/ 8 February 2020

Maimane’s Mosa movement to launch within two months

February 05 2020 Former Da Party Leader Mmusi Maimane Addressed The Cape Town Press Club At The Kelvin Grove Club In Newlands On Wednesday. Photo By David Harrison
Former DA party leader Mmusi Maimane addressed the Cape Town Press Club at the Kelvin Grove Club in Newlands on Wednesday. (David Harrison/M&G)

Movement for One South Africa (Mosa) leader Mmusi Maimane says his political entity can be the “Uber of South African politics”.

Speaking at the Cape Town press club on Wednesday, the former leader of the Democratic Alliance added some meat to the bones of his idea for a new South African political movement.

Stressing that Mosa is not a political party, Maimane said it will work closely with other political organisations. 

He said the movement will use technology and innovation to galvanise political support among citizens without becoming a fully fledged political party. 

“Why a movement, and not a party? We already have 48 [parties]. I’m not certain party [number] 49 is going to bring the change we need. If we look at global politics, it is not political parties that are bringing change [it is people]. What SA needs is a movement of citizens. It is a coalition of parties — an agreement between religious organisations, civil society and business.” 

Maimane said that although he is not desperate to get back to the parliamentary benches, he is not ruling out the possibility of contesting elections under the Mosa banner. 

The organisation will be awaiting a Constitutional Court case to determine whether independent candidates can contest provincial and national elections. Independents can already contest local government elections. 

Call for electoral reform

“We need electoral reform. We need to directly elect people who will serve us rather than elect a party who will give us people we don’t know,” Maimane said. 

He said that if a million people can sign up on Facebook to the I’m Staying campaign — pledging that they won’t emigrate to another country and rather become active citizens back home — then South Africa needs a movement.   

Maimane said the movement would be funded by individual contributions of as little as R20 a person, with some crowd-funding campaigns to raise money and awareness. He added that consultative forums will kick off in the coming weeks, with the official launch of the movement expected in April. 

The former leader of the opposition resigned from the DA in October 2019. He said there was no bad blood between him and his former party and would not be drawn on questions about whether he jumped or was pushed from his position following disappointing 2019 election results. 

He even thanked the party for giving him “the experience to help serve South Africans”.