NNP future 'in the balance'
2004-04-13 21:54
Cape Town - The future of Marthinus van Schalkwyk as premier of the Western Cape and the survival of his party hang in the balance when Western Cape residents cast their votes on Wednesday .
Van Schalkwyk is involved in a battle for the premiership with Ebrahim Rasool, Western Cape leader of the African National Congress, and Theuns Botha, the Democratic Alliance candidate for the post.
After Rasool indicated this week that Van Schalkwyk's chances of returning as premier were slim if the New National Party got only 10% of the vote and the ANC more than 40%, the gauntlet was down and the ANC, DA and NNP indicated they all would be going full out for the premiership.
The latest Markinor poll, released on Tuesday, showed that Van Schalkwyk was the favourite with 30.4% of respondents indicating their support for him as Western Cape premier.
Rasool had 23.3% support and Botha 21.7%.
The poll was conducted from April 2 to 4.
Less encouraging for Van Schalkwyk is the lack of support his party seemed to enjoyed in other polls in the run-up to the elections.
Danger signals for the NNP nationally
In most of them, the NNP could not match its support levels of the 1999 elections and, in some cases, dropped drastically.
A Markinor study in January, for example, showed 15% support for the NNP in the Western Cape.
This is much less than the 38% support the party had in the 1999 elections.
This signals danger for the NNP since the party's support base comes largely from the Western Cape and a poor performance there could signal a poor performance on national level.
Meanwhile, Van Schalkwyk said a outright ANC majority would give the ANC the premiership, but the same was true for the NNP.
Van Schalkwyk said: "If neither of the two parties (ANC and NNP) has an outright majority and a coalition government becomes necessary again, we will negotiate about the premiership."
He was confident the NNP would be in a strong negotiating position.
Van Schalkwyk did not want to talk about his plans for the future if he did not make the grade.
Meanwhile, the DA maintains that a vote for the NNP is a vote for the ANC and that Van Schalkwyk will be demolished at the polls, for, among other things, the decision to take the NNP out of the DA.
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