Van Rooyen a misclculation squared

15 December 2015

Like the Grinch who stole the children’s Christmas, President Jacob Zuma has stolen the cheer of South Africans this holiday season. We are all, almost everyone of us, poorer in the pocket because of the knock that the Rand has taken and the loss of business confidence that ensued after the axing of principled Nene.

As though the axing of Minister Nene, a minister with backbone, was not bad and horrid enough, President Zuma asked the unknown and untested van Rooyen to take charge of local government where all the new turns government has taken continue to lead to a dead end.  Executive mayors will have no time for a failed mayor.

Congress of the People believes that the tenure of both President Zuma and Minister van Rooyen will be cut short. Pravin Gordhan stated that van Rooyen’s appointment was a miscalculation. That miscalculation can now be raised to the power two to square it.

The South African public has been astonished at the paralysis and lack of moral courage within the ruling party MPs and ministers. Not one amongst them has had the courage to dissent in public with the mess that President Zuma is making. Not one of them has put the public interest in front of everything else. By their deafening silence they are all complicit in raining chaos on South Africa.

The time has indeed come for South Africans to join COPE’s efforts in creating a new political force for good which is shaped by the people and made fully accountable to the people. The ruling party has betrayed the trust of the people and must face the consequence.

Issued by Dennis Bloem, Spokesperson, COPE, 15 December 2015