DA body sets aside removal of councillors amid purge claims

The Democratic Alliance (DA) federal legal commission (FLC) has set aside the no-confidence motion that led to the quiet removal of the party’s eThekwini caucus leadership last month in what party sources believe to be a purge ahead of next year’s elections.

DA KwaZulu-Natal chairperson Dean Macpherson said the decision to remove the four had been motivated by their inability to hold the ANC in eThekwini to account but sources in the DA said they were being “dealt with” for backing MP Dianne Kohler Barnard against him at the provincial congress in April.

The infighting in the DA comes at a time when it is attempting to convene a pre-election pact of opposition parties to unseat the ANC nationally, and to consolidate itself in the metro, which the governing party controls by a narrow margin through a coalition with the Economic Freedom Fighters and the National Freedom Party.

The FLC, chaired by MP Glynnis Breytenbach, last week set aside the motion which removed caucus leader Thabani Mthethwa, deputy leader Mzamo Billy, chief whip Vincent Mkhize and whip Zoe Solomon last month.

The FLC found Macpherson and deputy provincial chairperson Martin Meyer, who chaired the meeting at which the no-confidence motion was tabled, should not have done so and this had tainted its outcome.

The FLC also halted the election of a new caucus leadership — which had been planned for last Friday —and reinstated the four councillors, who had asked it to intervene after the no-confidence motion was passed in what they believed to be an irregular fashion.

The FLC has also referred the matter to its federal complaint tagging committee for further consideration of whether an act of misconduct was committed by any of those involved in the matter.

In its dispute ruling, which the Mail & Guardian has seen, the FLC said while the motion of no confidence was “substantively valid”, it was “not tabled aloud in its totality, causing the motion that was served and the votes that were cast to be invalid”.

It found that neither Macpherson nor Meyer “had the necessary authority to act as the chairperson for the caucus meeting” and that Meyer had no legal standing to participate in it at all.

The motion was “declared to be defective and invalid” and the members who were removed must be  “restored to their elected positions with immediate effect,” the FLC found.

It further ruled that the caucus meeting planned for 30 June to elect new leaders should only deal with replacing councillors Riona Gokool and Warren Burne, who had resigned, and should be chaired by the eThekwini caucus leader.

The FLC decided to refer the matter to the federal complaint tagging committee for consideration and “possible investigation of any instances of misconduct that could have been committed” during the process.

It found that while Macpherson had relied on an “established practices”, which had been the norm since 2013, in dealing with the motion, there had since been “vast changes” to the DA’s federal constitution, its provincial constitution and the eThekwini caucus rules which “have an adverse effect on the applicability of established practices”.

“An established practice can never overrule the provisions of the federal constitution, the relevant provincial constitution or the relevant caucus rules, which find application as primary and codified sources of authority,” it said.

“Any established practice that falls foul of, or is incompatible with, the constitutional hierarchy that governs the party is outdated and must be condemned to irrelevance.”

The FLC said that arguments that the passing of the motion was “in the best interests of the party”, even if procedurally flawed, were a “fallacy”  as the DA operated within a constitutional, democratic system.

“As a party that considers the upholding of the rule of law as a matter of paramount importance, that which would constitute the ‘best interests of the party’ can never take precedence over the constitutional, statutory and regulatory frameworks that govern the manner in terms of which the party functions,” it said.

The DA provincial executive is understood to have met on Monday to discuss the ruling and how to manage the process going forward.

One source in the party, who asked not to be named for fear of victimisation, said they expected that there would be further attempts to remove the four because of their support for Kohler Barnard.

“People who backed Dianne are now being dealt with and what happened in eThekwini is part of this. People who are loyal and competent members of the party are being punished because of who they supported at congress,” the source said.

“There are elections coming and people who have very good skills and have worked hard for the party are concerned that they are going to be removed from the party lists because of who they supported for the provincial leadership.

“How are we going to fight an election if people are being purged?” the source said. “The national leadership needs to do something about this before it harms the party more than it already has.”

Macpherson referred the M&G to DA federal chairperson Helen Zille for comment on the FLC report.

However, he said that the caucus leaders had been removed because of poor performance.

“A majority of caucus members — 35 — signed a motion of no confidence in the leadership because they believed the leadership had not achieved the objectives of the caucus,” he said.

This included planning and coordinating party strategy in eThekwini; holding the governing party to account for illegal actions; promoting discussions on issues affecting the municipality and promoting the DA’s value charter and programme of action, Macpherson said.

Zille said she would not comment on an internal party matter.