Former Johannesburg mayor Mpho Phalatse unpacked the challenges and opportunities facing coalitions with Daily Maverick senior journalist Queenin Masuabi.
Former Johannesburg Mayor Dr Mpho Phalatse sat down with Daily Maverick senior political journalist Queenin Masuabi to unpack the challenges and opportunities associated with coalitions.
“Ideally, you need an administration that can be insulated from political instability. You need technocrats in the city to carry on the work of delivering services regardless of what is happening at the political level. Often, that’s not what happens,” Phalatse said.She was the executive mayor of Johannesburg in a DA-led coalition from November 2021 to January 2023. The coalition crashed and burned when Phalatse was“A good example is when I was ousted in September for 25 days,” Phalatse said.
“Unfortunately, because of that, the city gets affected, service delivery gets affected, people start dragging their feet and there is sabotage.” “This caused a lot of discontent from other parties. There was disagreement on whether our voices are the same irrespective of the number of seats we bring to the coalition.”
Phalatse responded: “You are absolutely right. However, those initial negotiations were not really based on what position people were getting. But there was gross mistrust. “The history between the DA and ActionSA is noteworthy and is not to be taken lightly. Herman Mashaba, the founder of ActionSA, was a DA mayor. When he left the Democratic Alliance, he was disgruntled. He felt he was pushed out of the DA.”
“They needed to outdo the DA. They were not supportive of me as mayor and often undermined my authority. They did not allow me to do oversight over their work and did not really work well transversely with other portfolios outside of ActionSA. So, by far, they were the most difficult coalition partners to work with.”
Beaumont referred to the dispute between ActionSA and the DA over the proposed appointment of Johann Mettler as city manager in 2022, noting that Phalatse had met him prior to his interview, risking the appointment being overturned in court. The DA at the time accused ActionSA of undermining its coalition partner.
The first was the introduction of a percentage threshold for every seat to ensure that smaller parties did not dominate negotiations. “There was a motion every month. There was no limit. It’s ridiculous and it doesn’t bode well for service delivery.” “Here’s what I see. We had unity as South Africans, but we have great fragmentation now. We had the Freedom Charter as a vision that we all bought into, but we also had leadership. We had elders.
Like any successful partnership, coalitions need high intellectual capabilities but also emotional and social IQs. Willingness to learn, listen, see others point of view even if in disagreement is essential. This is addition to having a clear understanding of why you’re there to begin with; excellent service provision to the constituents.
This illustrates well the lack of vision of our current political parties. Much of it is the politics of revenge. EFF, DA, COPE, … Much as I hate to say it, the IFP seems to have actually matured the most as a party, from the days of the IFP-ANC war in the Midlands during the 80s and 90s.
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