Zille has spoken out about what she calls a false ANC narrative about the DA.
DA Johannesburg mayoral candidate Helen Zille says her party will not bring back apartheid or take away social grants if it governs municipalities.
According to Zille, the ANC has been using scare tactics to discourage elderly voters in predominantly black communities from voting for the DA.
In a video circulating on social media, Zille described these claims as “falsehoods”.
“No one who works with the DA or voted for the DA has lost their grant, child grant, pensions, nothing. We will never do that; in fact, where the DA governs, it governs better, the ANC steals the money, we do not steal the money,” she said.
Zille said under a DA government people will receive better municipal services.
“We do not steal the money so people get better services, [a ]better free basic services package, and better opportunities all round to find jobs,”
She said the DA would provide a better life for all South Africans if given the opportunity to govern municipalities.
“The ANC must stop talking sh*t,” she said.
According to Zille, it is not the first time that the ANC has used the issue of social grants to campaign against the DA.
“This is how the ANC intimidates people into voting for them, even though they want to vote for change and the renewal of their city; the ANC puts fears into people’s hearts that they will lose their grants,” she said.
In the same video, a DA activist said that in Limpopo the elderly had even been told that the apartheid system of governance would be reinstated should the DA win municipal elections on 4 November.
Zille described the ANC’s campaign style as “evil”.
This is not the first time the DA and the ANC have criticised each other over social grants. In the 2024 general elections, ANC president Cyril Ramaphosa also hinted that social grants would be under threat if his party were removed from power. But in a statement in the same year, the DA said ANC corruption was the real threat to the social grant system.
Both the ANC and the DA have launched their election manifestos and have appealed to voters to give them a chance to run local government.
