Steenhuisen: DA approaching elections in much stronger position
DA leader John Steenhuisen says the party's relatively poor performance in the previous national elections were due to a move away from its values and liberal principles.
Steenhuisen delivered his state of the party report at the DA's national congress on Sunday.
More than 2000 delegates from nine provinces gathered at Gallagher Convention Centre in Midrand to elect new leadership.
The new leader will guide the party towards next year's general elections.
Former Johannesburg mayor Mpho Phalatse and Steenhuisen are both vying for the top job.
Steenhuisen told delegates that the party is in a much stronger position as it approaches the 2024 elections.
He blamed the drop in electoral support during the previous polls on "having become untethered from the party values and liberal principles".
"Up until 2019, we were proud to display the DA’s growth in election after election on graphs. That arrow was always pointing up to the sky, and we did our calculations and predicted when our upwards arrow would meet the ANC’s downwards arrow.
"We were buoyant and bold in these predictions. But then 2019 happened, and for the first time that graph wasn’t something we wanted to show the world. We kept up a brave face, but even internally there were some who had doubts about the future of the party.
"But this was nothing compared to externally. For non-DA voters and an increasingly DA-critical press, we were as good as dead.
"By the end of 2019, following the release of our Review Panel Report and the exit of several high-profile leaders, many wasted no time in penning our obituary," said Steenhuisen.
But Steenhuisen says that the party's internal review managed to pinpoint the real problem.
"We knew that, in trying to dabble in identity politics and watered-down aspects of policies of parties like the ANC in an effort to be a bit of everything to everyone, we had given up our very strong, very clear identity. And in politics, that’s suicide.
"But externally, the problem was diagnosed very differently by some commentators. To these critical media voices, it was precisely because we hadn’t gone far enough in appropriating the ANC’s stance on race and the ANC’s polices on redress that we were doomed."
Steenhuisen said polling has support for the party at 26%, while the ANC’s support has fallen to around 40%.
"The ANC’s decline is terminal, and it’s just a matter now of how fast. If this decline in support can be accelerated up until the election, and then held there as they roll out their squeeze campaign, we will see the end of the African National Congress in 2024."
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