I can see that the hon Watson is used to giving out orders, but the ANC won't adhere to the DA's orders ... [Interjections.] Clearly power and the position of mayor is more important to the DA than their promises to the electorate.
Pink letters of demand were sent to residents of Tafelsig during the election campaign in Tafelsig. The mayor promised residents that these letters would be stopped, but again it shows that the promises were made just to get the votes. The people of Tafelsig and other areas, hon Watson, are still receiving these letters, which is another broken promise by the DA-led council.
The core message of the DA during the municipal election revolved around the notion of "Take back your city" which was directed at whipping up emotions amongst the white community particularly, and taking it to its logical and barely disguised conclusion "... from these inept Africans". Also still focused on the white community, was the poster "Bly getrou" [Remain loyal], suggesting that whites should stand together against Africans.
These two slogans "Take back your city" and "Bly getrou" [Remain loyal.] are reminiscent of the slogans used by the Conservative Party in the 1980s to rally the white folk against the "verligtes" [liberals]. The Conservative Party's version of "take back your city" was: "Klou aan wat joune is". [Cling to what is yours].
The other version of the election campaign was targeted at the coloured community with slogans like, "Stop ANC's racism". The DA mayor, Helen Zille, was even more crude when she said in The Cape Times of 28 February 2006 that the ANC-led council was "applying rigid racial quotas for city contracts and employment".
It was said:
It makes no sense, for example, for the ANC to apply national demographics to government appointments and contracts in this region, and individuals have been identified as a group on the basis of their skin colour and singled out for privileged access by government policy.
In the Cape Times of 2 February 2006, she said that, in order to meet employment equity target that reflect national instead of local demographics, municipal employees are pushed out for having the wrong skin colour. She went on to say that, in housing allocations, the decision to build the N2 Gateway in Langa - another lie - was an indication to many coloured residents that they were being left behind because of their race.
The theme of the incompetence of Africans was evident in the DA response to the electricity outages in the Western Cape ... [Interjections.]