WATCH: Racial blindness is lazy politics, says Mmusi Maimane

“Racial blindness is lazy politics that does not take into account the diverse reality of South Africa,” says Mmusi Maimane, former leader of the DA and now leader of the One SA movement.

Maimane reacted to reports of Tony Leon, also a former leader of the DA, that referred to Maimane’s leadership of the DA as an “experiment that went wrong”.

Maimane was elected as the first black leader of the DA in 2015 after Helen Zille stepped down.

The party encountered many internal problems since then and subsequently lost substantial support, when the party declined from 22.23 per cent to 20.77 per cent in the general election of 2019.

Maimane then asked Ryan Coetzee to chair an independent review into the party’s election performance and broader circumstances. Maimane also asked Tony Leon and Michiel le Roux to join the panel.

In their report, they advised that Maimane and the other top leaders of the party step down, which he did.

Leon made his remark in an interview on News24 at the weekend, talking about his new book, titled Future Tense.

The interview sparked fury on social media, with Maimane indicating that Leon had disrespected him, saying he (Maimane) was a human being “who is nobody’s science experiment”.

Leon defended himself in an interview on Newzroom Afrika saying: “Indeed it’s an experiment to elect as leader someone who never voted for his own party in the general elections before he joined it.”

But Maimane was not satisfied with Leon’s explanation, adding that Leon’s comment was not one that benefited South Africa.

“Our history of racial division calls for a more sensitive approach when making political statements,” said Maimane, who explained to Izak du Plessis that race could not be ignored when talking about South Africa’s future.

Read original story on rekord.co.za