SWINE POLITICS: ANC slams Balindlela over piglets given to 3 EC villages

THE ANC has described as “swine politics” a gift of 24 piglets to three villages by a prominent Eastern Cape member of the DA.

The ANC’s provincial secretary Oscar Mabuyane lashed out at former Eastern Cape premier Nosimo Balindlela for giving the pigs to start community projects just a year before the national government elections.

Mabuyane dismissed Balindlela’s action as an act of desperation to ingratiate the DA with the masses, while Balindlela denied it was a political act .

But for some residents of Cenyu, Mlungisi and Cenyu Lands in Stutterheim, the gift meant they are now proud small-scale pig farmers.

Residents yesterday hoped the project will alleviate poverty.

Nomathamsanqa Mdedetyana, 60, said she hoped to make money from the pig project to assist with her old age grant.

With 10 mouths to feed Mdedetyana said she hoped the project could work.

“When the pigs give birth, we will give half the piglets to other villagers and then keep the rest to sell for ourselves,” said Mdedetyana.

Zimasa Nadopi, 29, a local DA activist , said she and other villagers joined the party in January this year and received the piglets between March and April.

“We asked mama Balindlela to get something that we can do in the community because many of us are unemployed,” said Nadopi.

She said Balindlela then gave them the piglets to start small farming projects.

Her group were given five piglets and the other two groups, in Cenyu, Mlungisi and Cenyu Lands, were given 19.

“It’s hard to get money from government for such projects ,” she said.

Balindlela’s tactic, although she denies it as an attempt to win votes, is a fresh one as normally the ruling ANC gives villagers food parcels in the build-up to both local and national government elections.

Mabuyane said it was a “smelly immoral attempt” to ingratiate the DA with the masses.

“These acts of desperation for votes have now degenerated into swine politics, as Balindlela and her team appear to be spending more time in the pigsty collecting piglets for distribution than doing anything cogent,” wrote Mabuyane.

Balindlela said it was not true she helped the villagers because she was campaigning for the DA as she had helped villagers through her Balindlela Poverty Alleviation Foundation which has been running for four years.

“It’s not my first time ; they know my record… that’s what made me succeed as a politician,” she said, adding that her foundation had no affiliation with any political party. — aphiwed@dispatch.co.za