For two decades, the DA has run Cape Town. In that period, the city’s population has grown to more than 5-million — testament, some would say, to how well it is run. Now, with just three weeks until November’s local government election, the party is dead set on retaining the majority that has given it free rein.
On a sweltering morning on October 10, thousands of DA supporters gathered at Erica Park Sports Ground in Belhar. People had come from all over the province, from places such as Saldanha Bay on the West Coast and the Overberg. The scene was a sea of blue, with people carrying placards that read “Make communities safer” and “Creating more local jobs”.
Among the DA high command at the rally was Western Cape leader Tertuis Simmers. Speaking to the FM on the sidelines of the event, he said he was “shocked” to see 55 parties would be contesting the elections in Cape Town. But he is confident that this won’t affect his party’s chances to keep the metro, which it won with 58% in 2021.
“All of the parties, bar the DA, are fishing in the same pond. They are cannibalising each other,” he said. “A lot of people a few weeks ago said we’re going to lose our majority in the city of Cape Town. You can see by today’s turnout from across the province … this is the response.”
Asked if he is concerned about the growth of the Patriotic Alliance (PA), which has won several by-elections from the DA in the past few years, he argued that the PA’s growth is “not natural”.
“What the PA has managed to do in certain non-metro areas is that it’s actually been working with other local parties. It’s to create the façade of this fastest-growing party.”
Still, he said, “the by-election is a dipstick in the mood of voting at that moment in time. It doesn’t determine [the outcome of] November 4, but it’s something I’ve been monitoring.”
DA federal chair Solly Msimanga is of much the same opinion. “It would be foolish of us to say we don’t take notice [of the PA],” he told media at the rally. “But to say that we are worried, I think it’s an overstretch. We have seen that they’ve got nothing else to offer except criticism of the DA. Wherever the likes of the PA have been given an opportunity, they’ve failed.”
Msimanga was bullish about Cape Town, and the Western Cape in general.
“People are leaving other areas and coming into the Western Cape because they can see there are prospects of them getting a better job, getting better services, living a better life,” he said.
By way of example, he compared Khayelitsha with Thembisa and Alexandra in Gauteng. “Tell me the people of Khayelitsha are not living a better life. We’re not saying that it is a perfect life, but it is something that we’re working on,” he said.
“We also need to ensure that this thing of fixing municipalities doesn’t happen only here in the Western Cape, because the more you fix here in the Western Cape, and you neglect somewhere else like in the Eastern Cape, the more problems you create for the Western Cape.”
Metro in the bag?
A common theme at the event was the effect of smaller parties on the ballot. After the 2021 local government election, 16 of 30 municipalities were led by coalitions. More coalitions could become a reality outside the metro if they gain traction.
Paul Berkowitz, political analyst at The South Africa Brief, says parties that stand to benefit from “softening DA support” include the PA, the National Coloured Congress and the Freedom Front Plus. Still, recent polls suggest the DA is on track for a clear majority.
“I expect more fragmentation in general in the Western Cape. The Cape Town metro is [in] a unique situation where the metro has about two-thirds of the registered voters in the whole province,” he says. “Winning Cape Town helps to set the DA up for national and provincial elections, but the party is vulnerable outside the metro, particularly in smaller, rural municipalities where the PA is likely to win a lot of DA seats.”
Political analyst Daniel Silke agrees that the PA is probably the DA’s biggest threat in the Western Cape. It’s done relatively well in rural areas, he says, but less so in Cape Town.
“Within the metro … I think the DA remains solid; I expect them to still eke out a majority in Cape Town without requiring a coalition partner. In fact, it’ll be a substantial disappointment to the DA if they had to drop even to marginally below 50%,” he says.
In Berkowitz’s view, the DA is likely to lose some support compared with 2021 — not just through competition from other parties, but also “the softening of some of its base due to affordability issues”.
Indeed, opposition parties regularly point to affordability as the reason they should be given a chance to govern the city.
“Cape Town cannot become a city where nurses, teachers, police officers, municipal workers, hospitality workers and young professionals are forced to live further and further away from the opportunities they help create,” ActionSA mayoral candidate Dereleen James said at an event last week.
“The city and province have access to strategically located public land. The question is no longer whether land exists; the question is why Capetonians are still waiting for delivery.”
It’s a point echoed by PA mayoral candidate Cheslyn Daniels. He says the city has decided that the CBD belongs to the wealthy, while the poor remain on the periphery.
“The PA’s commitment is clear: affordable housing, safety and fair rates. We will govern with the people in mind, not big business, not political connections. The DA has had its chance. Now it’s our turn,” says Daniels.
GOOD has also weighed in on the affordability and housing crises, with mayoral candidate Brett Herron telling the FM recently that the DA deserves to lose its majority as a result.
“They were very arrogant around the rates increases and the tariff increases,” he says. “They were somewhat disingenuous around the rates increases because they brought forward a general valuation by a whole year. The law requires a general evaluation of our properties to take place every four years. They did it after three years to cash in on [the] upswing in property values.”
However, Herron is coy on possible coalitions in Cape Town and other parts of the Western Cape. “We haven’t ever, and we will never, say we won’t work with this party and we are going to bed with that party. We will make decisions for all the municipalities we’re contesting after the elections,” he says.
‘Protecting progress’
That may be, but with a majority in its sights, the DA is on the offensive. “Only the DA can continue [the] progress we have made, and only the DA can defeat the chaos of the PA, ANC, GOOD and EFF,” party leader Geordin Hill-Lewis told the crowd at Saturday’s rally.
“Millions of South Africans will have the opportunity to determine the future of their local governments [in the elections]. That opportunity should never be taken for granted. There are a whole lot of small parties who want to steal our progress. But every time they get the chance, they destroy towns.”
Still, he warned against complacency, telling supporters: “We must protect the progress we have made. And we must take every municipality we govern forward.”
Even in a tough election, it seems likely that the DA will secure its majority in Cape Town, and Hill-Lewis the mayoral chain. But the party’s ambitions are bigger than that, and may determine whether Hill-Lewis serves a full term.
Silke says: “As we get closer to the 2029 national election, I expect that Hill-Lewis will move into parliament to give him the national platform, not just a metro platform. That to me will be essential to market the DA as a government-in-waiting.”
