After withdrawing from National Dialogue, FF Plus leader Mulder suggests parallel event without ANC
The party on Tuesday withdrew from the National Dialogue, accusing the ANC of being an obstructive roleplayer.
FILE: Freedom Front (FF) Plus leader Corné Mulder speaks to EWN at his office in Parliament on 27 February 2025. Picture: Lindsay Dentlinger/EWN
CAPE TOWN - Freedom Front Plus leader, Corné Mulder, is suggesting a parallel National Dialogue that does not include the African National Congress (ANC).
He said that as long as the ANC was uncompromising in its policy positions, it had no place in such a conversation.
The party on Tuesday withdrew from the National Dialogue, accusing the ANC of being an obstructive roleplayer.
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The dialogue will be preceded by a two-day national convention, which starts on Friday.
The Freedom Front Plus' former leader and minister of correctional services, Pieter Groenewald, has been part of the inter-ministerial committee planning for the National Dialogue.
But the party’s new leader, Mulder, said the ANC was being an obstructive roleplayer and the FF Plus did not join the Government of National Unity (GNU) to bend to the ANC's will.
"We are not in the GNU to be co-opted. We are not in the GNU to be used. We are not in the GNU to make it possible for the ANC to govern as if they still have a majority. That’s not why we are there."
Mulder suggested that the dialogue organisers go back to the drawing board and start the process afresh.
"That process should be led by civil society and not by the government, not by the Presidency, not by the deputy president. It should be completely out of their hands."
Mulder said the dialogue had presented the ANC with an opportunity to acknowledge that its policy directions were outdated.