So too political analysis.
So lots happening on the politics front, but we could not ignore what's been happening this weekend with the DA. And I was saying a little earlier as the show started that I felt like Theda really looked they looked, I don't want to say helpless this weekend in that press briefing, but they looked like they were trying to convince you and I that they're still in control.
Yet I think this weekend, for the first.
Time, at least for me, I felt like you could see that they were not in control and are not in control over affairs in this GNU. Of course, they had the press briefing after giving the president that forty eight hour ultimatum saying, if you do not fire the other ministers as well, after you sacked Andrew Whitfield, then we are going to make a big announcement on the GNU, and we are going to be announcing that after the
eight hour period lapse. That's now. Of course, it came and it went, and they were supposed to make this announcement, and I don't know about you, but I think many people were a little underwhelmed by the announcement that they made essentially saying they're going to be withdrawing from the National Dialogue. They will be participating in that, and they I think also maybe a lot more important than the
National Dialogue withdrawal. They said they would not be or they would be voting down the budgets of A and C ministers or ministers that they deemed to be corrupt. So that's really what happened at the weekend. Panita Hunter, a freelance journalist, has written for News twenty four an analysis piece saying the DA's strange performative outrage in the g and U soap opera. She joins us now live Pnisa, thank you so much for joining us on the Aubri massan Wo show this evening.
I maybe let's start with.
This headline, because really it is giving soap opera vibes, isn't it.
Quancert, thank you so much with this and wonderful chatting to you. It's a never ending uh theater. They are more you know, more boring days than others. But when it gets intense like this, one wonders.
To what end?
And so you're right to say, you know this this weekend seemed a little bit underwhelming to many people because you know, this is probably the fifth iteration of the DA issuing some sort of ultimatum. And one can understand that multiple things can be true at one time.
Hoos.
So you know, being undermined by your coalition partner in the form of presidence.
So Ramaposa unilaterally deciding.
To remove a president and you feel jilted, I mean a deputy minister rather, and you feel jilted about that. Sure you know you have the DA has all the right to to to feel that way. But secondly, this didn't come as a ball that of the blue. This was something that was addressed in cabin It. Ministers and deputy ministers were informed about this particular piece of legislation and that there is president in the form of William Mandela and the form of UH for Master road Lag. Yeah,
who were who were sacked because of this very thing? Right, if you feel like it's unjustified, you know the d A can can can you resist? But at the end of the day, the president had told the Democratic Alliance leader that give another name and and and we would replace that position. So it's it's it's almost what they call a d A position in the GNU. So if the d A decided to make this the hill they die on. If this is you know, the ultimate red line that or the line that they throwing in the sand,
there's absolutely no problem to it. But then you cannot issue an ultimatum and then uh make a decision that has no bearing on your participation in the GA in the GNU, because a National Dialogue doesn't even have a steering committee just yet, right, so we don't even know if it's going to be open to political parties, right.
Yeah, which makes me wonder. I mean, were they trying to seem like they were doing something, because when the forty eight hour period lapsed, we were now all waiting, and I suppose they had to make some sort of an announcement.
Yeah.
So the reality of it is that whether a president is governing by coalition or not, he is the president and in terms of the law, it's only him that hires and fires his executive Right. So, did Ramaposta do anything wrong? No, he just exercised his power that was given to him by the Democratic Alliance and many other political parties that now formed the g and U. If the DA decides by its own volition that this president that it had low owned its votes to in parliament
is not worthy and that the arrangement that they have. Remember, the g and u is basically a fancy way of saying, we borrow you our votes in parliament in exchange for positions.
Right.
So if the DA doesn't do its part, which is, for example, vote for a budget, because that's the only reason why you'd be in coalition is to to so that you can co govern and take things across the line.
That's the difficulty with a minority government, right, is that you you're not you're not always you're not always able to take things across the line when it comes to lawmaking, when it comes when it comes to pass or first in the in the first instant, you know, electing a president, secondly passing off budgets, thirdly making of legislation right, and then obviously further down the road is changing of the constitution et cetera.
Right.
So that's essentially what a g and u is is that it's an it's it's a it's a we decide we're going to govern together and as a result, we're going to support your endeavor as president ram A posa and the majority party being the ANC. Now the DA coming out and saying okay, let's forget about the national dialogue part of it, but saying we're going to go
vote against the budgets of corrupt ministers. It essentially says we are okay to that departments of a government that we are part of can hald to a grind, uh, you know, if we don't get our way, So we don't actually care if the minister if, for example, needy students get the money needed funded through the Department of Higher Education, because we have a problem with the sitting minister.
So that's where things become quite complicated. And what I argue today in my column News twenty four is that it becomes a charade because everyone knows that the real decision is whether you in or out.
One knows that.
The DA has threatened to leave at least five times when it was the Bella Act, when it became came to expropriation without compensation, when it came to the budget, and so now its just another iteration and people thought, oh, well, maybe they are serious, because maybe this is the line that they don't want to be crusted. But at the same time, the DA is living with the reality that they they they believe that it's better for them to
be in the GNU than out of the GNU. So this takes me to the the second argument that I made home so, which is, if you want to be in, then use your role of being in constructively instead of throwing tantrums. And previously I'd made the argument that do you threaten divorced to negotiate it with a house?
