Helen Zille says South Africa's GNU was a lie

In a dramatic twist, DA federal chairperson Helen Zille has, for the first time, publicly admitted that the multi-party government in its current form is not a Government of National Unity (GNU).

Zille said that the current government was a coalition between the ANC, DA and other, smaller parties.

Speaking at an event hosted by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom, Zille said ANC president Cyril Ramaphosa coined the term Government of National Unity.

"So from the beginning, Cyril Ramaphosa came up with the notion of a Government of National Unity, which he thought would be a better way of selling the concept of coalition to his own party (the ANC)," she said.

Zille said it was not a GNU because parties like the uMkhonto weSizwe (MK) Party and the EFF were sidelined from the power pact.

"Now, this, of course, is not a Government of Unity because a Government of National Unity brings all parties together, which would have to include the EFF and the MK Party, which it did not. But this still gave the president the fig leaf he needed to bring in all sorts of smaller parties to say, 'I'm not in coalition with the DA'," said Zille.

She added: "The truth is that we are actually in a coalition because a coalition means that if a party withdraws from the coalition, the government falls."

During a media briefing on the first day of the ANC national executive committee (NEC) meeting on Thursday, party secretary-general Fikile Mbalula said they would not engage with Zille on what he termed "polemics".

"We are the largest party (40%), we are not going to be engaged in polemics with Helen Zille and whoever wishes to do so. If they want to engage in that terrain, they can go on on their own, but we are not coming," said Mbalula.

Mbalula said the country was stable, "everything is on track, that's what is important for us".

Zille's public admission of the ANC-DA coalition sparked an immediate reaction from opposition parties, including the Jacob Zuma-led MK Party and Julius Malema's EFF.

Speaking outside the Durban High Court on Thursday, MKP secretary-general Arthur Zwane said: "We will not call what the ANC and DA are doing a Government of National Unity. This is an alliance between the sell-outs, which are the ANC and the whites, and represents their interests."

Despite bagging the most votes in KZN (37 seats in the 80-member provincial legislature), the MKP was sidelined in government after parties who were part of the Government of Provincial Unity, including the DA and the ANC, ganged up against the MKP.

The EFF said it was "exonerated" by Zille's utterances.

The party said in a statement on Thursday: "The Economic Freedom Party (EFF) is exonerated in our original characterisation of the so-called Government of National Unity as a grand coalition between the Democratic Alliance and the African National Congress."

The red berets added: "First, the real negotiations of the so-called GNU took place between the DA and Cyril Ramaphosa and not the fake national executive committee team led by secretary-general Fikile Mbalula.

"What this reveals, beyond any doubt, is that Mr Cyril Ramaphosa is a collaborator with the white capitalist establishment and treats black people, including his political party, with utter disrespect and disdain.

"We, as the EFF and Progressive Caucus, stand opposed to the DA-ANC coalition as we know its long-term agenda is to reverse the little progress made in securing freedoms and rights for black people in general, and Africans in particular."

With battle lines drawn, the MKP told the SABC last month to stop using the term Government of National Unity.

Among the parties that were part of the pact governing the country were the IFP, the Patriotic Alliance and the Pan Africanist Congress of Azania.

To sweeten the deal, Ramaphosa appointed the leaders of the smaller parties as ministers and deputy ministers in the seventh administration.

Political analyst Professor Sipho Seepe said: "The best name that fits the current government is that it is a coalition that was aimed in the first place to keep the ANC in power," said Seepe.

Citing the on-again off-against public spats between the ANC's Mbalula and Zille, Seepe said the outlook for the grouping was bleak.