BNC#6: Gayton McKenzie slams DA, calls for national unity – “Time to rise as South Africans”
In his candid keynote speech at BNC#6 in Hermanus, Patriotic Alliance (PA) president Gayton McKenzie rejected aligning with the Democratic Alliance (DA), criticising them for constantly comparing themselves with the African National Congress (ANC) and asserting the need for a different political approach. McKenzie emphasised the need for accountability, highlighting successes in local governance and proposing solutions for South Africa – most prominently the mass deportation of illegal foreigners. His speech underscores a call for unity and self-accountability across racial lines to address South Africa's challenges.
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Edited transcript of PA president Gayton McKenzie's keynote address at BNC#6 in Hermanus ___STEADY_PAYWALL___
00:37 Good morning everyone. I don't know why I'm speaking because Rob said a lot already. But here's the issue. You know, I wanna…
00:49 talk three minutes about the most asked question first. Everybody asked me about the DA. Why can't you work with the DA? Why do you turn against the DA? So let me just start and get it out of the way because I've got a lot of stuff to talk to you guys about. But I want to make you an example so we are all clear. My sister's one of the smartest people academically. Now I had the misfortune of my parents trying to judge me according to my older sister.
01:17 The teachers judged me according to my older sister. My sister probably got three, four degrees today. She's a deputy principal. That speaks to how serious she took education. And every time when the report came out, my father would know she gets straight A's. And with me, I wasn't as gifted as my sister. But I learned one thing. I made friends every grade with the dumbest guy in the class.
01:46 I made friends with the dumbest guy in the class and every time I go home when our reports came out, I knew I wouldn't pass. My dad would ask, how did you do? And my father would first ask him, he'd say, no, I didn't make it, I failed. My dad would say, and you? I'm like, I passed. So I never passed according to what he would want me to get, but I passed.
02:15 And my father always compared me to the guy next to me, my friend. And every year I had to make a new friend that's dumb in the grade. Because the previous one, I leave behind. Now the problem with the DA, you are comparing the DA to the ANC.
02:34 The ANC – the most incompetent party in the history of incompetent parties. Of course the DA is going to look like an angel. And of course you guys fall for it every year. Oh, we are better than the ANC. Of course, we're better than the ANC. Everybody's better than the ANC. Now you want me to fall for the things that you fall with. We've given the DA 30 years to remove the ANC. They've not even come close to it. Most of you are winners in everything you do. Sports, your sports team, you are a winner.
03:03 You can do whatever you want to do, but you've been betting on the wrong team for 30 years and you don't see a problem with that. You want me to bet on that team? I don't need you. I don't need your money. I need nothing from you. You must tell the people that you give money to, the people that need you. Those are the people that you should tell who they should go with. I owe you absolutely nothing.
03:31 I am not indebted to anybody in this room. And I will not work with the DA for a simple one reason. A strike. Let me tell you one of the nicest guys you can ever meet in your lives. The nicest gentleman. Politically, I don't like him, but he's a stand-up man. It's Mmusi Maimane. You'll be hard-pressed in your lives to find a better gentleman than Mmusi. The DA cannot even work with Mmusi.
04:01 Now what chance in hell do they have to work with Kate and Mackenzie? If they can't work with Mmusi, don't bring your craziness to me. I am not Mmusi. In the next lifetime, I might be as nice as Mmusi. But for now, I'm not Mmusi. So let me tell you what the second example I want to make before I go to South Africa
04:28 When I pay the fees for five students at WITS, they studying at WITS University and I pay, or I paid. And every time I need them, I ask them one question, how are you doing? Not once in five years did they tell me they were not doing well. They always tell me, because they need my money.
04:55 And the problem you are sitting with in this country, and I'm going to open your eyes on facts, not on what Helen Zille says, on what Gayton McKenzie says, on pure, unvarnished facts. You ask the DA tells you they are not in trouble in the Western Cape. The Western Cape is gone. The DA will never rule the Western Cape again.
05:22 Let them not lie to you, let me do the facts. The DA's strongest place is Cape Town. That's the heart of the DA, Cape Town. In 2016! The DA got 800 and something thousand votes in Cape Town!
05:42 2021, the DA got 500 and something votes in Cape Town. They lost a third of their support in Cape Town. In George, I've been giving them hiding after hiding.
06:01 For 15 years, no one except the DA and the ANC in Cape Town has ever won an award. We took an award last year. I'm not saying you're destined to say we're better than any party. I'm telling you so that you will stop this thing. And let's talk about national in the ANC. There's two parties that are a problem, a big problem. It's the ANC and it is the DA. The Western Cape is gone.
06:30 And if you're a third year, the best parameter to see if you are a subtle racist is my next point. Most racists don't even know they are racist. I have met racists in the Northwest at the mines where I've got most of my businesses. They don't know they're racist because they do what Harvard calls moral licensing. Moral licensing is when you take one person of a type and believe that every person of that type is the same as that one person.
07:27 And I want you to know you are subtle racist if you've made the statement and if you still believe the statement after what I'm going to tell you. You say the DA is doing a good job in the Western Cape. Yes, they're doing an excellent job – but only for the white people.
