‘I had to talk about why I left the DA’ – Maimane on why he wrote a book

Build One SA (Bosa) leader Mmusi Maimane said he hoped his newly launched Dare to Believe detailed his struggles as a black leader inside the DA.

Maimane’s book: ‘Dare to Believe’

Maimane said the book also painted a picture of the kind of future he wanted South Africa to have.

“The title of the book definitely gives it away; this idea of daring to believe and then saying to ourselves we can build a nation together. It looks at my own life’s history and why marriage matters to me and more than anything it looks at my role inside the DA,” Maimane said.

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Maimane has previously declined to speak about the flaws of the DA, but he said this book touches on the failures of the party and its protection of the “status quo”.

“The DA is filled with contradictions, contradictions where it fails to confront issues of race, confront issues of injustice. It is important for people to know why I had to leave because I could not stand in a society where the DA progressively became a minority party,” he said.

In previous interviews, Maimane said he was blamed for the loss of the Afrikaans vote in the DA.

“When we were confronting change in the DA, we would make other people uncomfortable and others would leave. We had a lot of people leaving and others would stay because they saw the DA as their home forever,” he said.

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Maimane said he felt the need to talk about his journey in the DA, not out of bitterness but because it is part of his life story.

“In the book I also raise an issue that I raised when I was elected leader of the DA which is if you do not see that I am black then you do not see me, because black is not just the melanin in my skin it goes broader, its an identity,” he said,

Maimane will launch the book on Friday at the St Angela’s Primary School in Soweto, which he attended.