DA says Ekurhuleni RDP houses a ploy for votes
The DA has laid a formal complaint with the IEC and the Public Protector, accusing the ANC of handing out RDP houses to residents as an electioneering campaign.
|||Johannesburg - Completed but unoccupied RDP houses in various Ekurhuleni townships look set to become a serious bone of contention between the ANC and DA ahead of the municipal elections.
On Thursday, the DA laid a formal complaint with the IEC and the Public Protector, accusing the ANC of handing out RDP houses to residents only now that the elections were around the corner.
The DA claimed that the handover of the RDP houses was not genuine, but a ploy to boost the election campaign of the ANC’s mayoral candidate for the metro, Mzwandile Masina.
Masina is the incumbent Deputy Minister of Trade and Industry.
On Monday, he officially cut the ribbon and handed over the houses in Alra Park, near Nigel.
Normally this would have been done by the current mayor, Mondli Gungubele, said the DA.
What made the DA more irate was that Masina then loaded the pictures on his Twitter account.
DA mayoral candidate Ghaleb Cachalia described Masina’s move as a brazen abuse of state resources.
Similar allegations were made in other parts of Ekurhuleni.
The complainants this time were local residents who accused the ANC of not handing the houses to their legal owners although they had been completed.
According to residents of Villa Liza outside Boksburg, the Ekurhuleni Metro and its officials were planning to hand over these houses just days before the polls to ensure that the recipients voted for the ruling party.
Cachalia supported this allegation, saying: “RDP houses built by the state for beneficiaries should have been handed over by metro officials in Ekurhuleni branding, not the ANC’s mayoral candidate in ANC garb.
“The Public Protector has previously ruled that the ANC’s handing out of food parcels sponsored by the state was an abuse of public resources for party-political campaigning,” he said.
Cachalia said Masina did not respect that ruling.
“Masina clearly takes his cue from the man who deployed him as the ANC’s mayoral candidate - Jacob Zuma,” he said.
“It is clear that Masina does not understand the concept of separation of party and state, and, like Zuma, will treat citizens’ money as his own personal bank account if given the chance to occupy the mayor’s office.
“As mayor, I would strongly respect the principle of separation of party and state, and govern in the interests of all citizens, unlike the ANC.
“Houses and Expanded Public Works Programme jobs would not be reserved for ANC members, but open to all regardless of political affiliation,” Cachalia added.
Masina’s ANC Ekurhuleni communication team was asked to respond to the allegations, but failed to do so by the time of publication.
baldwin.ndaba@inl.co.za
The Star