Gauteng premier Panyaza Lesufi believes he has played a masterstroke by handing over the province’s finance department to the EFF, as now they can never vote against their own budget in the legislature.
Lesufi has argued, in the midst of harsh criticism, that budget votes have proven to create instability in the running of government and that giving the EFF the role to draw up the budget will go a long way to create much-needed stability.
The EFF is one of the four biggest political parties in the Gauteng provincial legislature along with the DA, MK Party and the ANC.
Lesufi says the ANC needed at least one of these parties firmly in the government of provincial unity he leads in order to pass budgets and successfully defend motions of no confidence.
The EFF was the first to respond positively and the decision to offer them the treasury was a masterstroke that would stabilise government at least for the next three years.
“So it was strategic to bring one big political party among the top three. The EFF was the first to respond quickly when we made the offer,” said Lesufi.
It’s a narrow debate because you don’t look at coalition politics in terms of one political party, one region and province. You look at coalition government broadly.
— Gauteng premier Panyaza Lesufi
“And the reason we gave them the portfolio was that the only thing that brings instability now is ... the budget. So if they lead that portfolio there’s no way they can vote against their own budget and that will bring a permanent stability until the political term ends.”
Lesufi told the Sunday Times that he was under pressure to pass the adjustment budget. He said he avoided a catastrophe that would have placed his government at odds with the Auditor-General.
He explained that without the adjustment budget, government expenditure from April 1 was at risk of being declared irregular.
“We couldn’t pass the budget, so I had to prevent a catastrophe where the entire budget of the provincial government would be declared irregular by the auditor-general and payments to schools and hospitals would need to stop, which was going to be a catastrophe,” said Lesufi.
“The second area is that we need to focus on fixing local government, but if we are going to have lots of motions of no confidence against the premier, we are going to have budgets that are not going to be adopted, we are then disrupting government.”
Lesufi was speaking to the Sunday Times following criticism from some quarters of the ANC after he appointed EFF Gauteng chairperson Nkululeko Dunga as finance MEC.
The move saw the ANC’s Matome Chiloane being dropped from the provincial executive and Lebogang Maile being moved to head education and sports.
Some of his critics argued that he could have removed Rise Mzansi’s Vuyiswa Ramokgopa as MEC given that the party only brings a few seats to the coalition. But Lesufi dismissed this argument as a failure to understand the politics of coalition.
“It’s a narrow debate because you don’t look at coalition politics in terms of one political party, one region and province. You look at coalition government broadly,” said Lesufi.
“Rise Mzansi is chairing Scopa in the National Assembly and they are assisting us there, if you check the calibre and the way they vote with the ANC. It can’t be that because we are in Gauteng, we must ignore that aspect.”
Coalition politics require a bird’s-eye view, which he says is what he applied in making his decision, which he emphasised was given the green light by ANC national officials led by President Cyril Ramaphosa.
“The thing with coalitions ... is that you don’t know who you are going to need. You might need them moving forward and they will remind you that you ‘kicked us out’,” he said.
“So it’s people who don’t understand politics of coalitions, which many South Africans have not accepted .... They mean you must respect, they mean you must work together, and where you work together you must ensure that it’s a permanent relationship.”
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