On Friday, Democratic Alliance leader John Steenhuisen delivered a speech in which he called on the government to end the “lockdown crisis”.
In his speech, Steenhuisen said that the lockdown was not implemented to end all the infections, but rather to prepare healthcare workers to deal with the high volume that would come.
The party feels that the Level 4 lockdown is more restrictive than Level 5. “This didn’t progress towards a more open society and the economy at all. It was simply an extension of the hard lockdown – this time with no final deadline in sight,” Steenhuisen said. He says that South Africans are no longer dealing with a Covid-19 crisis, but an “ANC lockdown crisis”.
According to the DA, there is no valid reasoning from the Government as to why the lockdown needs to be lengthened. They say that without public information on the modelling used to decide the regulations, they suspect that fear is being used to further another agenda.
Steenhuisen concluded the speech saying that if the lockdown is not ended, South Africans will take charge and force its ending.