Helen Zille refuses to drop Johannesburg mayoral bid as coalition talks open
With negotiations under way in South Africa's hung councils after the 4 November local elections, the Democratic Alliance's candidate says rival parties will not decide who leads the city.
Helen Zille, the Democratic Alliance (DA) candidate for mayor of Johannesburg, has rejected calls from other parties to withdraw from the race as coalition negotiations begin in councils where no party won an outright majority, The Africa Report reports.
Ms Zille, a former premier of the Western Cape and former mayor of Cape Town, said the DA does not tell other parties whom to nominate for office and that, in the same way, rival parties have no right to dictate who should become mayor of the country's economic capital.
Her stance sets up a difficult opening to the bargaining in Johannesburg, where the DA will need partners to take control of the metro. Several of the parties whose support it may need have demanded that she step aside.
The talks follow local elections in which the African National Congress recorded the weakest result in its history, leaving a large number of municipalities without a governing majority. Parties now face the task of assembling working coalitions in those councils, with Johannesburg among the most closely watched given its long record of unstable alliances and frequent changes of mayor.