The rift between the DA and EFF over the motion to dissolve Parliament was unlikely to lead to the two parties cutting ties and handing over power back to the ANC in the country’s crucial metros.
An analyst said yesterday that the DA and EFF were bound not to agree on the matter.
This comes as Parliament said no date had been set for the motion to be tabled in the House.
Parliament’s spokesperson Moloto Mothapo said the DA would have to wait its turn to be heard in the chamber.
Professor Dirk Kotze of Unisa said the DA and EFF do not have a coalition as such in Tshwane and the City of Joburg. “They don’t have the official coalition. They have common understanding that they will vote together on certain issues.”
He said the EFF was of the view that the motion of no confidence against President Jacob Zuma delivered 35 ANC MPs to the opposition because they wanted Zuma to go.
Kotze said the new motion by the DA to dissolve Parliament was trying to unseat the ANC, and that was where they disagreed with the EFF.
“What the EFF is saying is that those ANC MPs won’t support this motion,” he said.
“That is why other opposition parties don’t support them, because it is unlikely to succeed.”
Kotze said he did not think the latest fight between the DA and EFF would affect their coalitions in the metros.
DA spokesperson Phumzile van Damme urged the EFF to support the motion to force Zuma out of office.
She said the EFF’s suggestion that the DA’s 89 MPs must resign en masse to force the dissolution of Parliament was wrong, and this was backed by constitutional law experts.
Van Damme said that if this were to happen, Parliament would continue to function with a clear majority of the ANC and no opposition.
Parliament has 400 members, and the EFF said that if there were fewer than 350 MPs in the House, this would lead to the dissolution of the chamber in terms of the constitution.
The EFF has maintained its stance that it will not support the DA motion. It has said the ANC has a mandate to govern the country until the next round of elections in 2019.