DA Cabinet seats at risk after backlash in budget vote, analyst warns

[File image] President Cyril Ramaphosa meets with GNU partners.

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Political analyst Sandile Swana believes the seats allocated to the Democratic Alliance (DA) in Cabinet may be reduced significantly after they did not vote in support of the national budget on Wednesday.

The DA, which is the African National Congress’s (ANC) biggest Government of National Unity (GNU) partner, rejected this year’s budget because the former governing party did not include its economic reform proposals in the fiscal framework.

However, the National Assembly was able to pass the budget without the official opposition party when 194 MPs voted in favour of the fiscal framework policy.

Swana says that there is a possibility that some of the seats allocated to the DA in Cabinet may be given to Action SA and Build One South Africa (BOSA).

“Then, if the DA is not happy with the remaining seats, it may decide to leave on its own. I don’t think (President) Cyril Ramaphosa is the type of guy who would actually go and tell (DA leader, John) Steenhuisen to pack his bags and go with his team.”

Swana says, “I think he will create conditions if he finds it necessary to make it less and less attractive for the DA to stay, but I don’t think he will be open and do a direct confrontation and execute a direct confrontation with the DA. That is, most of the time, that is not his style.”