Former City of Johannesburg Mayor Herman Mashaba.
Tebogo Letsie, Gallo Images
- Former DA Johannesburg mayor Herman Mashaba will launch his political party on Saturday.
- Mashaba has recruited former ANC and DA party leaders.
- The party is expected to have branches in every part of the country.
The seed money to launch Herman Mashaba’s new political party came from his own pocket.
Mashaba said as much during a media briefing to prepare for the launch of the party on Saturday. He said volunteers and concerned members of society also donated what little they had.
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The former DA Johannesburg mayor, who left the party after Helen Zille and a faction of the DA assumed control, has been crisscrossing the country creating branches and lobbying political leaders to join his party.
Mashaba first recruited former DA Johannesburg mayoral candidate Funzi Ngobeni to the People’s Dialogue. Ngobeni was recruited by Mashaba to join the DA’s city leadership.
Mashaba then went on to recruit former ANC MP and state capture whistle blower Vytjie Mentor.
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In an interview with News24, Mentor said she approached Mashaba because she believed in his vision, adding that his new party was the only one capable of unseating the ANC.
Mentor gained notoriety when she testified at the Zondo Commission on state capture that the infamous Gupta family had offered her a ministerial position.
On Thursday, Mashaba also announced that former ANC MP Makhosi Khoza, who was one of the first in Parliament to speak out on president Jacob Zuma’s government, would also join the party.
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He said Ngobeni, André Coetzee, and Paul Boughey, his once chief of staff would form part of the party’s leadership team as strategic individuals who have been with him from the early days of The People’s Dialogue.
Joining Khoza and Mentor will be Lieutenant General Deliwe de Lange, David Tembe, and Vivien Law.
“This leadership team will form the nucleus of our party going forward. It is a strong team that being a huge amount of experience. Most importantly they are great South Africans who are committed to the service of the South African people,” he said.
Ngobeni said the greater goal was to build an alternative political party that South Africans would be proud to call their political home.
He said the launch of the party was a step towards reaching that objective, adding:
Like Mashaba, I gave up a career in the private sector to get involved in politics. I did so because I love my country and I want more for the people of South Africa.
“My role is to build the ground structures of this new party, across the length and breadth of our great country, and to fill them with dedicated South Africans who will take our message to every province, every town,every city, every street and every home.
“South Africans, black and white, Indian and coloured, have come forward from the dusty villages and the bustling cities of our country in numbers that have overwhelmed us. So many of the people who have come forward are those who have given up on our political system and voting, but in this new party they are finding hope,” Ngobeni said.
He said the party had structures in every province in the country with over 60 000 volunteers who have registered.
