Lesufi survives DA’s no-confidence motion

Gauteng Premier Panyaza Lesufi has survived a motion of no confidence vote in the Provincial legislature.

The motion was tabled and pushed by the Democratic Alliance (DA), which has been condemning Lesufi’s leadership of late.

There were 80 members in the legislature, 24 voted for the motion of no confidence, while 54 voted against. 1 member was absent.

The DA’s push to remove Lesufi from his post followed a report by the public protector against the Gauteng provincial government.

The report found the Gauteng crime prevention wardens, nicknamed AmaPanyaza, were irregularly established, with no legal mandate.

As a result, Lesufi has announced that the wardens will cease to exist in their current form and will be repurposed as part of the Gauteng Traffic Police.

This will require the wardens to undergo intensive training for 18 to 36 months, with those who do not qualify being assigned to municipalities for by-law enforcement purposes.

Following this, Msimanga said that “the Public Protector Report is an indictment that he is not fit to govern Gauteng,” writing to other parties in the legislature to support the motion of no confidence

The African National Congress (ANC) in the province governs via a minority coalition, receiving ~34% of the vote.

The coalition, including the Patriotic Alliance, Inkatha Freedom Party and RISE Mzansi, has 32/80 seats in the legislature.

The DA, with 22 seats in the legislature, needed the support of opposition parties to get the motion over the line.

The DA provincial leader, Solly Msimanga, claimed that the parties that voted against the motion have betrayed Gauteng residents. 

He said that he is not surprised that most parties failed to hold Lesufi to account. “Most of these political parties are aligned with the ANC and are more focused on protecting their own positions than serving the interests of the people,” he said. 

Msimanga provided ulterior motives for why each political party voted against the DA. 

He said that ActionSA is currently part of the governing coalition in Tshwane, and its leaders in the Gauteng Provincial Legislature (GPL) may have feared that voting against Lesufi could jeopardise their position there.

“The IFP currently holds an MMC position in the ANC-run City of Johannesburg, and they cannot risk losing it, despite having previously criticised Lesufi for neglecting the welfare of hostel residents, the very community it claims to represent,” he continued.

He added that Rise Mzansi’s Vuyiswa Ramokgopa serves as MEC for Agriculture and Rural Development in Lesufi’s executive and was unlikely to jeopardise this position. 

For the rest of the parties that voted against, Msimanga said, “the EFF, BOSA and MK Party fell into the trap of letting their vendetta against the DA take precedence over the needs of the people of Gauteng.”

Motion dismissed by opposition parties as ‘political stunt’

The EFF, MK Party and ActionSA all announced that they had no intention of supporting or engaging with the DA’s motion prior to the meeting.

In the Gauteng legislature, the EFF has 11 seats, MKP has eight, and ActionSA has three seats.

The EFF instead demanded a public apology and retraction of past “inflammatory statements” made against it by the DA.

The party said any collaboration would require mutual respect and accused the DA of repeatedly undermining it in public.

The EFF argued that its focus is on confronting the ANC directly, not “enabling DA political gains” in Gauteng.

The MK Party, meanwhile, rejected the motion outright, defending Lesufi’s creation of the AmaPanyaza crime-prevention wardens.

The party said it would not punish the Premier “for trying to tackle crime”, even if the programme had procedural issues.

ActionSA dismissed the DA’s motion of no confidence as a “political stunt,” accusing the party of hypocrisy for previously supporting Lesufi and the ANC.