Zille Vs. De Lille?

Farrel — Tue, 24 Apr 2007 07:57:00 -0500

The media is all abuzz with stories that Cape Town Mayor Helen Zille is feuding with DA Western Cape Leader Theuns Botha. What makes the story all the more juicy is that Botha is supposedly in cahoots with ID Leader Patricia De Lille. According to reports Botha is not keen to have Zille become national DA leader as that would make him her subordinate. Tony Leon was quick to jump in and declare any stories about feuds and plots to be little more than media ‘distortion’. Despite proclaiming in his last weekly e-mail newsletter that the DA is proud of it’s transparent leadership selection process it seems when things get nasty it’s time to take things behind closed doors.

If this is all true it’s unclear to me why Botha would be conspiring with the ID. Sure he may not like Zille but why does Patricia De Lille not want Zille to become national DA leader? Perhaps in becoming DA leader Zille would dethrone De Lilla as first lady of opposition politics? Or does De Lille believe it would strengthen the DA in the Western Cape and perhaps thwart any plans the ID had of swapping alleigances (again) when floor crossing occurs again in September?

To tell you the truth I’ve never really liked Theuns Botha. To me he is a leftover from the highly unsuccessful DP/NNP merger and every time I see him I get the feeling the only reason he didn’t follow the rest of his NNP pals to the ANC was because of his still lingering dislike for ‘die kommuniste’. Although I could have the man all wrong.

"Zille Vs. De Lille?" by Farrel

Thu, 26 Apr 2007 17:00:31 -0500

No new developments on this story in the last two days. Perhaps Tony got them all to keep their lips zipped.

"Zille Vs. De Lille?" by hex

Thu, 26 Apr 2007 12:49:18 -0500

What are we supposed to make of this story? Ha-ha, search me. It all sounds quite worrying. I wonder what DA Mal would have to say about it, but it looks like he’s disappeared.

Politics.za: Zille Vs. De Lille?

Zille Vs. De Lille?

"Zille Vs. De Lille?" by Farrel

"Zille Vs. De Lille?" by hex