about a budget and this is what we are going to do, no policy issues,” he said.

“At the national level, there are policy differences between ActionSA and EFF, which are far apart.”

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