Author: tenise

On Wednesday, the Democratic Alliance (DA) led a mass protest through the streets of Cape Town against the African National Congress’ (ANC) employment equity amendments, which will set racial quotas designed to resurrect job reservation and racial group areas.

Yesterday, the ANC’s Minister of Labour and Employment, Thulas Nxesi, utterly vindicated the DA’s fight against these quotas by confirming that his political party is resurrecting apartheid-era racial divisions in South Africa.

During an interview on SABC News, presenter Aldrin Sampear put an example to Nxesi of an Indian person who applies to work at a company that has “met its target” for the employment of Indians. “What would your advice be to that professional. What would you ask them to do?”

In response, an audibly irritated Nxesi said: “You can’t employ more than what we want.”

Sampear followed up: “Exactly. So what happens to that Indian person?”

Nxesi’s answer constituted devastating confirmation of the new racist depths the ANC is plumbing with this Act: “He must look for jobs in other companies.”

With this answer, Thulas Nxesi has confirmed that the Employment Equity Amendment Act is built on racial quotas that will ban the employment of South African citizens on the basis of race in sectors and areas where they are “over concentrated.” The ANC has now placed it on the public record that Indian, coloured, white and black South Africans will be banned from taking up positions in companies where the “target” for their race group has been met. Companies that employ more workers with the “wrong” skin colour will be severely punished by losing access to state contracts and by being fined up to 10% of their annual turnover.

The ANC’s race law will be particularly devastating for coloured and Indian South Africans, with quotas set at 0.0% for these groups in various sectors and provinces. However, research shows that, in order to comply with the ANC Race Quota Act, over 600 000 South Africans from all backgrounds will need to be replaced in their existing jobs because they have the “wrong” skin colour.

Through its promotion and continued defense of this Act, the ANC has descended to depths of racism and tribalism this country last witnessed before 1994.

Nxesi’s comments also directly contradict the agreement his department reached with trade union Solidarity, clearly demonstrating that the ANC never had any intention of honouring it. This is why the DA is pressing ahead with our court case to declare these race quotas unconstitutional.

South African legal precedent makes it clear that race quotas are illegal.

Nxesi’s utterances have removed all doubt that the Employment Equity Amendment Act is built entirely on race quotas that will regulate the employment of South Africans based on the colour of their skin.

Despite attempts by the ANC as well as its partners in parties like GOOD and the Patriotic Alliance to defend these race quotas against the DA’s opposition, we will boldly continue to lead this fight for non-racialism and against the ANC’s resurrection of apartheid-style race laws. Nothing will deter us in this fight, because history shows that South Africans will unite as one to defeat the ANC’s reintroduction of Apartheid laws.

Be part of the mission to rescue South Africa, get help registering to vote at check.da.org.za

The Democratic Alliance (DA) can today reveal that, in direct response to pressure from our court application to enforce the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) directive for Russian President Vladimir Putin to be arrested on charges of war crimes for the abduction of Ukrainian children, South Africa’s National Director for Public Prosecutions (NDPP) on 17 July 2023 received a formal request from the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development for the issuance of a warrant to arrest Putin.

This fact was confirmed in an order issued this morning by the Gauteng High Court in the DA’s case to compel the South African government to uphold its responsibility to arrest Putin.

The court also ordered that the Director-General of the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development must pay the DA’s legal costs in this case.

According to an affidavit belatedly filed yesterday by the Director-General of the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development, Advocate Doctor Mashabane, the Department formally requested the NDPP to issue a warrant of arrest for Putin in a letter that was delivered to Advocate Shamila Batohi on Monday, 17 July.

This was in the same week that the DA’s court application was heard.

This means that, thanks to the DA’s sustained political and legal pressure to ensure compliance with our country’s international obligations, the government on 17 July 2023 formally initiated the process to arrest Vladimir Putin should he set foot on our soil.

Despite President Cyril Ramaphosa’s best efforts to shield Putin from accountability for his alleged war crimes – including through his absurd claim that the South African Constitution somehow prohibited him from complying with the ICC directive – it is now clear that the DA’s commitment to justice and the rule of law has been completely vindicated.

The Justice Department’s request for Batohi to issue a warrant of arrest for Putin directly contradicts Ramaphosa and confirms the DA’s stance that this was always the only correct course of action.

Thanks to the DA’s sustained fight on this issue, we have forced the South African government to uphold the rule of law in spite of Ramaphosa’s attempts to protect Putin.

This DA victory sends a clear message to the global community that, thanks to a patriotic official opposition and a justice system anchored in our Constitution, South Africa is not yet a lost cause in the global fight for a better world.

The DA hopes that our success in compelling the government to initiate arrest proceedings against Putin will begin to restore our country’s global standing and avert looming economic catastrophes like potential sanctions and South Africa’s ejection from the African Growth and Opportunities Act (AGOA).

The DA’s victory in this case sends a clear message to the global community that while the African National Congress (ANC) may have chosen the side of tyranny over justice and the rule of law, the DA and the people of South Africa will not allow a governing party who’s time in power is rapidly running out, to do so in our name.

