Coalition negotiating teams from the Patriotic Alliance and ActionSA following a meeting that was held on Wednesday to discuss agreement at hung municipalities.
The Patriotic Alliance will support ActionSA’s mayoral candidate in Laingsburg, but the parties still need additional partners to secure control of the 10-seat council.
This was the first agreement, with a formal coalition agreement still pending after the two parties held a meeting on Wednesday.
Laingsburg is one of the 16 hung municipalities in the Western Cape where no party won an outright majority in the local government elections.
The municipality has 10 seats with ActionSA and the DA holding three seats each, the ANC two and the Patriotic Alliance and the People’s Movement for Change one each.
ActionSA and PA still need two councillors
ActionSA and the PA together hold four of 10 seats, so they need support from at least two additional councillors to reach a majority of six.
PA spokesperson Steve Motale said the two parties held coalition discussions on Wednesday and reached the first agreement amid ongoing discussions.
“We know from experience that we can trust the word of Herman Mashaba, so we will support him in Laingsburg. We believe this is the best for our country and we are putting the country first,” he said.
Motale also said their councillor will work to ensure that the new administration puts residents first by providing reliable water and electricity, safer streets, jobs for local people and an end to the neglect the rural Karoo towns have suffered for too long.
Formal coalition agreement still pending
He added that the parties would continue to discuss further agreements in other councils where both are represented.
“We will announce these (coalition agreements) as they are concluded daily,” Motale said.
ActionSA spokesperson Matthew George confirmed that the PA has agreed to back their candidate for the mayorship.
“That's the confirmation I can give you,” George said.
“Those discussions are still underway. Keep in mind that the make-up of the council demands that we bring on board other partners. Those discussions are still ongoing, and we will communicate a formal agreement as soon as that is concluded, and hopefully by the end of this week or early next week.”
George said they were delighted that the PA would cooperate with ActionSA in municipalities where both have seats.
“Our engagement with them has been robust, but positive and very constructive. We are focused as a party on building and getting together partners who can work with us to turn around broken municipalities across this country.
“We are very glad to have the PA sign on board onto this programme across all of our municipalities, and we are hopeful that as discussions of all parties, which are still underway, we can find further partners in this effort,” George added.