Western Cape Premier Helen Zille will be served a notice of suspension from the Democratic Alliance (DA) for tweets she posted on colonialism.
DA
leader Mmusi Maimane made the announcement on Saturday following a
meeting of the party’s Federal Executive, saying: “This has not been an
easy decision”.
Although Zille has been suspended from
all party activities, she remains premier of the Western Cape. The party
has not suspended her from her position.
The matter has
been before the DA’s Federal Legal Commission for more than two months.
The reason the party took long to take action against Zille, Maimane
said, is because the party had attempted to settle the issue using other
avenues.
This included asking Zille to apologise for her Twitter comments, which she refused to do.
“As
the Leader of the party, it is up to me to rebuild public trust. In
this regard, I asked Ms Zille to tender an unreserved apology to both
South Africa and the DA for the damage she has done. Unfortunately, she
declined,” Maimane said.
Zille made comments on her
Twitter account in March saying colonialism is not “only negative”
following a trip to Singapore. The post drew public outrage and a
complaint was laid with the South African Human Rights Commission.
The
party began investigating and said that Zille had violated its social
media policy. Maimane has personally distanced himself from the
tweets and said that Zille’s comments have pushed the party into
ill-repute among South Africans.
The decision to suspend
Zille came after she continued to defend her colonialism comments in
opinion pieces and follow-up tweets.
“In this period, Ms
Zille has continued to damage the party with various pieces of
communication that seek to undermine what we are trying to achieve,”
Maimane said.
The party has taken much swifter action
against Mbali Ntuli, a DA member of the KwaZulu-Natal provincial
legislature. Ntuli was among the first to criticise Zille for her tweets
from within the party.
The DA announced disciplinary
hearings against her almost immediately after she allegedly liked a
Facebook post that accused Zille of being racist.
Zille will remain suspended from party activities until the disciplinary hearings against her conclude.
At
the time that Maimane made the announcement, Zille was attending an
event in Mitchell’s Plein, Cape Town in her official capacity as
premier.
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