Johannesburg - A night before the DA’s crucial policy conference, the so-called “black caucus” plotted its strategies at the house of the party’s parliamentary leader Lindiwe Mazibuko, signalling a breakdown in her relationship with her mentor and leader Helen Zille.
It is understood that some senior leaders in the party were uncomfortable about the dinner, questioning why white colleagues had not been invited.
In what could be construed as a realignment of factions within the party,
fiery DA MP Masizole Mnqasela – who has been openly critical of Mazibuko and is believed to be central to a campaign to remove her – was also present at the meeting in Bo Kaap, Cape Town, last Friday.
As the rift between Mazibuko and Zille grows, some of the DA’s black leaders are forming up around the parliamentary leader.
Also present at Mazibuko’s house were DA deputy federal chairman Makashule Gana and Khume Ramulifho, leader of Gauteng South, the party’s biggest region. A source said the DA’s candidate for premier, Mmusi Maimane, was also invited to the meeting.
The Sunday Independent could not confirm whether he attended the dinner. He could not be reached for comment.
Ramulifho said there had been nothing untoward about the meeting at Mazibuko’s place; the gathering had been a platform to get to know one another, not to tell people what to say at the policy conference.
“Before any major meeting we get together as a colleagues and friends. It is a normal thing.” he said. “I am only surprised now, that people are calling it a black caucus because we met Lindiwe. When we meet with other people, we are not called a black caucus.”
Ramulifho said he also happened to attend meetings where there were people from all walks of life.
“What we don’t want is to see our colleagues fighting. We felt embarrassed when Masi (Mnqasela) and Lindiwe were fighting in public. We had observed that we don’t have a platform where we network,”
Gana said there was nothing sinister about Mazibuko’s meeting – it was simply “the politics of the stomach”. “So we as black people are not suppose to have dinner? When black people meet, it is a black caucus. The black caucus is the figment of their imagination,” he said.
Mnqasela confirmed the meeting but said it was a social event and not a caucus for the policy conference.
“There was nothing new about getting together. We meet all the time. Here we had a braai because we wanted to get together as people who share the same values,” he said. Mnqasela said he and Mazibuko had buried the hatchet.
“We were never enemies,” he said, adding that he had friends of all races.
His comments came after a major fallout between the two when Mnqasela penned a document in which he said Mazibuko was too inexperienced and not black enough to lead the DA in Parliament.
The comments raised Zille’s ire, as she accused Mnqasela of thinking like Hendrik Verwoed, the architect of apartheid.
The DA’s policy conference and meeting of the black caucus came after weeks of public bashing of the party’s lack of clarity on policies that were meant to empower black people and redress past imbalances, including affirmative action and black economic empowerment.
The “black caucus” is a group of senior black DA leaders who were unhappy with the party’s vacillation on these policies.
Zille had to apologise for the party’s flip-flopping on employment equity. Zille said Mnqasela told her that he would be having supper at Lindiwe’s. “He said, jokingly, that the media would probably refer to them as the black caucus and we had a good laugh.
“There was a (picture) of about five people, Lindiwe’s dinner guests, on social media. No-one would have made such a post if there was any underhanded motive. It so happened that her dinner guests that night were black, but so what? If five white people get together to have dinner, do we call it a white caucus? We believe in freedom of association,” she said. Mazibuko refused to comment.
Sunday Independent