'The buck stops with the leader': John Steenhuisen on Mmusi Maimane's exit as DA leader

DA parliamentary leader John Steenhuisen has come out in support of the party’s review report, which led to Mmusi Maimane’s resignation as head of the DA.

Speaking to Eusebius McKaiser on Radio 702 on Tuesday morning, Steenhuisen said he did not believe in collective responsibility and that the buck stops with the party leader, no matter what.

“It doesn’t matter where things went wrong, the buck stops with the leader,” said Steenhuisen.

When a party had a bad election result, leaders the world over took responsibility and stepped down, he said.

Steenhuisen is part of a two-man race to replace Maimane as interim party leader at this weekend’s federal council meeting.

He will go head to head with Gauteng MPL Makashule Gana.

Steenhuisen is seen as the frontrunner to take the job, after he was elected, unopposed, as parliamentary leader last month, after Maimane’s resignation.

Steenhuisen dismissed that race should play a part in choosing a leader, making the example of Helen Suzman, who, despite being white, fought the apartheid government in parliament.

He said he did not think he could not speak for the poor just because he “lacks pigmentation”.

Steenhuisen argued that not all black South Africans felt the same.