A DAY IN A LIFE OF A POLITICIAN MADE ME THINK TWICE

I am one of the 100 aspirant public representatives who were admitted onto the Democratic Alliance's Potential Candidate Programme which ran during the course of 2013. Amongst other tasks, one had to spend a day with your political mentor. Most of the mentors were Members of Parliament (MPs) or a Member of the Provincial Legislature (MPLs). My mentor was Mr. Mike Moriarty (MPL) and I had the opportunity to do "A Day in the Life of MP/L" with him.

Mike Moriarty and I agreed to meet and spend a day together at the Gauteng Provincial Legislature. Upon my arrival, we exchanged pleasantries and Moriarty introduced me to some of his colleagues whose offices are adjacent to his. Moriarty spent some time explaining to me how the Gauteng Provincial Legislature is structured. He distinguished between the elected members, political leadership, and administrative management.

We left Moriarty's office and walked to the House. As we walked to the house, Moriarty explained how the legislature functions. He made the distinction between the Provincial Legislature, the National Assembly, and the National Council. Once in the House, Moriarty ushered me to the VIP Gallery. Directly opposite were African National Congress (ANC) supporters sitting in the Public Gallery. I saw some of these people earlier, getting off the mini-buses, as I walked into the legislature. It looked to me like ‘rent-a-crowd' thing.

This was my first time in the House. It was interesting to observe some protocols when the Speaker of the House arrived. Interestingly, there were no protocols and rituals when the Gauteng Premier, the Hon Nomvula Mokonyane arrived in the House. It was very clear to me that the ‘Boss of the House' was the Hon Speaker. When a Member leaves the House, she / he will bend forward to show respect to the Speaker; and the Speaker shall in return nod. I wished we have something like this in academia and business.

The session started by MPLs making some declarations. The declarations were approved by all MPLS.

After the declarations, the Premier and Members of the Executive Committee (MECs) provided oral responses to the oral questions posed by the MPLs. MPLs, mainly from the DA, engaged the premier and MEC's with several follow-ups questions.

The third item of the agenda was the discussion of the Annual Report of the Office of the Premier. During this agenda item, gloves were off amongst the DA MPLs and the ANC MPLs. The DA MPLs were critical of the performance of the Office of the Premier and they backed-up their claims and assertions with data and statistics. The Premier and the ANC MPLs appeared to be on the back-foot. However, when the ANC MPLs started to talk, the atmosphere changed and the DA MPLs appeared to be ‘feeling the heat'. Whereas the DA MPLs provided data to support their claims, the ANC MPLs were not interested in statistics, but they were literally hurling accusations to the DA MPLs.

Amongst others, the ANC MPLS accused the DA for the legacy of the apartheid. I found this to be disingenuous; totally wrong and unfair. When the Premier hot a chance to speak; she blamed the DA for only providing services to their "white voters" in the Western Provincial Government and she claimed that the DA was neglecting black citizens in the municipalities in which they govern.

 At this stage, I was experiencing mixed feelings, I felt both sad and angry. I asked myself - How dare they make such claims that are pure lies? At the end of each phrase, the ANC ‘rented crowd' in the Public Gallery clapped hands and shouted in support of the Premier. I asked myself a question - "Why the DA didn't brought its supporters?" But then I also thought - two wrongs don't make right.

Before going back to the office, I got some lunch in the canteen of the legislature. The food was extremely cheap and delicious. As we walked to the DA Caucus Room to get some tea / coffee, I asked Moriarty why they (DA MPLs) allowed the ANC to tell blatant lies without challenging them. He explained that ANC MPLs were just politicking and one doesn't have to get emotional about it. He further told me that ANC MPLs had an advantage of being the last people to talk. As Moriarty was explaining, I asked myself if I have thick skin to deal with such attacks. "Won't I take it personally?"; "Do I really want to be an MP/L and share a House with such insensitive ANC people?" I asked myself.

Once we got settled in the office, Moriarty took some time explaining the responsibilities of the Public Representatives, both in the Provincial Legislature and the National Assembly. There are lots of similarities. He also taught me the functions of the Portfolio Committees, and provide some examples of files and reports in his office; these included the Departments Annual Performance Plans, Departments Annual Reports, Auditor General Reports, and Quarterly Annual Reports.

During our deliberations in the office after the session in the House I started to feel tired and politely asked to leave. Moriarty was magnanimous, but asked me to have a look at his weekly schedule so that I can have a sense of the workload of the MP/L. He told me that it was very rare that he doesn't take some work home. While having a look at his calendar, I noted that there were more than 105 emails that he received that day and he still had to read them. I also remembered that he also has lots of responsibility as the DA Gauteng Provincial Chairperson. It was very clear to me that in his Legislature's and DA's email boxes, Moriarty receives about 200 emails per day.

As I walked to my car, I asked myself: "Do I really want to leave the academia and business worlds and become a politician? Too much work and stress, but very little money. Shouldn't I continue with my private life and raise a family quietly? I thought. I got answers to my questions from President Barack Obama who said: "Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we'have been waiting for. We are the change that we seek".

Rabelani Dagada is DA Candidate for the National Assembly

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