Is the Ruling Party in WC using state resources for its local government campaign?

Dear Gqeberha

We can confirm that three ANC Western Cape MPLs were participants on community radio station interviews sponsored by the national Government Communication and Information Service (GCIS). These interviews, contradict the role of the GCIS which is to “proactively communicate with the public about government policies, plans, programmes, and achievements”.

In one parliamentary reply, the national Minister in the Presidency confirms that “GCIS uses councillors/ community-based leaders, mayors, traditional leaders, community-based leaders and government spokes persons [sic] or subject matters specialists at local or district level.”

But in a separate reply, the Minister provides an outline of GCIS-sponsored interviews in the Western Cape. Over a period of five months, three ANC MPLs, and one ANC PR councillor – none of whom hold executive office – were invited by GCIS to represent government in paid for interviews. The value of these interviews is reported as R33,200.

The invited ANC politicians are not government spokespersons and they do not hold an official executive position of any sort.

This raises the question: is the GCIS is using taxpayers’ money to pay for ANC talk shops?

For this reason, we will be writing to the GCIS’s Western Cape Provincial Office for urgent clarification of this issue. We need to know why taxpayers’ money is seemingly being spent on broadcasting the ANC’s political platform, and in the absence of a suitable response, we will pursue additional avenues for accountability.

We heard this year at the State Capture Inquiry that the State Security Agency (SSA) funded projects to improve the political performance of the ANC in the Western Cape specifically. It is absolutely critical that we not allow for further abuse of state resources for the benefit of politicians, a temptation which the ANC might only increasingly struggle to avoid ahead of the Local Government Elections this year.

Regards

Mireille Wenger, MPP
DA Chief Whip, Western Cape Provincial Parliament

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