While the ANC might win the elections next year, United Democratic Movement (UDM) leader Bantu Holomisa is adamant that the party will no longer have a two-thirds majority in parliament.
He was addressing a lively audience at the TUT/Pretoria News Public Lecture Series at the university's Pretoria campus on Tuesday night.
According to Holomisa, the loss of the two-thirds majority will allow for the opening of investigations into the controversial arms deal and Travelgate, as the ANC has used its majority to block inquiries into the two issues.
Holomisa described this as a healthy situation for the country's democracy. He said the rebellion that has occurred within the ruling party had not only divided the ANC, but had divided the country as well.
"If they think Terror (Lekota) would be targeting only within the 600 000 card-holding ANC members, they are (fooling) themselves.
"There are about 18 million voters out there and many of them are not happy with what has been happening," said Holomisa.
He did not rule out forming a coalition with the breakaway movement led by the Lekota and former Gauteng premier Mbhazima Shilowa.
"Whether we will go into a coalition with them will of course depend on how well they perform in the elections.
"We have formed coalitions before, even with the ANC in Kwazulu-Natal because they were struggling to form a provincial government," said Holomisa.
He attributed the current political crisis within the ANC to the controversial multi-billion rand arms deal that has seen ANC president Jacob Zuma fighting corruption charges.
"Is it not ironic that both Zuma and former president Thabo Mbeki never got to finish their terms in office because of issues related to the arms deal?
"It was controversial from the start because the White Paper by the parliament's defence review had made it clear that there was no immediate necessity to channel resources into arms. Instead it recommended that these resources be channelled towards the RDP," said Holomisa.
Holomisa said the ruling party had justified the arms deal by saying it would create 65 000 permanent jobs and generate at least R4-billion in offsets and counter-trade.
In reality, the cost of the deal had skyrocketed from an initial R29-billion to over R60-billion and costs were still mounting.
"If this was the way of creating employment, why were poorer countries not just striking arms deals to create employment for their people?" he asked.
Holomisa castigated ANC leaders like treasurer Mathews Phosa for making reckless statements about the country's economy.
"He is not even in government but he was already assuring banks that they would be bailed out by the government if the current global economic crisis started to take its toll on South African banks," said Holomisa.
Asked whether Zuma would be suitable as head of state, Holomisa said he could do well if he surrounded himself with better advisers than the ones he currently had.
Holomisa asked why the ANC wanted a political solution to Zuma's legal woes while they maintained his innocence.
"He even travelled to Mauritius to stop the use of evidence from documents against him, including a diary that does not even belong to him," he said.
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