SA opposition may get 1st black leader

The charismatic black parliamentary leader of South Africa’s Democratic Alliance (DA) on Saturday announced he would campaign for the leadership of the historically white opposition party. Born in the black township of Soweto, outside Africa’s economic hub Johannesburg, Mmusi Maimane, 34, is seen as a front runner in the race and his election could help the party expand its support base beyond South Africa’s white minority. 

The DA’s leader of eight years, Helen Zille, 62, announced last week that she will be stepping down, after leading the party to win 22 percent of the vote in the 2014 election, its best performance. Announcing his campaign in Cape Town, where the DA leads the Western Cape provincial government, Maimane said his aim was to boost support for the party across South Africa’s nine provinces. 

The DA chooses new leaders at an electoral conference on May 9. Richard Calland, a political analyst from the University of Cape Town, said despite Maimane’s youth and relative inexperience in the party, his appointment could broaden the DA’s electoral appeal. “They got the majority of the minority in terms of the electorate, what they now have to do is make greater, quicker progress in terms of the black African majority,” Calland said.