DA, VF+ reach uneasy peace over Western Cape municipal disputes

The Democratic Alliance (DA) and Vryheidsfront Plus (VF+) are attempting to repair their fractious alliance in the Western Cape through a newly negotiated “stabilisation pact.” Pieter Groenewald, leader of the VF+ and minister of correctional services, confirmed that talks with his DA counterpart, John Steenhuisen, concluded last week. However, the pact requires approval from the DA’s federal executive committee before it takes effect.

The agreement aims to restore stability to municipal coalitions in the Western Cape ahead of the 2026 elections and revive recently collapsed partnerships where governance may be shared. The need for such a pact is evident: since July, three coalition governments between the two parties have unravelled.

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Fractured Coalitions
In Oudtshoorn, VF+ mayor Johan Allers replaced the DA’s Chris Macpherson following a no-confidence vote. The DA accused the VF+ of unilaterally dissolving the coalition, while the VF+ blamed Macpherson for several degrees of improper conduct and corrupt activity, as well as for cutting out its coalition partners from council negotiations and preferring to work with the ANC.

After this, the DA vowed revenge, and declared they would kick the VF+ out of all coalitions in the province.

In Langeberg, the DA ended its coalition with the VF+ after the latter abstained from a critical budget vote, citing, much like in Oudtshoorn, exclusion from budget discussions, which the DA continues to be happy to share with the ANC.

In Theewaterskloof, political infighting saw the DA initially ally with the Good Party and Socialist Revolutionary Workers Party, bypassing the VF+, who have less tolerance for corruption. After a leadership shuffle, VF+ mayor Theunis Zimmerman faced legal challenges, due to procedural errors in the council vote.

In Swellendam, after being caught in an alleged attempt to bribe an ANC councillor to step down and cross over to the DA, the party turned on the VF+ speaker, who had defied them by insisting on upholding local government norms around checks and balances against financial malfeasance. While the latter coalition remains in place, the relations in council have been strained.

The relationship between the two parties has been marred by public recriminations, but Groenewald expressed optimism that the stabilisation pact would restore order to the province’s volatile municipal politics.

Whether the DA can be held to the agreement is a separate issue.

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Do the parties have a future together?

Even during negotiations, the DA has insisted on attacking their erstwhile partner in public.

After heavy criticism from DA spokesman Willie Aucamp, Dr Corné Mulder, the VF+ leader in the Western Cape, penned in a recent article in Maroela defending his party against a variety of allegations from the DA, arguing that what Aucamp and his DA colleagues had alleged in recent weeks was in fact lies.

Willie Aucamp has been a bitter enemy of the VF+ since the early 90s. After most members of his father’s collapsing Afrikaner nationalist party the EAB joined the VF+, he and his father left for the rump Nasionale Aksie, after which he joined the ANC with his ex-NP wife Carol Johnson. He joined the DA sometime before 2019.

Willie Aucamp’s alleged lies included smears against Mulder’s standing in his own party, and counterfactual assertions about the chronology of events in Theewaterskloof. Mulder also expressed his displeasure at the brazen hypocrisy of the DA over affiliations with the ANC and other radical leftist parties, and a general absence of respect or trustworthiness in coalitions which betrayed an authoritarian tendency.

Nevertheless, Mulder has remained pragmatic, and recently pitched the notion of extending the GNU down to the local level in Gauteng, as a means of establishing a modicum of stability, and maintaining a cordon sanitaire against the forces of the MK and EFF, while moderating the Mashatile/Lesufi faction of the ANC.

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The party remains in a tense position in the Cape, but for now, it looks as if the waters may be somewhat calmer for a time. Whether they can remain calm until the local elections is another question.

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