Hypocritical ANC doesn’t care about investment and jobs

The ANC has shown yet again just how little it values job-creating investment in South Africa with its petty, hypocritical attack on the Mayor of Tshwane, Solly Msimanga, following his visit to Taipei in Taiwan.

With 9 million jobless South Africans, the DA praises the attempt by Mayor Msimanga to encourage investment in South Africa. This is what our country needs to create jobs and fight poverty.

This simply isn’t a priority for the ANC - they are a party of cronyism, fighting to protect corrupt interests. The people of Tshwane, like the rest of South Africa, come stone last.

The reality is that their baseless attacks stem from their unwillingness to accept that they have lost control of many municipalities across South Africa.

The DA reminds the ANC that neither the ANC nor the national government it runs can dictate who DA Mayors meet with in order to obtain job-creating investment, and that such international trips are allowed.

Indeed, the former ANC Mayor of Tshwane, Kgosientso Ramokgopa, embarked on international trips to encourage growth – including a 12-day business trip to the United States.

The ANC should also be duly reminded - so as to end their glaring hypocrisy – that South Africa maintains relations with Taiwan through the South African Liaison Office in Taiwan.

That the party of national government chooses to ignore this in order to score cheap political points, demonstrates precisely why our country’s foreign policy is such a mess, no longer based on Madiba’s six pillars and most importantly, human rights.

The DA is committed to creating jobs, delivering better services and stopping corruption where we govern. We will not let an uncaring, hypocritical ANC stand in the way of DA governments doing their job for all the people.

Statement issued by Stevens Mokgalapa MP - DA Shadow Minister of International Relations and Cooperation, 2 July 2016