Following the party’s recent visit to the White House, they claimed that they were fully committed to opposing race based policies. But to anyone following their recent communications, this would make no sense whatsoever.

Of course, the DA has long taken a vocal stance against ANC policy. And indeed, they are fully capable of being recalcitrant where VT is concerned. However, they have refused to use their powers within the ministries to set their own policies, and have instead gleefully celebrated ANC achievements and ANC plans, with narry a peep of criticism.

In the last couple of months, we have seen an enthusiastic endorsement from the DA minister of Basic Education for the ANC’s language policies and removal of powers from parents, we have seen John Steenhuisen endorse race-based exclusion policies in the agricultural market, attacks on right wing pressure groups for objecting to the Expropriation Act, and this weekend, even an endorsement of the new expropriation powers by Dean McPherson, the minister of Public Works.

So in what way are the DA opposing BEE?

Let us not forget, that in 2022, Sakeliga won a Constitutional Court case which ruled that racial priorities in public procurement were not legally enforceable. And yet the DA has insisted on implementing them wherever they govern.

In going off to the White House, the DA seems to want to counteract whatever influence both the influence of AfriForum and Solidariteit on the one hand, and the ameliorate hostility to the ANC on the other. This means essentially telling America that everything is in hand, and nothing bad is happening or can happen, so long as they are near power. But if they are to be taken at their word, they also want the same outcomes as the people they are attacking - the abolition of race laws in South Africa.

So why the performative contradiction? After all, the ministers are allowed to set their own policies for their own departments, the Provincial and municipal gocernments can set their own procurement policies, and the Party surely would welcome any leverage they could attain forreversing the trend of present developements.

So why don’t they use it?

I suspect the primary reason is that they are hoping to capture a certain segment of the black vote, and their confidence comes from them having received superficial evidence that it is working.

The most recent polls from the Social Research Foundation indicate that they have stabilised or perhaps even marginally gained support (25% with a 3% variance, and a slight minority and urban bias in polling). The ANC and all other black nationalist parties have taken a slight dip in support according to this poll.

In a recent encounter on twitter, one of their more loquatious young members disputed my observations from the exit polling done by Gareth van Onselen, which showed, just as the post-2019 study done by Tony Leon and Ryan Coetzee did, that the DA have a hard ceiling in black support of 4% (that is, 4% of the black electorate, not that only 4% of the DA support is black).

This fella insisted, based on the internal polls he had looked at recently (the DA does not release these to the public) that they now have the support of around 10% of the black electorate.

I tend to believe this guy, because he is incredibly naive.

This is of course a big if, but if the 10% figure is to be taken at face value, then it means that they have (at least temporarily) absorbed ANC critics. But this has come at the cost of their loyalty to equal rights and the interests of the minorities who comprise the bulk of their support.

As far as I can tell, the loyalty to the DA remains fairly rigid, even if the approval of their performance in the government may be on the wane.

But taking that black 10% internal polling figure and the SRF’s figure into account, it seems that minority support must be declining - doubling black support while maintaining a static overall score bodes ill - it would be the biggest minority swing against the DA yet.

In addition, there is no guarantee that the new support for the DA is certain - previous polls have seen a similar swell of black support in between elections before. That is not to say they cannot now convert their sentiments into loyalties, but it would be a novel development if it did.

It strikes me that the failure of other minoritarian/liberal parties to provide an attractive, clear and distinct alternative so far is the main obstacle to the permanent break with the progressive social-democratic model of the DA.

Most minorities tend to be reasonably conservative, and somewhat hardline on issues of crime and nonracialism, issues which the DA have taken significant steps away from wherever they have exerted their politcy preferences. It is a rather peculiar state of affairs that none have been able to make lasting gains in capturing those betrayed by the DA’s bait-and switch strategies.

The use of the DA to contain and smother the voices of minorities with a paradoxical combination of fear (of black-majoritarian decay) and self-esteem through rainbowy inclusivity, may be weakening somewhat, but whether the general population have become any wiser to their tricks despite their apparent instinctive sentiments, remains to be seen.

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