Willie Aucamp: Emma reveals DA support and the party refutes ANC rubber stamping

The Democratic Alliance (DA) has put an end to speculation around the resignation of International Relations spokesperson Emma Powell who cited threats and intimidation. Speaking to BizNews, the party’s National Spokesperson Willie Aucamp read out a message in which she denied a lack of support. It read “This is complete and utter nonsense. I've had nothing but support from the party and took the decision to step back for purely personal reasons.” Aucamp commented: “You can imagine the amount of pressure that was applied on Emma Powell to find out that you are being surveilled by the State Security services…” Aucamp also addresses charges that his party has sold its liberal soul for power. Listing all the DA wins in the Government of National Unity (GNU), he stated: “… to say that the DA or to imply that the DA has been co-opted and that we are a rubber stamp for the ANC is simply just not true”. Commenting on the African National Congress (ANC) NEC’s move to “reset” the GNU and talk to other parties, Aucamp states: “that (Sufficient Consensus) clause is very clear that there must be sufficient consensus when decisions are made and that sufficient consensus only occurs when parties within the GNU representing at least 60% of the votes in the National Assembly agrees. So there's no way that the ANC, together with all the other parties within the GNU currently, reaches that threshold. The only way that sufficient consensus can be reached is if the ANC and the DA at least agrees on something.”.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 at 5:30am 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 interview.Chris Steyn (00:02.188)The Democratic Alliance is in the cross-hairs. National spokesperson Willie Aucamp is here to respond to the latest claims against his party. Welcome, Willie. Willie Aucamp (00:13.848)Good afternoon Chris and thanks for having us. Always a privilege to speak with you and the BizNews listeners and viewers. Chris Steyn (00:20.108)May we start with the accusation that the party did not support your International Relations spokesperson Emma Powell, who resigned amid threats, intimidation, harassment, and possibly even State surveillance. Willie Aucamp (00:37.432)Yeah, Chris, that is totally not true. I watched the interview that Alec had with William Saunderson-Meyer, and he made those allegations. And for a seasoned journalist like Mr. Saunderson-Meyer, that is unacceptable. He doesn't have any corroboration for what he said. I myself in my capacity as the spokesperson for the Democratic Alliance nationally made a press release that we issued the moment that we heard that they were spying on her. We have made several press statements in this regard. We have fully backed Emma. Emma has received all the help that she could get from the DA. We approached our lawyers to assist her. We even went as far as to arrange personal security at a very high cost for her. The allegations that we did not stand with her is simply unfounded. Mr. Saunderson-Meyer went as far to say that he thinks that this was a compromise from the DA's side with President Ramaphosa and that we forced her to resign. That is absolutely not true. We stood behind Emma Powell. I think she has done an immense amount of fantastic work in her portfolio. She was excellent in that portfolio. She brought to light the fact that Mcbisi Jonas, the President's Special Envoy to America, did not receive a diplomatic visa. After that, she has been attacked by the ANC. That is unacceptable. And we stood by it. We made it very clear that the way in which the ANC and the Presidency and the Department of International Relations and Cooperation handled this is totally wrong. Where in your life have you ever heard that a sitting MP is investigated by State Security Services. And then those reports are leaked to the media. The Sowetan published this. So I myself came out in defense of Emma Powell. I know that the party…that she has addressed our Caucus. Our Caucus is standing firmly behind her. And all the things that we've done just showed that the allegations that were made by William Saunderson-Meyer… Willie Aucamp (02:56.31)…is unfounded and I would have expected more from a seasoned journalist like him. He should have gone and asked himself, have I read the DA's statements on this? I can tell you now and I want to read you, I'm opening my phone to just read you this. There were accusations made against the party that we did not support Emma. These are, this is Emma's words. And I quote: “This is complete and utter nonsense. I've had nothing but support from the party and took the decision to step back for purely personal reasons.” You can imagine the amount of pressure that was applied on Emma Powell to find out that you are being surveilled by the State Security services, to be attacked, to put words in your mouth and try to say what they think you said to the American people when you visited them in February. What