The DA in the KwaZulu-Natal Legislature has today welcomed former KZN MPL, Hlanganani Gumbi back as a Member of its Caucus. Gumbi was sworn in as a Member by KZN Legislature Speaker Nontembeko Boyce during a Taking the Legislature to the People (TLTP) in Kokstad. (view here)
The DA is delighted to have Hlanganani back as part of the team after his departure in 2019 to serve in the National Assembly. As the DA Shadow Deputy Minister for Tourism, he successfully blocked the Tourism Amendment Bill which sought to kill private enterprise within the sector and the many beneficiaries of Airbnb.
Gumbi comes with a wealth of political experience, having been an active member of the DA since his student days, founding the Democratic Alliance Students Organisation (DASO) at Rhodes University and later serving as DA Youth Eastern Cape Provincial Chairperson.
He is a former graduate of the DA’s Young Leaders programme, former DA Youth Training and Development Chairperson and a former member of the DA Youth National Management Committee and Federal Youth Executive – the highest decision making body in the DA Youth.
In 2011, following the Local Government Elections, he became the youngest municipal Councillor in South Africa at the age of 21, serving on eThekwini’s Economic Development and Tourism portfolio committee and later the Human Settlements and Infrastructure Committee. He is also the founding Chairperson of the DA Caucus’s Strategic Housing Task Team.
Between 2014 and 2019, Gumbi was a Member of the KZN Legislature where he continued his work within the Human Settlements portfolio committee, with a strong focus on housing allocation corruption and pressuring government for a fair and transparent housing allocations list.
In 2015, he was selected as one of 500 young leaders for the Mandela Washington Fellowship for young African leaders in Washington DC at Howard University. The MWF is former United States President Barrack Obama’s flagship programme to connect and support young African leaders.
The DA has no doubt that with his energy, determination and insight, