Solly Msimanga: Jacob Zuma has handed the shower to Panyaza Lesufi

The Democratic Alliance (DA) in Gauteng has unveiled a tongue-in-cheek billboard depicting Gauteng Premier Panyaza Lesufi taking a shower in a hotel amid the water crisis affecting parts of the province.

The billboard is a dig at how Lesufi recently faced a backlash after saying he was just as affected as ordinary residents by the water problems and “in some instances, I had to go to a certain hotel so that I could bathe and go to my commitments”. Lesufi later apologised for his comments, acknowledging that they might have been “interpreted in a manner that suggested the impact of water challenges differs based on one’s position in society”.

On Tuesday, DA Gauteng leader Solly Msimanga told party supporters in Pretoria that “it looks like Mr Jacob Zuma has handed over the shower to Premier Panyaza Lesufi”.

This was another swipe at how, during his rape trial in the early 2000s, then-deputy president Zuma admitted he had not used a condom during sex with his accuser, saying he took a shower afterwards to minimise the risk of contracting HIV.

“We might be laughing at this billboard but there are people in Newclare, Laudium, Hammanskraal, Ekurhuleni and Emfuleni who are still waiting for water to come out of their taps as it used to,” Msimanga said on Tuesday, accusing Lesufi of having flaunted his privilege in front of struggling residents.

“He said: ‘I will jump into my VIP protection vehicle, which residents are paying for, and I will go to a hotel that you are paying for and take a shower. But you can take a bucket and go to the streets and hope that a water tanker comes along.’”

“This is the type of tone-deaf government we do not need. We are saying to the people of Gauteng and across the country that they will continue doing the same and it will end in tears,” Msimanga said in a clear campaign message before the local government elections later this year.

“We said to the premier: ‘We want to give you an infrastructure master plan to implement,’ but because it’s not coming from comrades and it doesn’t include people who are benefiting, they don’t want it.”

Residents had a choice to either continue voting the same way or vote for something different, he said. “We have been struggling with electricity for the past 15 to 16 years and we have said we are going to have the same problem with water.”

He said that instead of taking responsibility for the water crisis, the provincial government blamed residents for high usage while failing to acknowledge that municipalities were losing significant amounts of the resource through leaks.

DA federal council chair Helen Zille said Lesufi’s ANC would lose its majority in every municipality in Gauteng in the local government elections. Whether the DA garnered more than the 50% needed to govern the province outright was the biggest question the party must ask itself, she said.

“What we know for sure is that the ANC is going to lose its majority. We know that service delivery has failed but there’s another reason people don’t properly analyse — the ANC leadership has lost touch with the people,” Zille said.

“After being in power for (more than 30 years) they think they are important, above everybody else and they can live a lifestyle that nobody else can dream about. When people don’t have water for weeks and months, Panyaza Lesufi says: ‘What are you fussing about? I just go to a hotel.’ He has completely lost touch with everybody’s lives. For him, the water crisis means nothing.”