BNC#8 Helen Zille Q&A: “Joburg can be saved” - but only if voters deliver a DA majority

Helen Zille weighs her next move as she considers a return to council politics, balancing campaign momentum with party leadership duties. She unpacks the DA’s electoral strategy, coalition risks, and fierce competition from the ANC and rivals. With Johannesburg at a crossroads, she argues bold leadership, voter turnout, and reform are key to turning the city - and South Africa - around..Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. The newsletter will land in your inbox every morning on weekdays. Register here.Support South Africa's bastion of independent journalism, offering balanced insights on investments, business, and the political economy, by joining BizNews Premium. Register here.If you prefer WhatsApp for updates, sign up to the BizNews channel here..Watch here.Listen here.Edited transcript of the Q&A.Alec Hogg (00:15:15 - 00:17:41)Helen, are you joining the council? You can now , can't you ?Helen Zille (00:17:45 - 00:47:39)Theoretically, I'm still the DA secretary general, which is a lot of work. And so I'm often working very late into the night to do all of that. So I'm enjoying the campaigning so much and being out on the streets and in all communities that I don't want to be reading agendas and all that fat and doing that sort of thing, because I take it very seriously when when I'm a councilor or a politician, I read everything that comes across my desk.Helen Zille (00:47:43 - 01:18:03)So I'll wait till after Congress because I'm stepping down as the secretary general at our Congress, and then I'll see if in our analysis, myself and the campaign team believe it's better for me to be inside or to be outside. When you're inside, you hemmed around by all kinds of rules about ethics. For example, I've been arrested in two election campaigns, and if I had happened to be arrested while I was a councilor in the City of Joburg, they would in fact then suspend me for a year, which wouldn't be useful.Helen Zille (01:18:07 - 01:52:04)So I have to make provision for an eventual, every eventuality. And it's not too rare an occasion that some policeman picks me up some way, so we'll have to see. Alec HoggAnd if you, you, you referred to the investment guys a few times, if you were to put odds on the dream scenario, the scenario that's going to get SA running out and going long on South Africa, where the, the DA does get over 50% in those three metros in the whole thing.01:52:08 - 01:57:11How what is it like 50 to 1 or is it a lesson that.Helen Zille 01:57:15 - 02:33:42Look, I absolutely know nothing about betting and even less about economics. But I do understand politics at the moment in all the major cities. We are polling higher than the ANC and that is a very good sign. But you must understand that the ANC has not swung into gear yet. Now they're pretty bankrupt and I don't know where they're going to get their money from now, if they can't get more from Iran and other places, which I surmise is where they get all their funding from.(02:33:46 - 03:00:49)Because if you saw the hysteria about which the ANC was determined to keep the international relations portfolio in our negotiations, you will understand why they have to protect the economic base. So when they swing into gear about three months out of the election, they really swing into gear and they have these strange technicians and all sorts of resources that they dish out in every single community that goes around.03:00:49 - 03:27:03And we must never underestimate the capability of the ANC to put it together of the last moment. But at the moment we are out polling them and if people got the message that they may not like the DA very much and they may dislike me very much. The point is, you can vote for people even if you don't like them.(03:27:07 - 03:45:39)You just have to love Jo'burg to know what is best for Joburg, and that there's only one party that can beat the ANC. So if we can deal with this 508 parties that are going to be on the ballot paper and get people who oppose the ANC to consolidate behind us, we're off to the races.Alec Hogg (03:45:43 - 03:50:23)I've got a broader question for you, and I'd love to get your insight on this.(03:50:30 - 04:15:36)Often when I talk to South Africans who are abroad, they ask me whether they should come home. And of course I say yes, but I say that our job here is to make South Africa the kind of place they like to call home. Now, what about Jo'burg? I'm a Joburger, but I live in Hermanus. I've been here for three and a half years, and it's going to be hard for me to go back to Johannesburg now.Helen Zille (04:15:45 - 04:37:08)Certainly not in the current state. And I think they are probably hundreds of thousands of people who love Jo'burg, who would not dream of going back there. How would you make it appealing? In the same way as we can make all of our expats to come back home. So, okay, I was born in Joburg and I've lived in Cape Town for a long time.(04:37:08 - 04:56:25)I only came here because I married someone here. But I'm telling you, who wouldn't want to come to Joburg? It's got the best climate in the world. It is the biggest urban forest in the world. It has the lekkerest people in the world. It really does. I mean, if you compare it, I'm not being disloyal. But it's just true.