Cape Town – A Patriotic Alliance (PA) leader in Matzikama has ditched the party and joined the DA together with one of the party’s councillors.
The leader, Brenden Owies, and councillor Christo Boks were welcomed at a press conference earlier today.
Their move comes after the PA announced that it was dumping the DA as its coalition partners in two Western Cape municipalities, which includes Matzikama.
The pair said their constituency does not agree with the decision taken by the party to dump the DA as coalition partners. The decision opens a door for the ANC to govern the municipality with the assistance of the PA and smaller parties.
DA interim provincial leader Tertuis Simmers said yesterday that councillor Boks went back to his ward to consult his voters and the overwhelming response was to give their councillor a mandate to resign from the PA and join the DA.
“They indicated that they would prefer the DA to run the Matzikama Municipality, instead of smaller parties that enable the ANC,” said Simmers.
Simmers added that from across the Western Cape, especially in the rural areas, there is an outpouring of frustration by voters towards smaller parties that have effectively sold out their voters and are enabling the ANC to continue its stunt of poor service delivery where it governs.
“Because of the DA’s positive track record of good governance and service delivery, especially in vulnerable communities, Councillor Boks and Mr Owies are excited to join the DA. We are confident that they will contribute towards us winning the ward and retaining the Matzikama Municipality, ensuring that good governance continues in Matzikama.”
The PA was caught by surprise that its members left the party to join the DA. National chairperson Marlon Daniels said he was not aware of the planned exit by the highly ranked members.
“I had a meeting with the councillor over the weekend and there was no indication that he had intentions of leaving the PA. People can tell you things, you will never get to the truth as to why he has taken the decision. That is the art of politics.”
PA president Gayton McKenzie took to Facebook with a screenshot of a tweet from a Weekend Argus reporter reacting to the news.
“I was just informed about one of our councillors who walked over to the DA. The leader of the PA in Matzikama also joined him at his new home. We, the leaders of the PA, wish them well and have nothing bad to say about them.
“This is the nature of politics, you lose some and you gain some. The PA is all about growth, we wish you growth even if it’s not with us; go well and make our people proud.”
McKenzie said they will be making some announcements regarding their next move in Matzikama very soon.
“We are also aware that the DA went on a huge drive to sign up PA councillors. I wanna thank those 14 councillors that informed us about the advances of the DA.”
Weekend Argus