Please find attached a soundbite by Dr Leon Schreiber MP.
In a nearly unprecedented show of political consensus, opposition parties present in Parliament today united in favour of the DA’s End Cadre Deployment Bill. The ANC was the only major party that voted against the Bill. As a result, the DA’s Bill was rejected by a razor-thin margin of only two votes.
Were it not for the ANC still having a slim majority based on the outcome of the 2019 election, Parliament would have abolished cadre deployment today.
This strikingly confirms the urgency of South Africans registering to vote in 2024, so that we can finally break the ANC majority that is now the only thing that continues to sustain cadre deployment corruption. If voters help us to drive the ANC below 50% in next year’s election, the DA commits to immediately reintroducing – and passing into law – the End Cadre Deployment Bill after the 2024 election.
By standing alone in defence of cadre deployment, the ANC of Cyril Ramaphosa today finally abandoned any remaining pretence of opposing corruption.
The outcome of the vote confirms beyond any doubt that the promises made, and lip service paid, by Ramaphosa to fighting corruption and state capture, were lies. In full view of the nation, Ramaphosa’s party today voted alone to sustain cadre deployment corruption. This is despite the findings of the Zondo Commission that cadre deployment laid the foundation for state capture. It also stands in contradiction to the National Framework for Professionalising the Public Sector, which recommend that “deployment practices ought to be ditched in favour of a merit-based recruitment and selection system.”
The DA proudly introduced, and voted in favour of, the End Cadre Deployment Bill today. We thank the opposition parties that united against cadre deployment, with various opposition leaders speaking strongly in favour of the “lifeline” offered to South Africa by this Bill.
In contrast, the ANC stood alone in betrayal of the needs of the people of South Africa. The ANC made it unequivocally clear that continued corruption and patronage is more important than the interests of our country. By doing so, the ANC alone shoulders responsibility for the continued suffering caused by cadre deployment.
From this point forward, every crime, every act of corruption or capture, and every service delivery failure, is the direct result of Cyril Ramaphosa and his party’s betrayal of the people of South Africa.