The GOOD Party congratulates our Leader, Minister Patricia de Lille on being honoured with the “Tourism Minister of the Year” award for Excellence in Governance - Infrastructure Development from the Pacific Area Travel Writers Association.
The GOOD party condemns the DA for recklessly borrowing foreign money linked to the unstable rand… Again. The City of Cape Town has borrowed R2.8bn from the German Development Bank, KfW to finance “major electricity grid upgrades”. However, the loan is actually for €150 million (which was estimated at R2.8 billion on 4 November). There is no guarantee of the rand value over the 15-year duration of the loan.
The GOOD Party is concerned about the lack of urgency displayed by senior officials at the Garden Route District Municipality to respond to the call for cost-cutting proposals to reduce the R11 million deficit facing the Municipality.
The Western Cape Commissioner of Police’s comments that it would be impossible to share evidence to anyone outside of a formal investigation, including a mayor, confirms what any common sense person would expect. The mayor’s suggestion that he received evidence from the police after they raided former Mayco Member Malusi Booi’s office, but no evidence after the police raided the offices of JP Smith and Xanthea Limberg was always patently false. No legitimate investigation by the police would include briefing a political leader about what evidence the police have.
Afriforum appears to be completely oblivious to the diplomatic storm they have created through a disinformation campaign that has no objective merit. In a briefing, CEO Kallie Kriel expressed his “great appreciation for Trump” for the “recognition of the injustice to which Afrikaners are subject in South Africa”. Afriforum are unable however to name the “injustice” they claim South African Afrikaners are experiencing.
The GOOD Party is concerned that the country’s housing programme is being manipulated by some, whilst others remain desperate and homeless on the housing waiting list. In Drakenstein, residents who have been lucky enough to be recipients of title deeds have chosen to rather rent out their properties instead of making it their forever homes. This practice is unfair to the hundreds of thousands of people desperately waiting for their housing opportunity.
The GOOD Party is shocked by comments made by Johannesburg Transport MMC Kenny Kunene. During a site visit to Lilian Ngoyi Street, Kunene is quoted as saying “We're making sure the street lives up to the icon it was named after - moenie huil nie ". The explosion claimed 1 life and seriously injured 41 people. Residents and commuters have been severely inconvenienced for 18 months, with road repairs only estimated to be completed in August. The MMC’s comments are insensitive and lack political maturity.
During a Special Council meeting, a report on the mid-year budget assessment of the City of Tshwane as well as a report on the achievements of the City’s mid-year performance targets were presented to Council. As GOOD we would like to congratulate the City at large for the improvements we are seeing in the financial status of the city.
If GOOD were to highlight a particular crisis that South Africa needs to hear from the president about, it is how his government intends to address poverty. We cannot have a government that ignores its own National Treasury's concession that there are 18 million South Africans who live below the food poverty line.
The City of Cape Town tells us, over and over, that it is “pro-poor” and fiscally responsible. But when we strip away the spin, what remains is a city run for the benefit of insiders, political elites, and their families, while the poor are left with broken promises, stale bread, and blue t-shirts from the last election. According to the 2023/24 Integrated Annual Report, trust in the City’s leadership has dropped significantly under Major Geordin Hill-Lewis. The people of Cape Town no longer believe in his administration. And the report gives a glimpse into why. It paints a damning picture of a City that rewards the connected and abandons the vulnerable.