(04:56:29 - 05:24:23)It's got. It's got the strongest social capital of anywhere that I've ever been. For every problem, there's someone doing something about it with their neighbours or with their friends or whatever. A plan must have been created in Joburg. That's saying it is I'm so happy being back. It really feels like coming home. And while people well, you know, the reverse migration has started because of the house prices in Cape Town and along the coast here, they're just insane.(05:24:27 - 05:47:19)So people come here looking for a better life. They feel the Cape Town wind. They've lived through one Cape Town winter and they say, no boy. Yeah, bruh. And they come off back to Joburg and the reverse migration has already started. But from abroad there are so many South Africans living in cramped, little damp bedsits in London and in here and in there.(05:47:23 - 06:10:19)And if you want to raise a family, who wants to do it there. So a lot of young people would like to come back and I think would seriously look at coming back if we got the politics right. Stupid. I'm not calling you stupid, but that's what we have to get, right. And if we get that side and the others and pitting the guys and Sean will follow, and there'll be a whole new dawn.(06:10:19 - 06:37:44)I mean, you've seen what a tiny little drop of a different chemical in South Africa's Bunsen. You know, beaker on the Bunsen burner has made. We heard how the economy starting to turn around, and it's been just was such a tiny little nudge. If we were the biggest party in the metros where the economy is, it's in the metros.(06:37:44 - 07:03:26)You can imagine what a change that would be. It was interesting listening to the ambassador a little earlier, and it was definitely a hand of friendship, a hand of, hey, we can work with you. But so far there hasn't been any indication at all that South Africa would want that hand of friendship. Let's say that you are mayor this time next year.Alec Hogg (07:03:30 - 07:12:29)Is there anything you could do as mayor of Joburg to perhaps grab that?Helen Zille (07:12:33 - 07:54:20)Well, the Democratic Alliance is avowedly pro Western values, the Western canon, the rule of law, accountable government, non-racialism the separation between party and state. Those are our core values and those of values that grew out of Western democracy. Simple as that. And we believe that the only way South Africa can succeed is through applying those values. We also know that South Africa faces problems that the whole rest of the world has never found answers to.(07:54:24 - 08:26:25)But if we understand that most people don't get on with most other people, most of the time we will build strong institutions that can mediate that conflict and enable individuals to decide which groups to associate with through freedom of association and build a better life for themselves, and that the state treats everybody equally before the law. We can make a success of South Africa and that is what we look to.(08:26:29 - 08:57:17)And that is why we believe in having very strong partnerships with countries that share those values and those and constitutions that reflect those values. So we believe it is completely self-defeating for the ANC to keep alienating the United States of America. They can get nothing out of the relationship with Iran. Well, unless, of course, my suspicion is right that they get most of their money from Iran because the ANC is always bankrupt and can't read stuff.(08:57:17 - 09:11:40)And then someone from Iran comes to visit and the next month is all full paid. So I don't understand that unless by joining the dots you can reach a deduction. You know, Occam's razor. That's the principle on which I work. So.(09:11:44 - 09:49:31)I don't know what value the ANC gets from its ideological enslavement to undemocratic countries and totalitarian regimes. It's a complete contradiction to our own Constitution says. And I think there are many people in the ANC that get that. You heard what Mr. Bozell said. He said a lot of people agree with us in the government in private, but they don't dare to do so in public because you can see someone like Cyril Ramaphosa, how badly burnt he's been by the EFF and MK.(09:49:35 - 10:12:42)And he knows that half of those party supporters are in his own party, and he knows exactly that they are disintegrating as a political force. And he knows exactly how politics has to realign in South Africa. But he's not a bold person by nature, and he would rather prevent that crumbling on his watch than say, it's inevitable it's going to happen and we're going to march into the future.