Cape Town – The Democratic Alliance on Wednesday dismissed an ethics complaint filed against its controversial MP Dianne Kohler Barnard as an election stunt and cautioned that it expected the upcoming local government vote to be “violent”.
DA chief whip John Steenhuisen told ANA: “We are in the election play pen and I expect this election to be increasingly violent, especially in provinces where the ANC are losing support.”
He was commenting on the ANC’s decision to file a complaint with Parliament’s ethics committee against Kohler Barnard, who was demoted to the backbenches of the official opposition after she re-posted a Facebook comment that suggested the country was better off under apartheid.
In a statement earlier on Wednesday the ANC chief whip’s office said DA leader Mmusi Maimane’s rejection of racism in a speech delivered at the Apartheid Museum rang hollow.
“Whilst Maimane yesterday waxed lyrical in his elaborate theatrical charade that racists are neither welcome nor should vote for the DA, a few weeks ago his party gave unrepentant racist Dianne Kohler Barnard a Christmas present to return to her parliamentary post as a reward for her racism and promotion of apartheid,” the office’s spokesman Moloto Mothapo said.
“ANC Chief Whip Stone Sizani, as announced last month, has now written to parliamentary ethics committee requesting it to probe Kohler-Barnard regarding her conduct. Her conduct is in clear violation of section 4 of the ethics code, which unequivocally states that ‘in the performance of their duties and responsibilities, (MPs must be) committed to the eradication of all forms of discrimination’.”
Steenhuisen said he viewed this as direct retaliation for the DA’s decision on Monday to file a complaint with the ethics committee against ANC MP Bongani Mkongi for “racist remarks, incitement of violence, and possible involvement in the removal of an anti-Zuma billboard”.
As tempers flared at the weekend over a vast billboard bearing the slogan “Zuma Must Fall” that was erected - it remains unclear by whom - at the top of Long Street in Cape Town, Mkongi on Facebook called for the Overbeek block of flats on which it was erected to be burnt down, along with its residents. He has subsequently apologised and Sizani said the ANC was therefore not planning to take any disciplinary measures against him.
The ruling party chief whip has accused the DA of being complicit in the erection of the billboard, saying the act bore the racist hallmark of its members and supporters.
Said Steenhuisen: “To date the ANC has failed – and certain structures even refused – to take disciplinary action against Mr Mkongi. Instead, the ANC Chief Whip in Parliament, Stone Sizani, today lodged a retaliatory complaint against a DA MP with the Ethics Committee.
“This illustrates a party far more interested in using disciplinary structures such as the Ethics Committee to settle political scores and intimidate the opposition as opposed to holding its MPs accountable for their calls and actions.”
African News Agency
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