The Democratic Alliance (DA) provincial and local leadership hosted a stakeholder engagement session at the Royal Port Alfred Golf Club recently. The DA Ndlambe caucus leader, PR councillor Sikhumbuzo ‘Skura’ Venene dwelled on the DA’s plans to address local issues and provincial caucus leader Nqaba together with constituency leader Kevin Mileham discussed the DA’s national agenda.
Water and sewage was the crisis on every resident’s lips, said Venene. He said the DA was considering escalating the issue of water to South African Human Right Commission on the basis citizens’ constitutional right were being violated. He said the alternative, using court processes, would allow the municipality to use ratepayers’ money to defend themselves.
“We need to be strategic,” Venene said. “We will not rest as the Democratic Alliance until we win that battle. We have given them enough time.”
Venene said the water crisis affected tourism and the agricultural economy.
“The agricultural community is mourning now and again because how are you going to grow that economy if you do not have water?” he said. “With the issue of sewage, there is hope because part f the new budget is allocated to address that,” he said.
Venene noted that most of Ndlambe’s revenue comes from Ward 10.
He emphasised the party’s concern about the unsustainability of staff salary increases.
Mileham and Bhanga briefed local residents on the DA’s national agenda. Mileham focused on the Basic Education Laws Amendments (BELA) bill, cadre deployment and fuel prices – issues the DA is currently dealing with at national level.
Said the bill sought to take away the power of school governing bodies to determine admissions and to determine language policy and puts it in the education minister’s hands.
“We are fighting this with everything we have because it should be up to the school to determine to what they can do.”
Speaking about cadre deployment, he said it was one of the things that the Zondo Commission findings had questioned, adding that the DA had long questioned the practice. He asserted it had led to state capture, mismanagement and corruption while also putting the ruling party’s people in positions of power.
“You cannot be a member of a political party if you are appointed into government office,” he said. “A political party should have absolutely no say in the appointment process of people into government office. We want a professional public sector,” he said.
Regarding fuel prices, Mileham said prices could be reduced by cutting the general fuel levy which costs consumers about R3, 93 cents per litre. He said rather than raising fuel prices they sought to implement new measures to deal with discrepancies in the Road Accident Fund.
“At the moment 80% of that makes lawyers rich while victims only get 20%.”
“We are not saying scrap it out because there are too many people for whatever reasons who don’t know how to get insurance,” he said.
Provincial leader Bhanga echoed Mileham’s words on the BELA bill.
“I want all of us to take this bill very seriously. It takes the independence of schools and centralises it in national and provincial government. We know what a mess the government has made in township schools,” he said.
Bhanga said he had recently travelled throughout the Eastern Cape and had visited agricultural schools which had no livestock.
He touched on the disadvantages of multiparty coalitions, saying small parties came with unrealistic demands, such as inexperienced candidates being placed in crucial senior positions such as finance portfolios.