Is that the way? Is that the way to do it? Yes, well you should not.
So, I mean, it's a it's a complicated of course, one understands that, you know, it's a frustration that the democratic it can't be easy to co govern with a party that was your art enemy. But it's a decision that you've taken as a democratic alliance.
And so what does that look like?
And so for the ministers, the DA ministers, for example, the Minister of Homefairs, the Minister of Basic Education, they understand that this serves as a this serves as a trial run, this serves as.
A pre show.
It's it's a you know, an opportunity to show the electorate this is what we can do, right, and that's that's that's huge.
That's something the DA never really had in the past.
Right where you can actually go to the electorate with a set of deliverables, because the last election showed us that promises people are weary of promises from wherever it comes from, which is why the four largest party is on didn't grow in and obviously the ANC plummeted, and so did the E f F and.
So did the I f P.
Right, So this is in addition to the electric to say we had a stab at national government and this is what we do. So everybody cannot foresee the DA
walking away. Right, So the modus operandi of expressing dissatisfaction distain, et cetera, should it be this one of threatening to leave or threatening fracture and causing some sort of pandemonium in the country to say, well, we'll we wake up with the new national government or with a different national government or not every time things don't go your way. And so that I think is quite an interesting or for me at least a little bit concerning.
Yeah, I mean, you know, there's there's a there's a sentiment that, you know, from what happened this weekend, it's starting to look like the DA will won't actually ever leave, you know, it's it's starting to feel like it's going to take a whole lot for them to leave, and even when they make threats, they're not likely to stand by them. It's that it's not the sense that you're getting like leaving is becoming a fine distant I don't even want to say reality, but possibility for the DA.
And that's fine, homo.
So in the sense that if the DA has made the calculation, the political calculation that says, under no circumstance to be had, or we give the ANC what it wants, we will. We will challenge them at every corn we decide to be in the you know, with this government, with the ANC, if they don't want us, they must throw us away. That's that's a political decision that's made right. But then your actions have to back up that decision
and honor that, however politically inconvenient. So if you're saying you're not backing out of a GNU, you cannot at the same time say we are considering emotion of no confidence against the president because the g and U exists because of that president, that president, that legally elected president by more than half of members of Parliament, including the Democratic Alliance in Peace, that government exists because of him.
So if you're voting for a motion of no confidence against the president, you're effectively breaking apart the government as it stands. Right, So you can't have your cake and
eat it. If the DA decides we are on a mission to collapse the existing government led by presidents, then own it, right, But it cannot say that we will not leave the g and U. But at the same time we mulling emotion of no confidence, which effectively means not only the GNU as you know it, but the collapse of government completely.
Yeah, nationally, at.
Least a colia, what can what can we make of the president saying it's okay if you don't want to participate in the national dialogue. It's fine for the DA not to participate. However, if any minister doesn't participate, that's a that's a whole different story. In fact, I want to use the right language here because I think I remember the President in that story using the term was it in subordination? That you know, ministers must must participate and so for you know, someone like John cna is
and this is going to be difficult. What do you make of that?
Yeah?
So so that's that's exactly it right. Like I said earlier, we don't even know to what degree political parties were going to be involved in this, in this in this national dialogue. Right, so as a party, if the if the DA says we're not going to always sell time with it, they are cool fine, right, But ministers, this dialogue is the intersection of government, civil society, business and ordinary South Africans and chartering a way forward for the country.
Right it is an initiative of the seventh Administration. There are DA ministers in the seventh Administration, in the executive and therefore it's an unthinkable scenario where ministers are instructed
by a president by cabinet just don't pitch up. That is clear in subordination, if that, if it were to come to that, right and so again, I don't get the sense that within the executive itself and in the engagements between the competing equalitm not opposing competing political parties in the GNU, that there is an acrimony that exists.
I don't think.
So people will be surprised by how well some DA ministers get along with A ANDC ministers. In fact, sometimes they gossip to they gossip to their opponent about their comrades, right, because that's the nature of politics. And so this this world where you know, the geneus is just this frawth thing.
I don't think it's possible.
And and and honestly, I've argued many, many, many many times most political parties in the genu have done the maths and have come to the conclusion that it is better to be in than out.
And and yes.
There are times where the the you know, they have the envelope has to be pushed a little bit.
In trying to get your weight.
For example, the DA would say that what what I would call tantrums through around the budget was worth it because you don't have a budget, I mean, you don't.
Have a bat increase.
The On the other hand, there's a there's a looming reality that a calculation was made and that it's definitely more worthy to be in.
And so there's going to be all sorts of political maneuverings.
The other point that I wanted to make homes, which is an interesting one, is we must not forget that the DA's elective conference is less than a year away twenty twenty six, and as a country we only know to talk about factionalism slate politics, that narrative in the context of the ANC. We don't know it in the
context of any other political party. But the DA now has the same problems the A and C once had alone, which is that they have a taste of governance and power so once So that creates a whole different dynamic within the Democratic Alliance and a different set of interest.
Right access to power.
