The following speech was delivered by Hill-Lewis at the first of the “Working For All Tour” stops, in Tshwane.
It is wonderful to be here in our nation’s capital. And thank you to every single person who has come here today because you believe that this city can be better than it is. I believe that too.
In fact, that is why I wanted Tshwane to be the very first stop on our Working For All Tour.
A few days ago, the Democratic Alliance launched our Manifesto. It contains detailed plans for water, electricity, safer communities, cleaner towns and cities, jobs, infrastructure, professional government and fighting corruption. The DA’s manifesto is a promise.
And if I am going to ask you to trust the DA with this city, I believe I have a responsibility to come here personally, stand in front of you, look you in the eye, and tell you what we intend to do with that trust.
Our promise is actually very simple: We will get your municipality working.
Because the destruction of South Africa’s towns and cities is not normal. And it is not inevitable. We should never accept it as our future.
I know from my own job as a mayor that local government is not abstract. It is the water that comes out when you open the tap. It is whether the streetlight outside your house works. It is whether somebody answers the phone.It is whether your rubbish gets collected.
That is how government is supposed to be.
And when those basic things work, people start believing in their city again. That is the future I want for Tshwane.
And today I want to talk about two things standing between this city and that future.
The first is coalition chaos.
Coalitions are sometimes necessary in a democracy.
The DA works with other parties where voters have required us to do so. We are doing that nationally in the Government of National Unity.
But there is a big difference between accepting coalition government when the voters make it necessary, anddeliberately voting for political chaos when you can elect a stable government.
And Tshwane knows the difference better than almost anywhere else in South Africa.
Your current city government contains eleven political parties. Think about that.
Eleven parties. Eleven sets of interests.
Eleven leadership structures. Eleven sets of political demands.
And every time there is a difficult decision, somebody has to keep all eleven pieces of the puzzle together.
That is not a recipe for decisive government.
It is a recipe for permanent political chaos.
And residents are now watching that coalition pull itself apart in public.
The DA pledges to end the coalition of chaos in Tshwane.
Look at what happened with City Manager Johann Mettler. The EFF pushed for his suspension. The ANC backed it. ActionSA didn’t know where it stood. It backed it behind closed doors, then switched their vote in the council meeting.
Then the Speaker illegally excluded 13 votes from councillors, stealing the vote in the most dishonest way.
The DA took the matter to court and the court rightfully overturned the whole thing, and the City Manager was returned to office.
Forget the personalities for a moment. Just think about what that tells you about how this city is being governed. The ANC, EFF, Action SA and FF+ are fighting.
Meanwhile, you are sitting at home wondering when somebody is going to fix the water. That is the cost of coalition chaos.
But this November, Tshwane can choose something different. You do not have to vote for another political lottery and then wait to see what coalition comes out of it.
You can choose the government you actually want. You can give Cilliers Brink and the DA an outright majority. It means you know exactly who is responsible.
No excuses.
No hiding behind ten coalition partners.
Just a government with a clear mandate, a clear programme and a clear responsibility to deliver.
And nowhere is the need for that accountability clearer than in Tshwane’s crumbling water system.
Because the water tankers here in Tshwane tell the story of what is wrong with local government in South Africa.
A water tanker should be an emergency solution only.
It cannot become your water system. Because every rand permanently spent trucking water around this city is a rand that could have gone into the pipes, reservoirs, pumps and treatment works that make the tanker unnecessary.
And here in Tshwane, the numbers should make every ratepayer sit up. Records from the 2025 financial year show a whopping R777 million in water-tanker invoices.
The City itself said it was examining around R120 million in questionable water-tanker invoices for possible fraud.
Media reported that two companies with close links to senior ANC figures in Tshwane received approximately R31.7 million from water trucking, despite records showing that neither company owned a water tanker.
One of those companies had been founded by Tshwane’s current Deputy Mayor and Finance MMC, Eugene Modise, and remained registered at his family home.
Another company was reportedly paid around R95 million for water trucking despite vehicle records indicating that it did not own the tankers needed to provide a service on that scale.
These are serious allegations and they must be properly investigated.
While politicians and contractors rake in money, you the residents of Tshwane are standing next to an empty tap with buckets in your hand.
You are the people the DA cares about. The DA is on your side. The DA says that the money residents pay for water must go back into water. Not into bloated administrations. And certainly not into somebody’s pocket.
We will ringfence water revenue and reinvest it in maintaining and upgrading the infrastructure that keeps the taps running.
That means fixing leaks. Replacing old pipes. Maintaining pumps. Investing before the system collapses rather than arriving afterwards with another convoy of tankers.
We will bring engineers and technical professionals back into the centre of municipal decision-making. And where a municipality does not have enough money or expertise to build the infrastructure residents need, we will use private investment and partnerships to get it built.
This is the common sense governance the DA brings.
The objective is water in your tap.
And the DA will clean up public procurement too. If you want to do business with a DA municipality, you must be able to do the job.
Not know the politician. Not have the right party membership card. Do the job.
Our manifesto commits DA governments to professional procurement and qualified contractors, and to consequences for corruption, mismanagement and poor performance. That is the difference I want people to understand on this tour.
We are not asking you to vote DA because we have identified everything that is wrong.
South Africans already know what is wrong.
You live it.
We are asking you to vote DA because we know how to fix it. We have done so in Cape Town, in uMngeni, in Midvaal. And Tshwane has an opportunity to choose that future in November.
Imagine this city with five years of stable government.
Five years in which the mayor spends less time negotiating the survival of a coalition and more time fixing the city. Five years in which engineers know the infrastructure programme will still exist next year. Five years in which businesses know who is governing and what the rules are. Five years in which officials understand that performance matters. Five years of building.
That is what an outright DA majority can give Tshwane.
And I want to say something particularly to people who have never voted DA before:
I am not asking you to vote for us forever. I am not asking you to agree with us on every issue. But I am asking you to give us a chance to show you what we can do. We will not disappoint.
We believe deeply that working government should belong to everyone. That is why this matters so much to me.
South Africa cannot become a country where the wealthy purchase their way out of state failure while everybody else is left behind. We have to make government work again.
And we know it can be done. Our manifesto is optimistic for a very simple reason: the DA already governs places where clean government, serious infrastructure investment and professional administration produce better results. That is why our message is not that South Africa might work one day.
Our message is:
South Africa can work – for everyone.
Tshwane can work.
Mamelodi can work.
Soshanguve can work.
Centurion can work.
Atteridgeville can work.
Pretoria can work.
So do not settle for another five years of political musical chairs. Do not cast a vote for a small party and hope that, after the election, your vote ends up supporting the government you wanted.
Vote directly for the government you want.
Give Cilliers Brink and the DA the majority they need to get this city working. Vote DA to end the coalition of chaos in Tshwane
We will put the politics in the background and residents back at the centre.
Choose change that works. Because when Tshwane works, South Africa is stronger.
And together, we can prove once again that South Africa can work – for everyone.