Maimane: ANC and ZANU-PF 'same WhatsApp group'
Democratic Alliance (DA) leader Mmusi Maimane says the events of the past few weeks in Zimbabwe should serve as a warning to the African National Congress (ANC).
Maimane was speaking at The Gathering at the Sandton Convention, where several prominent South Africans are discussing the ANC's upcoming national conference.
He says the removal of former president Robert Mugabe as leader of the country and the head of the ruling ZANU-PF "is a blueprint for the ANC's inevitable demise".
Mugabe was removed following the axing of former vice president Emmerson Mnangagwa.
"I am here to argue the fact that ZANU-PF and ANC, as the young people would say, same WhatsApp group," Maimane joked.
He said the factional battles which has plagued the ruling party north of the border, and eventually led to Mugabe's ousting, is being replicated in the ANC.
Maimane said the ANC presidential hopefuls all seem to be a paragon of virtue compared to President Jacob Zuma.
"But it is all a trick. It's an illusion, because just like ZANU-PF's Emmerson Mnangagwa spent three decades doing Robert Mugabe's dirty work for him, all the candidates in the ANC's race have long been complicit in keeping our country trapped in this current state."
The DA leader says in his opinion, it will make no difference who succeeds President Zuma at December's conference, as "the ANC is dead".