(10:12:46 - 10:32:39)So I do think the ANC is deeply split about that. I think a minority would support our view, but there are definitely some that do. And I think we have to make a bold choice for the values and principles that are the only ones on which democratic countries have ever succeeded.Alec Hogg (10:32:43 - 10:39:35)So we know your record. We know what you did in Cape Town, and I hope those who don't know will go and read up about it.10:39:39 - 10:58:48What parallels are you going to be able to use in, in, Jo'burg? And the one big thing that I would have that I've been thinking about is you look at your young lions that are coming through the system, Jordan Hill, Lewis, this young Cameron sitting over there, you've got, you mentioned, not Chris, but Chris Pappas.10:59:02 - 11:21:23And we've got, Celliers Brink also talking here. The the nominee for 20. You got some really top issue. Sarah Palin is doing a great job as deputy finance minister. You've got such good talent. Can you suck any of them into Jo'burg to come and help you? Helen Zille (11:21:33 - 11:44:36)Well I'm trying. Jordan loves being the mayor of Cape Town.Celliers is passionate about Tshwane. Chris Pappas, I'll leave him to explain his future himself. Ash was a first rate deputy minister of finance. He's now going for my job, and I think he's got a lot of support in the party for that. So we've got brilliant young people. And you know what? It didn't happen by chance.(11:44:40 - 12:12:43)It's happened by deliberate strategy because you've been running a Young Leaders program since 2006 when I first became mayor of Cape Town. And we go round and look for the brightest and the best. You know, politics is not a normal choice for the brightest and the best because they see what these investment guys are earning and they look at what a politician can earn at the top of their game, and they think they're going to be an honest politician.(12:12:44 - 12:33:29)I hope if they're going to come in to the DA and so they know they'll never get wealthy if they are an honest politician, you can't. It's not possible. But we have we do find the passionate people who understand that without getting the politics right in South Africa, nothing else will come right? And those are the young people we want and we draw them in.(12:33:29 - 12:53:25)And these are people who can do just about any other career they want, and we draw them in and we make sure they get opportunities and they build their careers, not because they getting a gold watch for long service, but because our entire system recognises talent and rewards talent so they can move right to the top very quickly.(12:53:29 - 13:16:23)And now we've got a whole lot of mayors who under 35. We're soon going to have a a leader of the party unless anybody else opposes him. Currently is unopposed. Who's in his mid-thirties in what other political party do young people have those opportunities. So they're all great. Bringing them to Jo'burg is a little bit more difficult, but we've got great young people in Joburg.(13:16:27 - 13:45:06)They've just been under this incredible dead weight of a dysfunctional government, and they'll all come into their own. If we get a proper government. Alec HoggWe're going to the questions in a moment, but I've got to ask you for your comment on Frans, current year's very strong opinion to say that by putting you forward to be the mayor of Cape Town, City of Joburg was was a brilliant chess move.(13:45:08 - 14:08:41)He thought he said it was the best move that the DA has made in a decade. How did you guys decide on that? Helen ZilleWell, really, it was because we had battled to find someone who we thought had the resilience and the perseverance and the hard, the heart, right, is the only way I can describe it. I mean, Afrikaans has the best words.(14:08:41 - 14:33:05)You've got to admit, it's the hard right to actually do that job. We've got very brilliant youngsters in Joburg in the DA's caucus. But to take over a criminal sphere of government in Cape Town was never as corrupt. In Cape Town, we had a few rotten apples in an otherwise nice barrel, but in Jo'burg you've got a few honest people in a completely rotten barrel.(14:33:09 - 14:52:15)And so it's a completely different level of transition and turnaround that we need in Joburg. And so we looked everywhere in the business community. That was a bloody nonstarter, because when they see what a mayor earns, they say, oh my God, you're not serious. This is a 90 billion rand a year annual enterprise. And is this what a man's going?(14:52:15 - 15:13:39)Don't talk to someone else. So they're not interested in that. And even people in the NGO world scoff at coming into politics. In fact, the most bizarre thing is that many people in the NGOs think they're very holier than thou and pure. If they say we don't do politics well, how do they think anything will change the right person?(15:13:39 - 15:37:21)Residents associations do exactly the same. No, no, no, we can't be politicised. I'll say there's no other way to save Joburg. Guys. You can do a lot of things in your own community and fix things, but you can't fix the billing system. You can't fix the the infrastructure under the grounds, the pipes, the electricity reticulation network, anything. So you better understand that only politics will fix it.(15:37:25 - 15:56:28)And would you ever put somebody in charge of a 90 billion rand per year enterprise without at least listening to them or interviewing them? So people just don't get it. They feel holier than thou if they say, no, no, no, we don't talk about politics. It is complete nonsense. And that is what we are facing at the moment.(15:56:40 - 16:15:09)So turning it round is going to be massive. And I tried, and I nearly succeeded with one person who also pulled back because of the salary of the mayor and then we had to go back and say, well, what the hell do we do now? And then I said to myself, Zille, you can do one more term. You can go and go for it.