PORT ELIZABETH, June 5 (ANA) – A handful of Democratic Alliance councillors from Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality’s northern areas pledged their allegiance and new-found loyalty to the African National Congress on Sunday.
Councillor’s Isaac Adams, Brian Kivedo, Isabel Wagenaar, Penny Naidoo, and Nico Du Plessis – all dressed in DA T-shirts – attended an ANC public meeting at the Helenvale Resource Centre where they officially embraced the ANC colours by changing into ANC T-shirts.
Hundreds of people also wearing DA T-shirts accompanied the councillors while dancing and singing along with ANC supporters.
Du Plessis, who represented ward 13 (Helenvale), was found guilty earlier this year by a DA disciplinary panel after being accused of using money from a councillor’s discretionary fund last year. He pleaded guilty to some of the charges and was stripped of all party offices for period of 18 months in February.
He told the crowd that DA Nelson Mandela Bay mayoral candidate Athol Trollip was power hungry and wanted “all the positions” in the DA. he claimed there was “no fairness” or “any opportunity” in the DA and councillors serving under the DA did not feel valued.
“We won 10 wards from the ANC in 2011, we were responsible for that. We won four wards from our own constituency from the ANC. We won in the northern areas from 42 percent to 82 percent… but there is no place on the list for us coloured people or black people,” he said.
Adams, from ward 11, said the group felt they had been marginalised by the DA. “We are staunch supporters of mayor Danny Jordaan in what he wants to do and where he wants to take the metro. The only way we can support him is to leave the DA.”
The councillors joining the ANC posed a potential threat to the DA as many of the wards were currently DA strongholds. About 450 DA members would now join the ANC, he said.
Naidoo, from ward 31, said she was joining the ANC because the party was giving her an opportunity to extend her services to the community. She believed Jordaan was an “authentic person” and she supported his vision for the metro.
ANC Deputy Secretary General Jessie Duarte told the gathering she felt a bit emotional as people had now “come home” to where they belonged.
“Some political parties were born to keep people apart. The ANC taught us to respect the dignity of every human being. I think Madiba would have been proud, as he taught us that there is no difference between people who speak Xhosa, Afrikaans, English, Sotho… We must make sure the DA maybe gets one percent in Nelson Mandela Bay,” she said.
Jordaan called on voters to choose between a mayor from Bedford (Trollip) or a mayor from Bethelsdorp on election day on August 3.
“We were born here, we grew up here… the first challenge in the metro is unemployment. People ask how we will create jobs? The 36 percent unemployment cannot be accommodated in the auto motor sector. We must develop other sectors like the oceans economy,” he said.
– African News Agency (Photo:ANA)