happened to it is unacceptable. The DA stands firmly behind it, as we have always had. We will never leave one of our own on the battlefield. And we haven't done that with Emma here. And I think William has been totally wrong in his approach to this. Chris Steyn (04:05.154)When I interviewed her successor just the other day, he said the personal toll on her had just become too great. Willie Aucamp (04:14.722)It has, you can imagine. I am so glad and I said that to her. I've had numerous discussions with her and I could see the stress on her. Can you imagine how you would have felt? I know that that would have put an immense amount of strain on me and my family. And I can tell you now the support that Emma received from not only me, but from John Steenuisen, from the Caucus at large has been wonderful. And that is why the quote that I've just quoted of her is there. So it's unacceptable to think as a journalist you can make statements without having any substance to that and now it's out there and we will not take that lying down easily and that is why I really appreciate the fact that we've got the opportunity to really put that to the test and it's been disproven William Saunderson-Meyer is wrong… Chris Steyn (05:10.762)I interviewed Emma on the Jonas issue and she was standing strong and firm. So I must say I was surprised when she resigned Willie. It seemed very sudden. Willie Aucamp (05:23.662)I've had numerous discussions with her because I was doing the media on this and assisting her. Each statement that I've put out was done in cooperation with Emma Powell. And I've had numerous statements that went out. She had had numerous statements. The fact that the people said that some of her statements were blocked. You can go and have a look at how many press releases was done under Emma's name. And since the resignation, how many has been done on the name of Mr. Ryan Smith who is now the spokesperson for the DA on international relations. We have never tried to silence anybody or censor anybody. We've got the utmost respect for our spokespersons on their portfolios. And as I said, Emma did an excellent job in that regard. It's just not true that the DA left her out in the cold or that this was some sort of a compromise. We have not expected of her to resign. We've not asked her to resign. That was done out of her own personal issues as she has said in the quote that I've made. And I think we've got to respect that. It's very easy to stand on the side and criticize or draw conclusions. But if you are going to stand in that person's shoes, it's a different story. And I would imagine that seasoned journalists would do that more often than just throwing accusations. Chris Steyn (06:45.26)Thank you for sharing Emma's message with us, Willie. Now onto another charge that your party has sold its liberal soul for power. Willie Aucamp (06:57.742)Yeah, you know, I listened to that interview. Again, it's easy to stand on the side, Chris. Let's start from the beginning. If Mr. Saunderson-Meyer looked at the markets, he would have seen what happened with the South African markets right after the formation of the GNU. Immediately, our markets became stronger. Invested confidence due to the DA's presence in this GNU immediately showed. We've seen over the last year that, yeah, sure, this wasn't an easy year, but we've made a lot of progress. Let's walk through some of the major things that have happened. Let's talk about BELA. With the BELA law, we said that it is a red line for us and we need to protect the rights of parents at schools to be able to determine certain issues on... Willie Aucamp (07:53.614)…regarding these schools. When the GNU was formed, we got the Minister of Basic Education…has as in the last month, published the regulations regarding BELA. It has been welcomed by Solidarity, by AfriForum, by the South African Teachers Union, by FETSAs, which is the Federation for School Governing Bodies, because she drafted those regulations in a way that protects the right of parents to make those decisions. So we won that fight. So we didn't lay down. We got what we wanted. Let's take the NHI. The NHI was signed into law before the election already. John Steenhuisen, the leader of the DA, reached an agreement in Cabinet that there's no money available firstly in the medium term budget for NHI. And secondly, that the big contentious issue with NHI, private medical aids, will not be affected by the NHI. So it's a big one. Obviously we know that NHI can't be implemented because there's no money for that. And the DA's insistence to make it public that there has been no money set aside on the medium term budget policy statement as well as the fact that medical aid private medical aids will not be affected is a huge win. So I don't know why he still thinks that we just became a rubber stamp for the ANC. Let's go further. If it wasn't for the DA, we would have had a 2% VAT increase that was would have been announced on the 19th of February. The DA stood firm. We weren't a rubber