(16:15:09 - 16:24:43)And so I did. I put my hat in the ring.Alec Hogg (16:24:47 - 16:35:19)I know, I know, you're going to be posing questions to others and probably including Rob herself. So he's got a question for you. What? Who are your two top competitors?Helen Zille (16:35:23 - 16:40:03)Whom are two top competitors?(16:40:07 - 16:45:01)Look, I don't know who the ANC is putting forward.(16:45:05 - 17:19:33)We are lucky that the Patriotic Alliance has put forward Kenny Kunene and I call him the Pothole Alliance, because Kenny Kunene is responsible for the roads in Joburg. And if you see them, you'll understand why the Patriotic Alliance is in Jo'burg, the Pothole Alliance. So we're glad that, they've put forward Kenny Kunene. It, I do think we mustn't underestimate Herman Mashaba because there is an absolute deep hatred of foreigners in many parts of Joburg.(17:19:37 - 17:41:24)And the extent to which he hammers on that point is a vote winner for him. And he's going to do it more and more and more, even if it has disastrous consequences, as it may do. So I think those two, and then it depends on who the ANC puts up, but they are so internally divided that they almost split down the middle, whoever they choose.(17:41:28 - 18:01:45)So when I spoke to a senior ANC person and I said, who are you going to put as your mayoral candidate for Jo'burg? They said, it'll be definitely a person with a national profile. So it depends on who and let's see. But, you know, I take every opponent seriously because every vote we lose, the ANC is more likely to win.(18:01:49 - 18:20:38)But the strategy is to get the vote out, ensure that the Da voters come to the polls. That is the biggest risk we face. Not all of you know people. When I'm in an audience like that, they say, well, Helen, why are you speaking to this audience? Look at us. You know, don't stop preaching in church. Go to other communities.(18:20:38 - 18:47:43)And I say in other communities far more than I mean, audiences like this all the time in Alexandra, in Orange Farm, in Soweto, everywhere, all the time. But that's not where our key threat lies. A key threat lies in DA voters who don't get registered and don't vote. That is the core problem. And it sounds so bloody obvious.(18:47:47 - 19:12:01)And if every person who voted DA last time just brings one other person with him to vote DA this time who didn't last time, we will get that clear majority that they've got to do that. Alec HoggNelson has got a question for you. He says you were mayor of Cape Town from 2006 to 2009, and also served as their leader during that period.(19:12:05 - 19:18:43)Do you see any challenges for Jordan Hill as being both mayor and party leader?(19:18:47 - 19:42:13)Look, there are challenges. I think the biggest challenge is that Jordan's a very committed father. He's got a daughter and he likes to spend a lot of time with his daughter, and hats off to him for that. One of my biggest, sense of concern, perhaps guilt, is that I perhaps didn't spend too much, well enough time with my young family growing up.(19:42:17 - 20:11:23)Thank goodness for my husband. But my guys are fabulous, contributing, lovely people, and we're still a very close family, so maybe benign neglect was the better option for raising them, who knows? But, Jordan likes to spend a lot of his time with his daughter, and that's a challenge because when you're being mayor and leader every week and you've got to be somewhere else in the country every weekend, you've got to be leader of the weekends everywhere in the country.(20:11:29 - 20:41:37)And during the week. So that's a big challenge. Jordan has got an extraordinary intellect. He's got an exceptional way with people. I mean, I've never seen a people person like Jordan. He can make his opponents feel welcome and liked, which I can't do. My first come out far too instinctively. So he's got so much going for him and he's got such huge capacity that I think he'll it'll be a breeze.(20:41:41 - 21:17:09)He also did manage to get a lest we forget, the leaders of the EFF and the ANC in the city of Cape Town to join him or to join the DA. That's unusual. That is unusual. I mean, you know, look, eventually most people in other parties realise that they would like internal democracy, that they would like accountability, that they would be liked, that they would like to be judged on what they know rather than who they know, and that they would like internal fairness.(21:17:13 - 21:41:28)And the DA is literally one of the very few parties, I would say the only one, but one of the very few that offers that. And I can also say this without fear of contradiction. Everyone who has left the DA for another party ends up being sorry that they did. Shelly waters is from Jo'burg, I know, and she says you have a reputation for discipline and clarity.(21:41:32 - 22:00:11)But South Africa's crisis is not only about diagnosis, it's about execution through weak institutions. Alec HoggWhat have you learned from your own years in government about where reform is most commonly fail and how would you avoid repeating those mistakes in Johannesburg? Helen Zille (22:00:15 - 22:02:31)It's a very good question.You know, if I could.