As political parties in the Lichtenburg-based Ditsobotla Local Municipality in the North West campaign strongly ahead of next week’s by-elections, political analyst Professor Andre Duvenhage says the African National Congress (ANC) might not win an outright majority again. 15 parties and an independent candidate will be contesting the 20 wards and 19 proportional seats that are up for grabs.
Serious service delivery failures, corruption and maladministration led to the council being dissolved in September. Its equitable share was also withheld by Treasury.
The ANC previously held the majority support but smaller parties might give them a run for their money this time.
Ditsobotla Municipality residents voice frustrations at lack of services during Mashatile’s visit:
Nontenzizwa Mzwandile is the co-ordinator of the African People First (APF) and Benny Mosiane of the Save Ditsobotla Movement.
“Our manifesto is simple, we get our manifesto from our people. As you can see here in Scotland people do not have toilets, people do not have houses and also the local economy in Ditsobotla is poor. The APF will make sure that the economy is going to be where it used to be. That is the aim of the APF,” says Mzwandile.
“We are ready but we are anticipating that we won’t get less than five wards out of the 20 wards in Ditsobotla and obviously we will have some PR candidates but we are anticipating to get not less than 10 councillors. We might look ambitious but on the floor, we know that we have taken a lot from these other guys,” says Mosiane.
The Democratic Alliance (DA) which was previously the official opposition says if they win, service delivery will be their priority.
“First thing that we got to do is to sort out the finances of the municipality, we need to be transparent, pay off the debts and we need to put in place officials there because they are able to do the job and not there because they know somebody in the municipality. We need water engineers, electricity engineers, technicians and be able to fix the infrastructure that is collapsed so badly,” says John Steenhuizen the DA leader.
Possibility of coalition government
Political analyst Professor Andre Duvenhage says the possibility of a coalition government can also not be ruled out.
“I am expecting the EFF to perform better. Another interesting contest will that be between Democratic Alliance and the Freedom Front Plus. What is interesting is that Action South Africa is not also contesting, the Tax Payers Association, United Christian Democratic Party, etc,. But I am not expecting an absolute majority for the ANC,” says Duvenhage.
The by-elections will take place on Wednesday.
Zille blames ANC for poor service delivery in Ditsobotla Local Municipality:
