Own goals not helping the DA

Hypocrisy is a trait that the official opposition party cannot afford leading into its campaign to replace the ANC as the ruling party in 2019.

One of the most difficult transitions for a political party must be moving from being the ruling party to the opposition benches, especially if you never even contemplated the possibility of that happening. That’s what happened to the ANC in three metropolitan municipalities after the local government elections last year in August. One minute they were allocating how funds were going to be spent and the next they were criticising how the DA-led coalition executive committees were allocating funds to be spent. No preparation, no shock absorbers. That’s politics.

It was very curious this past week to hear of the DA suspending Patricia de Lille and a member of her executive, JP Smith, over allegations that security renovations to her private home were done using public funds.

Any right-thinking South African will know that if there is a sin that an opposition party should not indulge in, it is doing anything that resembles Nkandlagate. Not if they’re serious about dislodging the ruling party from the throne come 2019.

It’s early days yet to tell whether there’s any real substance to the allegations that De Lille has done a Jacob Zuma, but one can say that for Mmusi Maimane to see fit to suspend the mayor of Cape Town from participating in party activities, there is a perception created that there’s something to the allegations.

De Lille, even before joining the DA, was projected as a one-woman crusade against corruption, right from the time that she presented the arms deal dossier in parliament that led to the 783 corruption charges that are an albatross around the neck of the president.

She unwittingly placed herself in a class of those that chose to throw stones at others’ glass houses. It would therefore not only be regrettable for the DA for her to be caught with her fingers in the cookie jar, it would be highly hypocritical.

And hypocrisy is a trait that the official opposition party cannot afford leading into its campaign to replace the ANC as the ruling party in 2019.

But the DA seems to be on the path of scoring own goals lately.

Hardly a few months ago, when the Black First Land First party chose a very intimidatory tactic of demonstrating outside the homes of journalists perceived as being a front for white monopoly capital, the DA was up in arms, telling all and sundry about how that is not only an infringement on press freedom but also a threat to the journalists’ basic human rights and security.

Fast-forward to last week when the leadership of the DA saw fit to lead a demonstration to 1 Saxonwold Drive, the Guptas’ compound. No amount of sugar coating can sweeten the Guptas presence in our political landscape, but they remain human beings with the same need to privacy and security as the journalists harassed by the BLF.

It is easy to justify questionable tactics when dealing with individuals with chequered reputations, but a voter can sniff hypocrisy from a mile away. It is that voter that the DA needs to effect a regime change. The voter who says if you screamed for Zuma to step down because of Nkandlagate, put processes in motion for the removal of one of your own if they did what the president did.