Sport, Arts and Culture Minister Zizi Kodwa has urged the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) to consider including the prohibition of the burning or desecration of national symbols in the Code of Conduct of political parties.
He said his department was also consulting with its legal team over what action could be taken against the DA after the party featured a digital version of the South African flag engulfed in fire in one of its election television adverts.
The DA has defended the use of the image, saying it wanted to highlight its argument that the country is facing multiple crises.
The advert, launched by the DA on Sunday, shows the South African flag in the background, and is titled “This election is about survival”.
As the flag burns in the background, a voice says: “The ANC will lose the majority vote for the first time in 30 years but will do anything to stay in power.”
As the flag is engulfed by flames, the voice says a coalition of the ANC, EFF and the MK Party will see an escalation of corruption.
Kodwa on Wednesday said that there was currently no prohibition against desecrating national symbols in the IEC’s Code of Conduct.
“As we continue to review the Heraldry Act Amendment Bill, there must be penalties which include imprisonment for anybody who destroys a national flag,” said Kodwa.
Burning the flag is not illegal, but Kodwa said the advert had crossed the line and that elections must be about contestation of ideas and policies.
“It must not be about destroying or desecration of our national symbols.
We have been considering a number of options since Wednesday, we have been consulting with our legal people, from the government point of view, to see what action can be taken.
“We know this is the silly season, but how do we prohibit this beyond elections?”
Neeshan Balton, CEO of the Ahmed Kathrada Foundation on Wednesday told “The Mercury” that there is a history to the flag which is linked to the history of democracy in the country and the DA was misplaced in its strategy.
“I am not sure if it will amount to electoral gains, it might have got a million hits or views but it has just deeply polarised people.
“If you want to show that it’s a country that needs saving, there could have been so many more creative ways of doing this, rather than to attack symbols of national unity,” Balton said.
He said the subliminal message is about rallying people around their fears about a possible coalition that might burn the country down.
“The reality is that this is an electoral contestation, this is not a war that we are in. To evoke that kind of imagery and in an election period, I think this is misplaced.”
President Cyril Ramaphosa described the burning of the flag in the advert as treasonous and unacceptable.
DA leader John Steenhuisen, speaking to party supporters in East London on Tuesday, said the party’s controversial advert was meant to be uncomfortable.
He said the inefficiency of the governing party had led the country into a downward spiral.
“There is too much at stake. The advert is warning South Africa about the threat that we face as the nation,” Steenhuisen said.
He said this threat was the “doomsday coalition” between the ANC, EFF and any alliance with former president Jacob Zuma.
DA Federal Council chairperson Helen Zille also weighed in on the issue, saying in a statement that the “DA had the guts to tell a hard, inconvenient truth”.
Zille said the DA had to do everything possible to prevent a “doomsday coalition”.
Political analyst Professor Ntsikelelo Breakfast said the DA was not wrong in pointing out the weaknesses of the governing party, but their strategy had gone overboard.
“They could have driven the message home without evoking emotions and what they did does not sit well with some people because a flag of a country is something that is emotive.”
Breakfast said the DA’s strategy is also divisive along racial lines.
“Now you have a situation whereby we have some black people defending what the governing party says and it does not look good.”
This is not the first time the DA has used a controversial strategy ahead of an election.
In 2021, ahead of the local government election, the party put up posters in Phoenix that were seen as racially insensitive.
“The ANC called you racist. The DA calls you heroes,” read the DA posters in the predominantly Indian community of Phoenix, where scores of black people were killed during the July unrest.
DA KZN senior leader Dean Macpherson later apologised and said the party would remove the posters which “inadvertently caused offence”, adding that the posters were not sanctioned by the party.
The Mercury