14:37 The moonshot pact is stillborn. Politics is about the past. A path to politics is about the past. There's no path for the moonshot pact, even if some of them get double. The moonshot pact doesn't have enough people. They didn't attract enough people. Zuma is now busy with the MK. John Stenhuisen should go and sit with the notepad.
15:33 I only have matric, he only has matric. This assignment apparently was given at university, where you have to understand people's relationships. He is, rather say, we don't want Gayton. You don't want me because I beat your ass in every by-election and today, there's a by-election in Rustervaal. I'm going to beat the DA again today. You watch the news tomorrow morning. And if they beat me, then it was no every day I said you was this shit. And you know what?
16:01 The last time they beat my ass in Rustervaal. But I want to show you how far the mighty has fallen. So the moonshot pact is out. It's out. Let me tell you, I don't see how they're going to get to 50. So what's going to happen in 2024? The ANC is sick, but they're not dead. They are not in the mortuary. They are in ICU.
16:33 So what's gonna happen? And these are the facts you must just live with. The ANC and the EFF can form a government. You're watching the wrong game. The game you should be watching is the game between the EFF and PA. Because we want to be that person that rather form the government and not the EFF. Rob mentioned it, property rights. I don't believe in BEE.
17:01 Don't say to me you've made your money to be here. I didn't. He already found me rich. I say to you, you cannot bring anybody in my business and care what colour is. He is and say I must be my new partner. That's not our business work. I come from a maximum security jail. I spend my whole youth in prisons across this country.
17:30 The first time I saw real freedom was at the age of 30. At the age of 30, I built myself up. I started corporate businesses. I bought listed companies, shares in listed companies. I understand the concept of business. I have thousands of people working for me. I've got multiple businesses. So if God comes down and says no political leader should ever do politics, I won't have a problem because I understand where my bread and butter is coming from. So to everybody in this room, there comes a time and a place in every country's life where the country dies or it rises.
18:15 No other way, there's no sideways. You die or you rise. We are there. After 2024, I was sitting with Christo Wiese and Rob and I was listening to the nonsense they talk about guns. White people have guns, I'm thinking like, you can have all the guns you want.
18:36 When the black masses rise, they will flatten you, and it's not scaring you. It's a position we have to stop. Number one, this country's democracy is not working for us. Sixty-nine people get murdered in this country, and you worry about the Constitution. So let me tell you with my last minute why.
19:03 Anybody that loves South Africa should be voting for me. I was the mayor for one year in Central Karoo. The most corrupt, the most poorest, there was 230,000 in the bank when I arrived there, in Beaufort and the surrounding places. The people were using bucket toilets for 80 years. The swimming pools were not working. The people in Leeu Gamka were drinking dirty water.
19:32 They have to cook the water before they could drink it. And if there's load sharing, nobody drinks water. I became a mayor and I said, in 100 days, if I don't fix the water situation in Leeu Gamka, in 100 days, if I don't fix the bucket toilets and make sure nobody uses a bucket toilet, in 100 days, if I don't fix fives of the six pools, I will resign.
20:01 Nobody today. I didn't take a salary. I didn't take a credit card. I didn't take the perks. I didn't stay in a state house. This guy called Derek Welgemoed, the leader of the DA in the Central Karoo. I looked at this guy's CV. Because I was impressed with the way he argues in council. He was a councillor. I asked him for coffee. I said, Derek, I need you to leave the DA. He says, for what? I said, this municipality, I looked at your CV. This municipality needs
21:09 He says, you know, I've observed you, and I will serve under you anytime. He resigned from the DA only on my word. The ANC hates him. They tried to block his appointment
24:36 Because I thought white people just see me as a k*****. When they speak, they see a k*****. I thought that. And I had to de-k*****-ate myself from that thinking. And say, you know what? Not all white people are like that. I can't judge two white people for the sins. Or I can't judge all white people for the sins of two white people. So in conclusion, I want to say to the cancer, we need to look in the mirror. And the mirror tells me that we need to take the best people we can get for the job.
25:05 The murder tells me we have to bring back the death penalty. Don't vote for me if you don't want the death penalty. At the last conference, three white ladies stopped me. He say, you know what? What you said about the death penalty, that's so wrong. Innocent people might die. I said innocent people are already dying. Innocent people are dying every day. Farmers are being killed every day. Those farmers are innocent. People are dying.
26:05 There's an expiry date to blame your ex-wives. She ran away with your money. There's an expiry date to blame your teacher for not motivating you. Today, it's embarrassing for me as a black man to hear my leaders still blame white people for the sins of apartheid, for what is wrong in this country. It is an indictment we've been in power for 30 years.
26:33 How dare we still blame in Rwanda in the later part of the century they had the genocide twenty-five years down the line the country is a prosperous country. The pain was turned around. You don't blame yourself for incompetence of the ANC. I want to say to every white person here that you know what? You must stop feeling guilty for the sins of your fathers, for the sins of your grandparents. It's time that we rise up. Not as white, not as black.
27:02 Not as Indian, not as coloured, but as South Africans. And build a country like the Springboks that they are the epitome of an example. Nobody thinks about Kulisa as black although he is black as the night. But you see him as Captain My Captain. And that is how you build a country. Salute.
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The above transcript has been condensed and paraphrased for brevity and clarity, and may not capture the full context or nuances of the original speech delivered by Gayton McKenzie at the Biznews conference, BNC#6.