Former ANC Tshwane chairperson Kgosi Maepa. (Deaan Vivier/ Gallo)
Former ANC Tshwane chairperson Kgosi Maepa has written to the Democratic Alliance through his lawyers, asking that the party provide him with documents on its “cadre deployment policy” from 30 September 2016 to January 2024.
But the DA former Tshwane mayor and current Gauteng leader Solly Msimanga has dismissed the letter — an apparent retaliatory move after the opposition party recently sought similar documents from the ANC — as a joke.
In the letter dated 27 February, a copy of which was seen by the Mail & Guardian, Maepa’s lawyers demanded that the DA and Msimanga provide them with minutes of the party’s federal executive (FedEx) meeting dated 30 September 2016 or the resolution passed.
They demanded that the DA give their client the party’s “fit for purpose policy” as of September 2016 or any policy that governs the employment, deployment, appointment, recommendation of DA members to positions of power (“the DA’s cadre deployment policy”) as of September 2016.
The letter said these positions of power included, but were not limited to, positions as defined in the Public Service Act, the Public Finance Management, the Local Government: Municipal Structures Act, and the Local Government: Municipal Finance Management Act.
The lawyers also demanded “any amendments, revocations, additions, alterations made to the DA’s fit for purpose policy, the DA’s cadre deployment policy between the period September 2016 and January 2024”, as well as the minutes of the FedEx between September 2016 and January 2024 “wherein the DA’s fit for purpose policy was amended, added or altered for the DA’s cadre deployment policy”.
The letter said former DA official John Moodey was employed as the party’s provincial leader for Gauteng between 2016 and 2020 in terms of its fit for purpose or cadre deployment policy and that Msimanga was employed as Tshwane mayor between 2016 and 2019 under the same terms.
“Msimanga knew of and/or implemented the DA’s fit for purpose policy or the DA’s cadre deployment policy during his term as executive mayor of the City of Tshwane metropolitan municipality between the period 2016 and 2019,” the lawyers said.
“Msimanga was employed as the DA’s provincial leader for Gauteng between the period 2020 and 2024 in terms of the DA’s fit for purpose policy or the DA’s cadre deployment policy. Msimanga knew of or implemented the DA’s fit for purpose policy and/or the DA’s cadre deployment policy during his term as DA’s provincial leader for Gauteng between the period 2020 and 2024.”
The letter demanded a written response from the DA or Msimanga to be provided to Maepa by 5pm on 6 March.
Maepa confirmed that the letter was authentic, telling the M&G that he was the first person to demand the “cadre deployment records” from the DA.
Msimanga also confirmed that he had “received the joke of a letter from Maepa” and that the DA’s lawyers would “respond to it and expose what this is all really about”.
The move comes after the DA won a court order compelling the ANC to submit all records of the decisions of its cadre deployment committee for more than a decade. The party demanded that the ANC release “minutes, CVs, email threads, WhatsApp discussions and other relevant documents relating to the deployment committee”.
The official opposition was particularly interested in cadre deployment records during President Cyril Ramaphosa’s time as the head of the ANC’s deployment committee.
But the DA last week suffered a defeat after the Pretoria high court rejected, with costs, its application to have the cadre deployment policy declared unconstitutional.
The ANC and other parties — including former DA leaders — have accused the main opposition of double standards, saying it uses the same principles as the ANC to deploy people where it governs.
In a recent post on social media platform X, former DA Midvaal mayor Bongani Baloyi, who is now president of the Xiluva party, said it was true that his former party also practised cadre deployment.
“When I was mayor of Midvaal in 2013-2021, the municipality couldn’t conclude a senior staff appointment without the approval of FedEx,” Baloyi posted.
“It was standard procedure that all mayors apply to get the approval of FedEx before the municipality would conclude the appointment. This practice hasn’t changed,” Baloyi said, adding that if the DA had nothing to hide “they must release minutes of FedEx and you will see that they practised the same Cadre deployment that the ANC practised”.
Former DA leader Mmusi Maimane, who is now president of Build One South Africa, also urged DA federal chair Helen Zille, via X, to release the documents on DA’s cadre deployment.