The DA Caucus in Johannesburg is deeply concerned about seeming lack of involvement of crucial departments in trying to get to the bottom of the blast.

We note that the Premier, speaking on behalf of the Executive Mayor of Johannesburg seems to be focused on the cause of the explosion, while important, we have not heard a clear disaster Management plan and what the inspections will include.

Whilst relying on the Joint Operations Committee, the buildings all along Lilian Ngoyi Street need to be inspected for structural integrity by the Development Planning Building Inspectors. Inspections on the buildings along this road need to form part of the integrated response to avoid building collapse which could potentially lead to more injuries and possible loss of lives.

In the meantime, the DA Shadow MMC of Development Planning, Cllr Daniel Schay will also visit the area today, being an engineer to also see for himself.

It is for this reason that I wrote to the MMC of Development Cllr Eunice Mgcina to request that the Building Control department in Development Planning do inspections to check the structural integrity of the building which are largely overcrowded.

The DA will continue to fight for all residents of Johannesburg, follow up on recommendations and questions asked to the Executive to ensure that the Executive Mayor and his MMC’s are held accountable and service all residents with an appropriate response to avoid loss of life.

The Democratic Alliance (DA) in Gauteng is calling on the MEC for Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, Mzi Khumalo, to launch an urgent investigation into the cause of the explosion in the Johannesburg Central Business District (CBD) earlier this evening.

This explosion is life-threatening for the tens of thousands of workers, job seekers, and residents of the CBD.

The cause of today’s explosion must be determined as a matter of urgency to prevent further incidents like this from occurring again.

Furthermore, this explosion occurred along the Bus Rapid Transit System (BRT) route, which means that the structural integrity of the road must be determined before being used by the public and public transport vehicles.

The DA proposes that the government must consider moving people out of some buildings that are situated near the scene of the incident to ensure their safety.

The DA will be monitoring the progress of this investigation, and should it be delayed, we will be left with no option but to take the matter up privately. Our residents must work and live in a safe environment.

We urge the public not to go to the scene of the explosion until it has been declared safe.

Our thoughts and prayers are with the injured and those who had their property damaged during this incident.

The last-ditch attempts by GOOD to derail the George by-elections to avoid defeat, have been exposed as lies born of desperation. After lodging a series of failed objections to the IEC over the past few days, the party has called for a postponement of the by-election.

The DA rejects this call as we have rejected all the supposed objections against the voter roll and now, at the eleventh hour, unsubstantiated claims of election fraud by the secretary general of GOOD Brett Herron.

He alleges that the DA registered people living outside the ward where the by-election is to be held.

What is perhaps most disturbing is that, as laid out in the DA’s answering affidavit, it was canvassers who left GOOD to join the DA and then returned to GOOD following the alleged irregular canvassing that are at the heart of the fraud that GOOD itself is alleging!

GOOD also alleges that 188 voters live at one residence and invoke this as a reason for postponing the ballot. However, according to the 2021 voters roll, there were more than 188 persons residing at that address.  Good, which won the Ward in those elections, did not complain at the time about these voters.  In the months since the government election, Good has never taken issue with these voters, except now—the day before the by-elections.

The DA has committed no fraud, nor has it misled either the IEC or the voters of George. The same cannot however be said for GOODs dishonest attempts to derail by elections it fears losing, even with the support of the other ANC proxy, the Patriotic Alliance.

The Democratic Alliance welcomes a judgement handed down by the Gauteng High Court today, which ruled that the government of the Republic of South Africa, in accordance with the Rome Statute to which it is signatory, must publicly and transparently argue its case around South Africa’s obligation to arrest Russian President, Vladimir Putin, following the issuance of an arrest warrant for Mr Putin by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes.

It is clear that the South African government is making every attempt to obfuscate and cover up this pivotal matter to avoid public scrutiny, and to mask its inability to stand up to war mongers and despots like Vladimir Putin, as should be expected from any human rights-based foreign policy.
Given the farcical nature of President Ramaphosa’s responding affidavit, it is little wonder that he did not want it to see the light of day.

Deploying flimsy arguments which allege that the Russian Federation would declare war on South African should we arrest Vladimir Putin, are little more than strawman arguments when the Constitutional principle and both domestic and international law make the merits of this case crystal clear.

What is comical about the President’s affidavit is his claim that refusing to arrest Vladimir Putin would disregard the sovereignty of the Russian Federation, when the South African government, in its support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, showed very little concern for the sovereignty of the Ukrainian State.
It has always been our belief that the public interest in this matter overrode government’s attempts at supposed confidentiality. This especially given the enormous implications for all South Africans that hinge on government’s decision on this matter, including South Africa’s standing on the international stage should there be a repeat of the circumstances that surrounded the visit of Omar Al-Bashir where South Africa failed in its statutory obligation to both its own foreign policy and an instruction by the ICC.

