Cosatu Hits Back: Why Ramaphosa’s Praise for DA Municipalities Struck a Nerve

When President Cyril Ramaphosa told thousands of ANC councillors in Soweto that some of South Africa’s best-run municipalities are under DA control, he probably expected uncomfortable murmurs. What he got instead was open backlash from his own alliance partners.

The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu), one of the ANC’s oldest and most loyal allies, has branded his remarks “unfortunate.” For Cosatu, it wasn’t just about naming Cape Town and Stellenbosch, it was about what that comparison symbolised in South Africa’s still-divided political and economic landscape.

“What are we talking about?”

Cosatu’s first deputy president Mike Shingange didn’t mince his words during a Newzroom Afrika interview. He argued that Ramaphosa’s praise ignores the lived reality of millions of working-class South Africans.

“When you land in Cape Town and drive into the city, yes, it looks clean and well-run. But on your left, along the N2, you see Khayelitsha and surrounding townships left behind. What are we talking about when we say Cape Town is better run?” Shingange asked.

For him, DA municipalities are not necessarily models of service delivery, they’re examples of servicing minority communities while maintaining old inequalities. By contrast, ANC municipalities are largely responsible for poorer, under-resourced regions where raising revenue is far harder.

Ramaphosa’s uncomfortable truth

At the heart of the dispute is something Ramaphosa himself admitted: ANC-run municipalities are struggling, and many are sliding backwards.

He told the packed FNB Stadium in Soweto that it “hurts deeply” to see ANC municipalities underperforming. He even revealed that the Auditor General had flagged instances where financial statements weren’t prepared by councils themselves but outsourced elsewherean indictment of the ANC’s governance track record.

Ramaphosa’s challenge was direct: learn from others, even from political opponents like the DA. “We cannot forever stay at the bottom,” he told councillors. “We need to ask ourselves: what are they doing better than us?”

A clash of politics and pride

Cosatu’s pushback highlights a deeper dilemma for the ANC alliance. On the one hand, Ramaphosa is trying to inject urgency into failing municipalities, which remain a sore point for voters tired of potholes, unreliable water, and power cuts. On the other hand, his comments inadvertently reinforced a long-standing opposition narrative: that the DA governs better.

Political analysts say this exposes the fragility of the tripartite alliance (ANC, Cosatu, and the SACP). Criticism from within the family is often sharper than attacks from the opposition, precisely because it touches on pride, history, and identity.

Public reaction: between honesty and betrayal

On social media, reactions split sharply:

• Supporters of Ramaphosa praised him for being blunt and acknowledging reality. “Finally, a president who admits what we all see with our own eyes,” one user posted on X (formerly Twitter).

• Critics, including ANC grassroots members, felt betrayed. “How can you stand on our stage and tell us to copy the DA? That’s handing them votes on a silver platter,” a Soweto resident commented on Facebook.

Community radio discussions echoed a similar divide, with callers torn between appreciating honesty and feeling insulted by comparisons that don’t account for uneven resources.

A bigger question for the ANC

The dust-up between Cosatu and Ramaphosa isn’t just a spat over words. It’s a window into the ANC’s crisis of credibility at local government level. If the party cannot restore trust in municipalities, it risks losing ground not just to the DA but also to smaller parties capitalising on service delivery anger.

Ramaphosa may have struck a nerve, but he also hit on an uncomfortable truth: South Africans deserve working municipalities, no matter who runs them.

{Source: IOL}

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