stamp for the ANC. We said to Minister …that we will not support that. I think that President Ramaphosa and the ANC thought that if they pushed this out till very late, we might just cave in. We did not. Unlike other parties like ActionSA and BOSA and the Patriotic Alliance, who voted for a VAT increase invention. What did the DA do? We took that matter to court. We didn't lay down and... Willie Aucamp (10:16.801)be a rubber stamp for the ANC. We took that to court. We won that case. A settlement was reached. It was made in order of the court. And we do not have a VAT increase now due to what the Democratic Alliance has done. Now, let's go to the Appropriations Bill. We made it clear to the President that we will not support certain budgets. We want to see him acting and fighting corruption. And it cannot only be that it is the DA in the GNU that finds that. For the first time in democratic South Africa, we have seen an ANC Minister being sacked by the President basically on instruction of the DA, because the president knew and the ANC knew that we will not support the budget of Higher Education if Minister …was still there. So they had to cave in. Now we've got a new minister there. They've fired that minister. They've put...The president has put Minister Mchunu on special leave and in the same week he also suspended the director of public prosecution in Gauteng, Advocate Chauke. So we saw that the pressure that the DA has applied did bear fruit. We will keep on putting the pressure on the president to get rid of other ministers that has also been implicated. Willie Aucamp (11:43.746)We see that we are making inroads and should we now have just stood back and not support the Appropriations Bill while moves have been made from the President's side, while we can see that the President is also serious and in fighting corruption and that we will obviously put on the pressure on him. It would have been ridiculous not to have supported the Appropriations bill. We have made huge inroads. The DA's presence in the GNU is welcomed by the majority of people out there. We see that not only in our polling, we see that in all the polling that came out. I think that the ANC is battling to get used to the fact that they're not governing alone anymore and that they've got to do power sharing and that it is difficult for them. But to say that the DA or to imply that the DA has been co-opted and that we are a rubber stamp for the ANC is simply just not true. I can go on. Let's take the formation of the GNU. Yeah, we've got six ministers and a lot of people only look at that six ministers. But Chris, we've got six ministers, we've got six deputy ministers and we've got the chairpersonship of five portfolios in the National Assembly. So that give us 17 portfolios where we've got highly senior people, either minister or deputy minister or the chairperson of the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee. We've got the deputy speaker of parliament. We've got the house chairperson in the National Assembly. In the NCOP, we've got the chair of chairs…And we've got several portfolio committees there, which we are also chairing. So if you look at the footprint that the DA has got in the Government of National Unity, it is very much larger than the people out there think or that the media is sometimes trying to sell out there. And if you look at the work that our ministers are doing. Let's take Leon Schreiber, the changes that he made at Home Affairs, the eradication of the backlog of visas, the work we've touched on that already ….done with regards to the BELA Act, the work that Dean MacPherson is doing at Public Works and Infrastructure, what John Steenhuisen is doing in agriculture. Agriculture... Willie Aucamp (14:07.053)…was the fastest growing sector in our economy in the first quarter of this year. So it clearly shows you that there's a lot of work that's being done there. And we are so proud of the work that we are doing. So to then listen to an interview like the one that you had, Alec had with William Saunderson-Meyer yesterday, it makes one sad because you don't know what's the idea behind this. Why are they trying to do this? Another attack that was made by him was basically on John Steenhuisen. Now let's go and look at the facts. John Steenhuisen took over the reins from Mmusi Maimani in 2019, where the DA was at a very low point. We've lost votes in that election. Since then, we grew in every election. Our support under black voters grew faster under the leadership of John Steenuisen than he did under Mmusi Maimani. We are now a party of government. John Steenhuisen won our conference or the election where he was elected as leader with 83% of the vote. And under John Steenhuisen's leadership, the DA grew. We are part of government and we're making a huge difference. So the attacks on John Steenhuisen is also unfounded. I don't know why. There might be people out there that like me or don't like me or like John and don't like John. You get that. But whatever you say must