(22:02:35 - 22:20:03)I would get rid of a lot of people who I know are corrupt because I've been very grateful to all the whistleblowers, and they are some who come to see me in the dead of night and tell me what is going on behind the scenes, and they do so literally at risk of their lives, as you know, they do so literally at risk of their lives.(22:20:07 - 22:38:25)So I've got a good understanding now of the network of corruption and the extent of it. And ideally, I would love to go in and say, you're out, you're out, you're out, you're out. But you can't do that because there are laws in South Africa that make it enormously difficult to get rid of anybody without paying them a fortune to go.(22:38:29 - 22:47:28)And it really runs against my grain to pay corrupt people to leave. So I'm not going to be doing that.(22:47:32 - 23:17:43)Without giving away a strategy that is going to create huge resistance, I don't talk in too much detail about strategy. There are some easier access points in Joburg than others. Just for one example, the entities that are supposed to be the cutting edge of delivery in Joburg have boards and the mayor gets to appoint or dismiss those boards.(23:17:47 - 23:43:12)And that's a huge and significant capacity that a mayor has. If I put that out there. Nine to great detail. You know, it's going to be, you know, more you say before the election, the more people who are going to oppose you, mobilize before the election and work to stop you, which they often succeed in doing if they have enough of a lead time on so that is that is a key area.(23:43:12 - 23:50:45)And there are many others that enable you to get a handle on.(23:50:49 - 24:33:16)The tiller to turn it around. But you do understand, if I am in force to be in a coalition with other parties, you can't do that because they will stop you. If they don't like what you're doing and they stop you on threats of bringing down your government. So if you're in a nine party coalition in which eight parties can bring down your government, if they don't like what you're doing and they don't even have to not like it in principle, they can just be told by a group of their supporters in the administration, stop Zille and they will withdraw their support and bring down your government.(24:33:20 - 24:59:23)So if we're there with a whole lot of small parties, and even if we're forced into a coalition with the ANC, which I would definitely not choose because it put all those corrupt cadres in, then how am I going to sweep out all that corruption? If the very party that put the corrupt people, they can hold a gun to my head, that's going to make it all the more difficult.(24:59:35 - 25:18:06)And that's why I keep on saying to voters, it's up to you. They're enough of you to give us a clean slate, as they did in, Guinea as they did in Midvale, as they've done in Cape Town, as they've done in so well in Mossel Bay specifically, you know, even in a place like Prince Albert, the voters get it, they wake up, they understand.(25:18:06 - 25:46:38)Let's stop splitting the vote. Let's let's consolidate. Even if we don't like the DA that much, and then they reap the rewards afterwards. So if you want me to bring change quickly, and if you want me to be able to change the institutions and take tough and sometimes quite ruthless decisions, I'm going to have to be able to do that without someone threatening to bring the government down and being able to do so.(25:46:42 - 25:55:24)That's all I'm saying.Alec Hogg (25:55:28 - 26:08:05)Also from Joburg, says the DA in action is they are likely to hold the majority together. Can Helen and Herman work together? I'll ask him that tomorrow as well.Helen Zille (26:08:17 - 26:27:00)Well, I'm afraid he's a bit of a Michigan. But, Further, I can't go. Look, I really don't know what's happened to Herman. I really don't. I was the person who sat opposite him for days saying, Herman, we need you as our mayoral candidate. The only concern I had about him was that he was a bit too rightwing at the time.(26:29:15 - 26:38:44)And I persuaded him. And then he came in and helped me, and we worked and worked on Herman and eventually agreed.(26:38:48 - 27:13:47)And what happened in short order was that he was captured by the EFF. And if you don't believe me, read a very important book called Malema Money, power, Patronage by politician Vache and Micah Reddy. Very important book and you need only read between chapter 22 and 25, which are the chapters on Mashaba. And it shows how, because Mashaba got into power through doing a deal with the EFF that I was, did opposed to and at that time.(27:13:47 - 27:33:37)I think that's why Herman started turning against me, because I said if we rely on the EFF to put us into power, they will have a vice grip on us and we will have to dance to their tune to stay in power. But the DA had all kinds of arguments at the time, and I put my case to the federal executive and I lost, which is fine.