Furthermore, when hundreds of thousands of jobs and billions in exports linked to South Africa’s preferential access to the United States’ market via the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) are at risk, the implications of this case rightly become the business of all of the South African people.
We look forward to the merits of this matter being argued in open court where they belong in any open constitutional democracy, and we will resist any further attempts by government and the ANC to shield its decisions from the people of South Africa. This includes the report into the circumstances surrounding the Lady R which government is trying to shroud in a similar manner.

When foreign policy decisions have the capacity to decimate South Africa’s international reputation, harm our influence as a regional power, and decimate our economy, it is crucial that government uphold its obligation to be open and transparent with its people.
South Africa fought to be freed from a secretive state that heavily censored its citizens – we will not allow the ANC to reemploy these tactics to keep South Africans in the dark.

Please find attached soundbites in English and Afrikaans by Veronica van Dyk MP.

A lack of response from SASCOC on burning issues, contribute to the dysfunction within sporting bodies, as is evidenced by its failure to address the issues within Netball SA.

The DA welcomes the feedback from the Department of Sports, Arts and Culture that they will bring the transgression in Netball SA to the attention of Minister Zizi Kodwa, after the party’s request for an urgent investigation into Netball SA matters.

We will request that the matter be put on the parliamentary portfolio committee on sport, arts and culture’s agenda as soon as possible after the end of the Parliamentary recess period to afford the Department an opportunity to provide feedback on its progress.

We not only hope for the Minister to prioritize Netball SA’s intervention as soon as possible, but for SASCOC to act in accordance with its constitution and mandate. We also remind the President of SASCOC, Barry Hendricks, of his undertaking to the portfolio committee at its last meeting (16 May 2023), that SASCOC would respond to outstanding questions within 10 days.

The DA not only expressed deep concern over the troubling revelations brought to light in a documentary released by Afriforum two weeks ago, which sheds light on critical issues within Netball SA and its president, Cecilia Molekwane, but we further take note of a letter addressed to SASCOC by the civils right movement urging SASCOC to investigate the public allegations against Netball SA. The DA supports Afriforum in holding SASCOC to account.

The DA has consistently reported the concerns regarding Netball SA’s and its president to the portfolio committee of sport, arts, and culture and SASCOC, highlighting that pressing matters in sports, such as sexual abuse, financial mismanagement, administrative dysfunction, and the abuse of power plaguing Netball SA under Cecilia Molekwane’s leadership needs to be urgently addressed, but these bodies at large, are failing sport federations and athletes.

SASCOC needs to step up and take responsibility to ensure proper governance of all federations, including Netball SA, and act against discrimination and violence in sport, encouraging the development of sport for all.

Be part of the mission to rescue South Africa, get help registering to vote at check.da.org.za

The DA has severe misgivings about the withdrawal of our candidate in the upcoming Ward 7 Johannesburg by-election. This decision comes after at least one meeting our candidate had with Gayton McKenzie, a meeting that he discussed with the DA campaign manager in the ward.

According to a sworn affidavit by Nicola du Plessis, our campaign manager, the candidate, Randell Markgraaff, told her on 5 June and again on 7 June that he had been invited to a meeting with Gayton McKenzie and said he wanted to attend as there was a possibility of being offered up to R5-million in order to move with his family to Cape Town. Find the affidavit here.

Ms. du Plessis, and another DA public representative, subsequently confirmed that the meeting between McKenzie and Markgraaff had indeed taken place. However, following a three-hour discussion with the candidate, he confirmed that he was committed to the DA campaign.

A DA public representative then warned us to be wary of what might happen on June 16, Youth Day, in relation to the candidate. As it transpired, Markgraaff chose this date, today, to withdraw from the campaign, at a time when it is too late for the Party to nominate an alternative candidate.

The withdrawal also comes after significant investment in the candidate and the by-election campaign. The candidate was enthusiastic to be running for the DA in the ward until shortly before his meeting with McKenzie. At this point, his attitude changed.

Announcing his withdrawal from the campaign on Facebook today, Markgraaff also stated that he would deliver a public address via Facebook tonight. Such Facebook addresses are also drawn from the McKenzie playbook.

This shocking development raises serious questions about the integrity of the electoral process and the extent to which “mafia tactics” may now even be undermining the country’s ability to hold free and fair elections. This should be of the utmost concern to all South Africans.

This is a betrayal of the trust of the Ennerdale community, but the implications stretch far beyond this to the very fabric of our democracy. However, we want to say to all residents of Ward 7: we in the DA remain steadfast in our commitment to you. Despite this setback, we will not abandon our duty to serve the community of Ennerdale. We will continue to fight for good governance, transparency, and accountability in Ward 7, across Johannesburg, and the entire country.

We are currently engaging with the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) to determine the best course of action in response to this matter. We are committed to ensuring that the electoral process is fair, transparent, and free from corruption. The DA will continue to stand strong against any form of political manipulation and corruption. We will always put the interests of our country’s communities first, and we will not be deterred by those who seek to undermine our democratic processes.