DA Gauteng leader Solly Msimanga speaks to the media on DA’s position of budget votes in the Gauteng provincial legislature.
The DA in Gauteng will not support any budget votes by the ANC-led coalition, this despite parties in the provincial government of unity (PGU) previously expressing confidence that opposition parties would vote in passing of budgets and bills.
This week several MECs will be presenting their respective departments’ budgets for a vote in the legislature. This after Premier Panyaza Lesufi announced his new PGU cabinet last month despite the ANC failing to reach a majority in the Gauteng.
Briefing the media ahead of the house sittings of the provincial legislature to debate on budget votes, the DA outlined its position on the budget votes. Its Gauteng leader Solly Msimanga revealed that the party would not support of the budgets, saying they were not dealing with and adequately addressing the issues the province was facing.
According to Msimanga, this matter came up as “very glaring and needed to be addressed”.
He said:
Therefore, we will not be supporting these budgets. We thought that it will be important to inform members of the media and the public that we are going to go in there and debate why various things have to be reviewed or be relooked as these budgets to us are not talking to what the people of Gauteng are telling us.
“The current government continues to put budgets that are aimed at just spending and not improving people’s lives. The budgets are not aimed at growing the economy, or actually addressing the issues of safety and security at our schools and hospitals. In fact, what we’ve seen is a continuation and upward trend of the so-called priorities and these are, for us, what Panyaza [Lesufi] is using to really boost himself up instead of then delivering for the people.
“But ultimately, we’re hoping that sanity can prevail and that some of the things we are proposing are going to be taken up and implemented. Then ultimately, we’ll be able to serve the people of Gauteng.”
READ: Will Gauteng pass budgets without a majority?
With the PGU excluding the DA as it only made up of the Patriotic Alliance, the IFP and Rise Mzansi, Gauteng was now a minority government and the ANC-led coalition would require parties from outside its collective to pass any budgets. The coalition has 32 seats. EFF (11), unMkhonto weSizwe (eight) ActionSA (three), Freedom Front Plus (two), African Christian Democratic Party and Build One SA have one each.
The DA, which holds 22 of the 80 seats in the legislature, resolved to sit on the opposition benches after talks with the ANC to secure a majority government through coalition collapsed and the parties reached a deadlock over positions. Msimanga said the decision not to support the budgets was not because the DA was outside the PGU but rather it was based on issues the party wanted the ANC during the negotiations.
He added:
We would have still voted these budgets down, had it not been that when we were in cabinet, we would have been listened to. So, these are some of the things that made us not to go into cabinet. Which is to then say; let’s unpack decision-making. Let’s unpack how services are to be dealt with, how are we going to make sure that there are programmes that are aimed at delivering services.
“So, things like this wouldn’t have come forward because we would have dealt with them in cabinet or in the preparatory meetings. We would have had an opportunity to have a say in how these things are put forward or how we then deal with the adjustments, going forward. Therefore, we would have supported them in that instance.”
READ: ANC will form a government in Gauteng ‘with or without DA’, says Nciza
Msimanga added that the DA made it very clear that Johannesburg, Ekurhuleni and Tshwane metros required stable governments and needed clear leadership.
“We are not moving from that stance. We want that to happen. But what we don’t want is to just remove people willy nilly. There’s no plan in terms of how you stabilise government and also ensure that service delivery becomes the priority – not position-mongering being at the centre of what needs to happen,” he said. “We also want to make sure that the infrastructure that is falling apart in Gauteng is actually fixed.”
Lunga Simelane
www.news24.com