(27:33:37 - 28:06:27)You often lose in politics, but we saw the consequence. So on the question of the Joburg Roads Agency, on the question of city power, on the question of the free rent fleet, on a whole range of other things. Those chapters in the book spell out point by point how Julius Malema instructed Herman Mashaba to do what he wanted, how Herman Mashaba did, and Julius Malema was the first person to call Herman the EFF smart.28:06:31 - 28:36:44We only started calling him that after Julius stood, after Julius did. And so the last one was to bring Floyd Brink in as city manager of Joburg and a more in appropriate appointment you can think of that happened under the Da and the Herman Mashaba and Floyd Brink was the guy who was in mid-level management in the provincial department of housing in Limpopo, where he and Julius Malema got up to all kinds of shenanigans.00:28:36:48 - 00:29:04:18And when Julius Malema was fronting with the on point engineering so-called company, Floyd Brink, and he used that to extract resources from the Department of Housing in Limpopo. And from that position, he was made city manager of Joburg because Julius Malema had Herman Mashaba there. You know what's so that was the problem and we could see that happening.00:29:04:22 - 00:29:33:33And Herman didn't see it. He either did see it, we didn't see it, or if it was doing the right thing or the land invasions in south of Joburg was because Julius Malema told Herman, don't stop them. And so that is what happened. We were hostage to the EFF, and then the ANC very cleverly wanted to bring a motion of no confidence in Herman Mashaba, and the EFF was going to support him and they all thought that the Da would.00:29:33:37 - 00:29:57:32But people in our own caucus came to me and said, Helen, we can't support him anymore. He's the EFF's mayor. This is what he is doing. I mean, and he still resigned. You just read Sean Phillips's account in Daily Maverick, what was going on? And they said, we can't, we can't carry on anymore. And Herman picked up that he was going to probably lose that motion of no confidence and left before he did.00:29:57:36 - 00:30:22:19Now he's got this, Gus, that for some reason I was behind all of this and I organized it. I did nothing of the sort. And he carries on about the Institute of Race Relations for some extraordinary reason. There is no foundation to that belief. None whatsoever. He is a product of. I'm afraid. I'm afraid a disease, the imagination.00:30:22:23 - 00:30:45:49And tomorrow I'll probably come and tell you the whole conspiracy theory again, which has no basis in reality. Alec HoggOr on the upside, maybe he's seen things differently. And John Idris is the CEO of IRR. They can have a chat to Herman and maybe give him that assurance. And I meet him, and Herman has to believe what he has to believe, because it's his only way of justifying things to myself.00:30:45:49 - 00:31:25:25So, Magnus Heystek has a question. The last one? Yeah. He's a good, great Magnus election. When is the election? When do you. Where do we register and who qualifies to vote? Helen ZilleOkay, so you do have to be a South African citizen to vote. And if you're a South African citizen that lost your citizenship because you took the citizenship of another country, we fought a court case right to the Constitutional Court to win back your right to your South African citizenship so you can vote you are a South African citizen and just get your citizenship back and get on the voters roll before the election.00:31:25:29 - 00:31:55:01We're expecting the election to be in November, but it's the president's core. It has to constitutionally be sometime between the getting of Sept no, the beginning, between August and the end of January. That's when it has to be. Constitutionally, we think the ANC won't be ready as early as August, so we think they won't want it in December or January, because those are difficult times for South Africa, and we think they're probably most likely to have it in November.00:31:55:01 - 00:32:17:05But that's just a guess. And we can also work it out from the registration weekend, which is, I think, going to be 22nd of June round about that. So if you a South African citizen, you can and must vote. Unfortunately in a local government election, South African citizens abroad can't vote and you can only vote where you are registered.00:32:17:09 - 00:32:31:04So if you were registered in Bits on a voter and now you live in Johannesburg, reregister. And if you're anywhere else in South Africa, come and register in Joburg and come to Joburg in the election.00:32:31:08 - 00:33:02:40So you can only vote where you are registered and you've got to be over 18 to vote. And if you're 16, you can already register. And please get all the young people who are going to vote to, of course to register and vote. Don't get people who aren't going to vote for the DA to register and vote, but get people who you're young people to register and vote because they're also so supercilious and take all the freedoms we have for granted and don't think it can ever go anyway, you know?00:33:02:40 - 00:33:19:22I mean, my sons one didn't vote once, didn't vote in a in a UCT's RCL election and a club them so hard that they've never forgotten it. So get your kids to register and vote and don't take any nonsense. Alec HoggThank you Helen.

BNC#8 Helen Zille Q&A: “Joburg can be saved” - but only if voters deliver a DA majority

Related Stories

McKenzie: LGEs ‘26, Zille and Jozi, GNU strength test, sports governance crisis, SA's coalition era

Helen Zille on Joburg, coalitions and the price of power

Coalition Country: Up to 141 SA municipalities could be ungovernable after November

Helen Zille: The Burke saga, a response to Corné Mulder, and the battle for Joburg and beyond