Richard Poplak’s lofty and patronising piece, Life in Maimanestan, speaks more of who he is than of the DA leaders and the party he seeks to denigrate. Once we get past his offensive references to DA mayoral candidate Herman Mashaba – and indeed the gratuitous suggestions that it was apartheid that helped him succeed – we can tackle his criticisms of all that is DA.

Herman Mashaba is a man who has an incredible story to tell, who has made a success of himself despite apartheid.

Why the obsession with ‘the haircare magnate” Mr Poplak? Mr Mashaba is many things besides – he is a successful businessman who has supplied the market with products, and indeed, provided 30 000 jobs in the process. Mr Poplak’s attitude to people’s haircare needs is his own problem.

On jobs. Yes, Mr Poplak has hit the nail on the head – the DA has a workable policy offer and, yes, it centres on jobs. With an economy set to go into recession, and the related mass shedding of jobs, we would encourage Mr Poplak to go and speak to some of the families impacted by these job losses about his plan for the kind of progress South Africa needs that does not include economic growth.

The fact of the matter, Mr Poplak, is that, unlike the policy offerings of the  governing party (which let’s be honest, are almost always different to those which their governments implement), everything promised in the DA manifesto is practically and financially do-able. The DA has never offered the South African voters anything we know we cannot deliver upon.

Face up to it: the promises we are making – to bring much-needed change to cities and towns across South Africa – are promises we know we can deliver and promises we have already delivered. We will never make lofty promises to the people of South Africa knowing that we cannot deliver on them given the constraints – for this honesty we areunapologetic.

Face up to this too: The DA does, indeed, have the best track record of delivery where we govern. As your piece correctly sums up: “did you know the City of Cape Town has delivered 6,151 title deeds in the last year, compared to Johannesburg’s zero? It’s rolled out more than 200 public wi-fi, zones, has blocked tolling of the N1 and N2 highways, spent 67% of its budget in poor communities, offered a basket of free municipal services to the city’s poorest, and kept wasteful, unauthorised spending down to R399,000”.

Despite the many attacks on the DA’s successes (including your own), we remain the party that has provided more free basic services to the poor in the DA-run Western Cape than any other provincial government has done.

Far from Cape Town being an “intellectual cul de sac”, it is a city which showcases what can be achieved when government is people-centred and not a means of self-enrichment.

We are justifiably proud of our record of governance. Nonetheless, our promise does not herald Cape Town as a ‘paradise’,While we have made progress, there is still much work to do in all of our governments. DA Leader, Mmusi Maimane, has challenged all DA governments to be guided by two basic questions: what are we doing every day to improve the lives of poor, excluded South Africans; and what are we doing every day to make our governments tangibly better and noticeably different from the ANC?   This does not mean that we are not, and should not, be proud of the strides we have made in turning around the cities and towns we govern – we want to be able to offer this to more South Africans after the August 3 election.

Why should we not highlight these achievements to show residents in other metros and smaller municipalities how we can make great strides in other areas too?

Mr Poplak recognises when speaking of Nelson Mandela Bay that: “Zuma’s clowns have screwed up Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality so thoroughly that a donkey couldn’t make it worse”. Is this the cul-de-sac he would prefer we look at? Examples of governance outside of South Africa perhaps (which apply to completely different contexts, legislative frameworks and challenges)?

But why replicate non-South African solutions, when we have already managed to address challenges endemic and indeed, unique, to South Africa, with our own workable models of good governance?

The short answer is that our offer is indeed based on best practise, largely our own, implemented where we govern. The fact that the City of Cape Town has managed to introduce so many innovative solutions to a number of problems is hardly a sign of an intellectual cul de sac.

Mr Poplak, face it: The DA is the only party in South Africa that runs a significant number of municipalities which are recognised both by the national government and non-governmental agencies as being among the best-run in the country.

You clearly don’t understand the governance challenge yourself. There is no single simple way to deal with the legacies you mention in your piece. Furthermore, we would challenge you to present your model of progress (at a local government level) which does not require economic growth or a focus on job creation.

It is at this point,  that we sincerely question how it is that you can suggest that the EFF’s, in your very own words, “totally unworkable manifesto”, is closer to what South Africa needs. Surely, Mr Poplak, you cannot really believe that South Africa’s problems can be solved through a mixture of unconstitutional by-laws (because by-laws cannot confiscate land) and local recording studios? To put reality in your own words – the EFF’s plans for local government are no intellectual highway – they are not even a bicycle lane.

South Africa is a country dealing with deep inequality – and the DA is the party which has done most to address this where we govern.

In your piece, despite clearly having little understanding of the challenges facing South Africa at a local government level, you infer, from your position of financial and urban privilege, that you are the voice of the urban poor and disenfranchised.

We believe it would do you well to spend a year as a local government public representative, working, every single day, in communities still suffering from the inequity of apartheid, and having to use limited government resources and competencies to address these problems. You have very little understanding of the harsh reality of the trade-offs. The DA does, and unlike ANY other party in this country, we have made progress. After all, that is what we have done in municipalities where we govern. We know what the challenges are within an incredibly constrained local government space. But we at the DA remain determined to work and innovate within these limitations to make peoples’ lives better and to  help provide more opportunities to all South Africans. We will continue to offer residents where we govern the promise that we will work harder to make more progress possible. Where we are given a chance to govern after the August 3 election, we will work to create more jobs, stop corruption and deliver better services. This is the change that will move South Africa forward again. DM

Photo: Leader of the Democratic Alliance (DA) party, Mmusi Maimane (C) at the launch of the party’s election manifesto in Johannesburg, South Africa, 23 April 2016. EPA/KEVIN SUTHERLAND