be rooted in fact. And that was definitely not the case when the allegations were made against me. Chris Steyn (15:49.597)Willie, the DA joined the Government of National Unity to keep out parties like the Economic Freedom Fighters. But now the past weekend, the ANC NEC announced that it had decided to reset the GNU and it is talking to other parties. Now, what will the DA's position be if ANC brings in a party like the Economic Freedom Fighters belatedly and after all. Willie Aucamp (16:18.67)We've got a statement of intent that was signed when the GNU was formed. The DA will never sign a document if we are not prepared to give effect to that document. And the ANC is also bound by that document. We heard Mr. Fikile Mbalula yesterday say that before the ANC will do anything, they will have to speak to their partners within the GNU, which is in line with the statement of intent. So that is what needs to happen. The statement of intent also clearly sets out what must happen for other parties to become a part of the GNU. And it clearly says that there must be sufficient consensus. Now, the Sufficient Consensus clause, clause 19 of the Statement of Intent, was put in there on the insistence of the DA. And that clause is very clear that there must be sufficient consensus when decisions are made and that sufficient consensus only occurs when parties within the GNU representing at least 60% of the votes in the National Assembly agrees. So there's no way that the ANC, together with all the other parties within the GNU currently, reaches that threshold. The only way that sufficient consensus can be reached is if the ANC and the DA at least agrees on something. So we've got to go back to that. And that brings me again to the interview that you had yesterday. If the DA was a rubber stamp for the ANC, we would not have insisted on something like that clause regarding sufficient consensus. And we would not have applied that clause. We would have sat back and say, ANC, do whatever you want. That is exactly the opposite of what we are doing. We are standing up to the ANC. These parties that you're talking about now, the EFF made it clear that they will not form part of the GNU as long as the Democratic Alliance is there. We heard the same from the Cape Coloured Congress of Fidel Adams yesterday. And we also saw that the ANC in the NEC meeting over the weekend said that they want to continue with the GNU in its current format. Now, you will remember, Chris, that there was a stage where we had to vote on the fiscal framework and the DA did not support that due to the VAT increases. The ANC then went and they got support from parties like Action SA, like BOSA… Willie Aucamp (18:43.745)like Rise Mzansi, like the Patriotic Alliance. They've got a very slim majority. In actual fact, I think it was 202 votes out of the 400. So the moment that you've got such a slim majority, it really creates instability. What we saw with the Appropriation bill that the DA supported is that we've had in excess of 60% of the support in the National Assembly, voting in favor of the Appropriation bill. There's a huge difference between the Appropriation bill and the Expropriation bill. The Appropriation bill was passed with a strong majority, so there's no need to try to strengthen the GNU any further. We've got a huge majority as members of this GNU. So it's not necessary to bring other parties and we've got to respect the Statement of Intent. Just to come back to the Expropriation Bill now. We saw that the Expropriation Bill was signed. If the Democratic Alliance was a rubber stamp for the ANC, we would have sat back and do nothing. The Democratic Alliance took that to court. So why would we take something to court if we are lackeys of the ANC? The Democratic Alliance made it very clear, Chris, when we entered the Government of National Unity, that we will remain our own party, that we will remain with our own identity and that we have not been co-opted. And I think what we have achieved and what we are doing within this GNU has clearly showed that. So I would urge anybody out there, and especially we are, I'm replying now to Mr. William Saunderson-Myers' interview yesterday. Mr. Saundersono, you are welcome to contact me. I'll have an interview with you and I can put out the things that we've done and hopefully I will be able to change your narrative. But please don't put out narratives there if you don't have any proof for that, or if it is your own subjective opinion. As a journalist, we expect from our journalists to be objective and not to throw around accusations and ideas that was done yesterday. It's not acceptable, Chris. Chris Steyn (20:58.348)Thank you. That was Willie Aucamp, the Democratic Alliance's National Spokesperson, responding to attacks on his party. Thank you, Willie, and I'm Chris Steyn Willie Aucamp (21:10.425)Thank you very much for the opportunity.

Willie Aucamp: Emma reveals DA support and the party refutes ANC rubber stamping

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