DA's backdoor negotiations with ANC reason ActionSA's cut ties in City of Tshwane
ActionSA Gauteng chairperson, Funzi Ngobeni said the DA was planning on replacing it with the ANC in Tshwane.
ActionSA leader Herman Mashaba. Picture: X/Action4SA
JOHANNESBURG - ActionSA says it was the Democratic Alliance (DA)’s backdoor negotiations with the African National Congress (ANC) that forced it to cut ties with the party in Tshwane.
Herman Mashaba's party has announced that it will no longer be part of the DA-led coalition governing the capital city.
The decision was made by ActionSA’s highest decision-making body, the Senate.
When the DA entered into talks with the ANC about forming a government of national unity (GNU), there was a tentative understanding it would also trickle down to provincial and local governments.
READ: Brink no-confidence motion: Tshwane DA-led coalition urges ActionSA not to punish residents
ActionSA Gauteng chairperson, Funzi Ngobeni said the DA was planning on replacing it with the ANC in Tshwane.
“ActionSA was not going to wait for the DA to remove us – we had to be proactive, we had to protect our reputation, protect our own brand, protect ourselves as a party but also ensure the destabilisation process of the DA doesn’t affect the residents at all.”
However, the DA in Tshwane has denied trying to break up the governing coalition, saying it only engaged the ANC for a stability agreement in municipalities under both parties’ control.
Meanwhile, ActionSA councillors in Tshwane, who serve in the municipal executive will not be resigning from their posts, despite the party cutting ties with the governing coalition.
The party has two of its councillors in the Tshwane municipality executive deputy Mayor Nasiphi Moya and MMC for economic development and spatial planning Hannes Coetzee.
Ngobeni said it was the prerogative of the mayor to remove MMCs at will, however, the deputy mayor can only be removed by council through a motion of no confidence.
“They will continue to do their work up until this government ceases to exist and they will continue to deliver services in the areas they have been allocated at – so the work will continue up until anything happens, which we would have to assess and see what steps we have to take.”