The DA ‘still favour coalitions’
THE DA had a vision for South Africa shared by all and with opportunities for all – so said party leader John Steenhuisen in his Day of Reconciliation address.
Steenhuisen said his party still believed that coalition governments were the way to go despite their crushing loss of control of the City of Joburg and the imminent loss of the Pretoria metro.
“As we approach the end of the year and reflect on the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead in 2020, let us pause on this Day of Reconciliation to gauge where we stand as a country, and where we ought to be heading.
“Twenty-five years into our democracy one would have hoped that the scars of our divided past were well on their way to healing, and that the symbolic freedom of 1994 would have translated into a real, substantive freedom for millions of South Africans who had been locked out of opportunity and the economy. But the reality is that ours is still a country beset by crippling poverty and deep divides,” Steenhuisen said.
He said instead of highlighting how far we had come as a society, Reconciliation Day instead served to point out how far we still had to go, saying it reminded us that we once shared a dream for a united, inclusive and reconciled South Africa, and that our current course was taking us further and further away from that dream.
Steenhuisen said not everyone shared this dream, adding many in the country still benefited from keeping us mistrustful of one another.
According to Steenhuisen, there were many for whom conflict, blame and resentment were powerful weapons with which to cling to power, and these people would continue to drive wedges between us.
“But that can’t be the future of our country. There are too many of us who want to make it work – who have the same vision of a South Africa shared by all and with opportunities for all – for us to give in to those who only seek to divide.
“Our challenges may be daunting, but they are not insurmountable. If we act now, and if we harness the power of all those who want what’s best for South Africa, we still have enough time to overcome these challenges. This will require a new kind of coalition that truly has the interests of ordinary South Africans at heart.
“Some will point to the collapse of the coalitions and voting agreements in certain metros as proof that coalitions do not work in South Africa. But that is simply not true. Coalitions do work, as long as the partners stand in agreement on their core objectives and principles.
“This means that they have to agree on building an inclusive economy around sustained economic growth; they have to agree on clean, corruption-free governance and they have to respect the Constitution and the rule of law. With that as an unshakable foundation, we can make any coalition work for the people,” Steenhuisen said.
He said the DA made a very complex coalition work in the City of Cape Town back in 2006, and it came very close to doing so in Nelson Mandela Bay.