Changes the nature of internal party dynamics, and so decisions made about the GNU or how people show how you know, whether whether there's going to be a mass walkout by DA ministers or mass stay away or whatever it may be, or collective in subordination, however it may play out right on the fifteenth of August at the end of the day, that's a decision that if the leader takes it or whoever has the upper hand in ultimately deciding that, you know, it has some bearing on that sort of side position
within the DA. And we know for a fact that there's a competing in between those who believe the ANC is disrespecting the DA and that they must just leave, and they're there are those who believe that it's worth the discomfort of being in the A n C. In the Geneura with the a n C and and and and sell it to the public as an effort to block the extreme left in the form of the e
f F entering the Government of National Unity. So what I'm trying to say is that undoubtedly there's no sort of singular position when it comes to the Democratic Alliance, and that's why you'll always see it toulting or you know, because again before not there was not too much at stake, There was no there was no contest for state power internally.
And it happens anyway in politics. Politics becomes you know, in extreme sport when there's when there's real on the line versus theoretical power in the form of being an official opposition right. And we even saw that in smaller parties in the IFP when they got positions you know, in municipalities. We even saw it to some degree in the EFF where they started governing through coalition in Johannesburg
and Ecuornic for example. Power changes, power dynamics, and so the das are not immune to that, and I do think that it's going to be quite fascinating to see how that plays out. The point that I've argued today Homoso is that it could have been a lot more constructive.
Yep, we've got freelance journalists Creator Hunter talking us through her column on the DA's press briefing at the weekend and they position now in the GNU. She calls it a performative outrage. What else she got a tantrum? You call the tantrums. I've been calling it throwing toys out the cut and really it all means the same thing. You know this, This really does seem very performative by the DA, and I think we've all been wondering what this announcement not to be part of the National Dialogue
actually means. We are taking your contributions on zero double one, doua A three seven oh two, So please give us a call. I am seeing some of your sms is on the SMS line on ey time before I let you go. The summation of your column really is questioning what this announcement on the National Dialogue actually does or mean. But there's a second threat, so to speak, quote unquote threat by the DA where they basically say they won't
be voting voting, or they'll be voting down. I should say, the budgets of ministers that they deem to be corrupt. Isn't that a little more serious a threat than the initial.
Yeah, it is. And so it creates a.
Situation where the ANC cannot be comfortable that in the Government of National Unity all of the partners would support it and would have to do what it did for the budget, which is make individual deals a case by case with other mpace to make sure they have the majority to pass the budgets. And again it creates a cogmya for the ANC in some ways to say, then, for.
What reason are we.
Sort of blending power if you like, to the Democratic Alliance in the form of those thirteen executive positions, Because the understanding of the GNU and the statement of intend which is often invoked, is that the DA will then vote and pass legislation and support, et cetera. So it creates the room for the ANC, unprovoked or provoked rather or not not not self provoked at least, to say, then what do we need them for if if if it keeps you know, if the if the sort of
you know, the the barriers or the keep changing. And so definitely there were discussions already in the African National Congress about national working committee meeting about what this means. But there will definitely be an agitation in the any C when it meets quite soon about whether whether they
should just you know, eventually pull the trigger. And just like the d A in the A n C, there is that sort of uh crust between those who believe, you know, having the d A with the n C in government is good for the country, and they're those who are ehomintally opposed to it. And so this thing she ates on both sides the appetite for.
A relook of it.
But again, as we've seen with the multiple iterations of this before, whether you know, like I said, it was budget or before that expropriation, before that bella, et cetera, is that it comes down to the ANC saying we are not going to get rid of them and be blamed for the collapse of government as we know it, and the DA saying, well, we're not going to leave it willingly. So you know, who actually pulls the trigger becomes the interesting point.
I'm going to wrap this up with a question that maybe I should have started with, and that question is whether you think we are a step closer towards the end of this GNU.
I think just as a function of time, Yes, because remember this this doesn't outlast I think in its currenty relation the the you know, much after the local government elections.
Right again, the.
Incentive for parties are essentially just you know, to use it as a as a mechanism to show the election to what they can do with with limited power. So hopefully the elected will extend that power. Right And so I think that it's healthy like you know, throw tantrums right like the you know, that's that's the nature of coalition politics. It's exactly that push and pull and compromise, and it's just up to you to decide whether you want it to your participation to be constructive or not.
And that's not something I was going to hunt a yo Homoso can dictate to the DA. The DA has
to decide for itself. And given the reaction even from DA supporters to say you need to decide whether you're going to be a hardline or not, you can't threaten to be a heart to take a hard line position and then kind of you know, try to negotiate your way down and try to make it seem that you're flexing your muscle when there's actually nothing there, So it really is about whether or not the theatrics benefit the country or benefit the DA, And from where I'm standing,
it benefits nobody, not even the DA's only electric because as we know, there's only so many times you can cry wolf.
Cector Hunter, a freelance gennalist who's talking us through her column in News twenty four on the das I don't want to call I'm just gonna say press briefing this weekend where we saw the DA coming out to address or to give an address after giving that forty eight hour ultimatum to the present mina, thank you so much for joining us, and thank you for all your contributions.
Thank you very much,