Removed: Tshwane mayor Cilliers Brink. (Deon Raath/Gallo Images)
Who knew the Democratic Alliance (DA) could support under-fire leaders, for example, sticking with ousted Tshwane mayor Cilliers Brink like Sfarzo jeans on party leader John Steenhuisen’s rotund frame?
For those, like me, who have frequent fashion failures akin to those of uMkhonto weSizwe party MP Papa Penny, Sfarzo jeans are costly Italian pants, which are as tight as a tiger on any frame, especially those — again, like me — who are gifted in girth.
Brink — who was removed last Thursday after a motion of confidence vote that went against him by 120 for, 87 against and one abstention in the 214-seat council — was backed to the hilt by his party.
The DA went as far as running a “Save Tshwane” campaign, including protests, in defence of the removed mayor, with federal council chairperson Helen Zille asserting ahead of last Thursday’s vote that Brink’s axing represented “a tragedy”.
“This is a tragedy, not only for Tshwane, but for South Africa and the government of national unity,” pontificated the politician, who refers to herself as GodZille.
She was speaking on the DA’s official online platforms, where she stressed that “South Africa would suffer a great setback” with Brink’s removal.
“Anyone who envisions a better future for our country will support Cilliers Brink in Tshwane,” she added.
Whether those alarmist views are true or not, former Johannesburg mayor Mpho Phalatse — herself a DA elected representative who suffered a fate similar to Brink’s when she was voted out of office in January last year — sure could have benefitted from Zille’s GodZilla-like fighting spirit.
Ahead of Phalatse’s removal, there was no fight or “Save Johannesburg” campaign conducted by her party, despite the same main actors in Brink’s booting-out — such as the ANC and the Economic Freedom Fighters — being involved and currently co-governing the City of Garbage.
In fact, ActionSA — the party which had been in coalition with the DA since the November 2021 local government elections but has betrayed the Smurfs in Brutus-like proportions by also voting for Brink’s axing — offered to give up two mayoral committee posts in favour of the Patriotic Alliance (PA) being included in the Johannesburg coalition to save Phalatse’s job.
However, the DA rejected the offer in a statement penned, ironically, by Brink in his capacity at the time as the party’s MP, citing what he called the PA’s “corrupt and extortionist tactics” as the reason why his party could not work with the PA, led by Sports, Arts and Culture Minister Gayton McKenzie.
In another bout of irony akin to receiving a death row pardon two minutes too late — to borrow briefly from songstress Alanis Morissette — the DA and PA now serve in the same government of national unity that Zille says is threatened by the elimination of Brink, who could not work with the PA to save Johannesburg.
Worse, like Rocky Balboa getting up off the boxing ring canvas after enduring a pummelling, Zille is not giving up without a fight to get Brink re-elected, throwing the Hail Mary punch of threatening the DA’s negotiations with the ANC on co-governing hung municipalities in KwaZulu-Natal and the Eastern Cape.
The DA’s federal chairperson, in a letter to the ANC quoted by City Press, stated: “The return of Cilliers Brink as executive mayor of Tshwane is non-negotiable for these talks to continue.
“The ANC must take note of the anger in the capital [city] towards the parties responsible for the removal of Mayor Brink.”
I imagine that Phalatse, while watching the DA swinging wildly to save Brink’s mayoral chain, must be wondering why she was ditched like Ultra Mel custard on a pair of Carvela loafers worn by a teenager in the Ekurhuleni township of Katlehong, in her time of need.
Mind you, that is another reference to Italian fashion, this time shoes that were made popular by a group of “Skhothane” teenagers who suffered from severe delusions of grandeur and displayed crass materialism by ruining their expensive clothes with custard.
It doesn’t make sense, does it?
About as much sense as fitting your motorbike with an ashtray or fighting to keep the City of Tshwane and not the bigger budget in Johannesburg.