DA’s intervention plan to rescue Gauteng and KZN residents from ANC/EFF coalition’s water crisis and service delivery failures

18 March 2024

The Democratic Alliance (DA) today announces the five-point intervention plan to address the governance and political instability we have seen in the country’s major metropolitan areas.

The instability in these cities is due to coalitions that are bound by gentlemen’s agreements and not by good governance principles that place the residents at the heart of the governance agenda.

Over the past fortnight, we have seen how unstable coalition governments led by the ANC/ EFF coalitions have led to unprecedented water shortages, with residents going days without any water in most parts of Johannesburg and eThekwini. In eThekwini, a long series of infrastructure maintenance and service delivery failures, coupled with an illegal SAMWU strike, has plunged the City into paralysis.

These systemic service delivery issues have been caused and exacerbated with the coming to power of the ANC/EFF coalitions. Unless residents of these metropolitan areas are rescued from the coalitions of corruption, we will continue to see these cities plunge into even more chaos.

That is why we are pleased to announce today that the final two bills in our trilogy of coalition bills, originally announced in October 2022, have now been introduced into Parliament to regulate coalitions in local governments. These Bills will aim to regulate the following:

Extending the time limit to appoint mayors and speakers, from 14 days to 30 days to allow for coalition partners more time to properly negotiate a successful coalition;

Insert an electoral threshold that would require parties to obtain a certain number of votes before they can qualify for seats in council;

Limit the number of motions of no confidence that can be brought against a mayor or speaker, to once per twelve month period – subject to certain exceptions thereafter.

Today, the DA plans to introduce its five-point intervention plan to rescue residents from the severe water shedding and service delivery collapses gripping Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal (KZN).

The five-point intervention plan to rescue Gauteng and KZN is as follows:

Introducing the final two Private Member's Bills of the trilogy of Coalition Bills to regulate and prevent unstable coalition governments.

Urgent Call to the President to mobilise the South African National Defence Force (SANDF) to make use of their logistical infrastructure and water tankers, as a short term measure, to ensure that those residents most affected by water losses are able to get clean drinking water until the water crisis has been solved.

Calling on local and provincial governments to set up and encourage public-private partnership to collaboratively address the water-shedding crisis, leveraging resources and expertise from both sectors to find sustainable solutions.

Calling on SAPS to establish a Specialised SAPS Investigating Team to deal with and investigate acts of sabotage contributing to the service delivery collapse and ensure they report back to the Portfolio Committee in the National Assembly on their progress made.

Government Support for NGOs and NPOs: The DA will urge the government to onboard and allocate funds to non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and non-profit organisations (NPOs) to provide support to the worst-affected areas due to the water shedding crisis, ensuring assistance reaches those in dire need.

Political instability is at the heart of this service delivery crisis and we cannot allow these doomsday coalitions and smaller parties to hold cities to ransom to receive powerful and lucrative positions.

We call on all parties in Parliament to support these Bills when they come to the House for a vote. Once we have a legislative framework for coalition governments, we will be able to hold governments to account for service delivery. These Bills should be passed before the May election in order to prepare the country for possible provincial and national coalition governments.

The DA has a plan to ensure that these parties who do not enjoy the confidence and support of the people are not the ones being kingmakers over major metros.

On the 29th of May, South Africans will have two choices. Vote for a Dooms Day coalition of destruction or vote for the DA and rescue South Africa once and for all.

Issued by Siviwe Gwarube, Chief Whip of the Official Opposition, 18 March 2024