Democratic Alliance (DA) leader Helen Zille was emerging as a person who would go to extremes to cover up the truth, a former member of the DA said on Tuesday.
”[She is] a person who criticises the judiciary and the media because their duties do not fit her political agenda,” Kobus Brynard, a Western Cape MPL for the African National Congress (ANC), said in a statement.
He was reacting to Zille’s description this week of the Erasmus commission as an ”illegal and unconstitutional hit squad” set up by the ANC to wrest control of Cape Town from the DA.
The commission was set up by Western Cape Premier Ebrahim Rasool to investigate the City of Cape Town’s probe into controversial councillor Badih Chaaban.
Brynard, who crossed the floor to the ANC last year, claimed that some potential Erasmus witnesses were being offered bribes not to testify.
”Bringing out the truth is not about undermining the public confidence in the Zille and the DA, but in fact all about the public interest,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Democratic Alliance will ask the Chinese government to halt all weapons shipments to Zimbabwe, following reports that a second load of arms is bound for Zimbabwe.
Die Burger reported on Tuesday that another shipment is to be flown into Harare from China in the next week.
DA foreign affairs spokesperson Tony Leon said he had written to the Chinese ambassador in South Africa, Zhong Jianhua, asking his government to halt all weapons shipments until Zimbabwe had a legitimate government.
His letter emphasised how China was damaging its international standing by supporting Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe’s dictatorial rule.
”To supply arms to a government that has demonstrated no respect for the democratic will of its people, and is guilty of violently repressing its citizens, only lends weight to the impression that China is not serious about protecting human rights, either at home or abroad,” he wrote. — Sapa