Johannesburg (AFP) -{ South Africa’s opposition leader Helen Zille announced Sunday she would step down from her position at the party congress next month.}<\/p>\n
Her departure is seen by many as an opportunity for a black leader to take the helm of Democratic Alliance as it continues its crusade to win black support.<\/p>\n
Zille, a white woman who has been the DA leader since 2007, said her decision not to stand for re-election was in the interests of the party.<\/p>\n
“Facing the upcoming congress I have spent months wondering whether it is time to go now… therefore, (I) decided not to make myself available for re-election as leader at the forthcoming congress,” she said in a statement.<\/p>\n
The 64-year-old said she would however remain premier of the Western Cape, which includes the city of Cape Town, and the only region not governed by the opposition.<\/p>\n
Her term as premier expires in 2019.<\/p>\n
The former journalist has been credited with building support for the DA, particularly among black people.<\/p>\n
The party won over 22 percent of the vote in the 2014 elections following Zille’s fierce campaign in ruling African National Congress strongholds.<\/p>\n
She told journalists that her decision had been “a long time coming” but “taken quickly, even suddenly”.<\/p>\n
Zille has been a staunch critic of President Jacob Zuma and his ANC-led administration, particularly over allegations misconduct and corruption.<\/p>\n
The DA is currently challenging the dropping of corruption charges against Zuma before the 2009 elections, the year he came to power.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Johannesburg (AFP) -{ South Africa’s opposition leader Helen Zille announced Sunday she would step down from her position at the party congress next month.} Her departure is seen by many as an opportunity for a black leader to take the helm of Democratic Alliance as it continues its crusade to win black support. Zille, a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2000068272,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[100],"byline":[170],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-19212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-africa","byline-igihe"],"bylines":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"contributors":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"featured_image":{"id":2000068272,"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton19212.jpg","alt":"","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","width":0,"height":0,"sizes":{"thumbnail":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton19212.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton19212.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium_large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton19212.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton19212.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"full":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton19212.jpg","width":0,"height":0}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19212"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19212\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2000068272"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19212"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=19212"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=19212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}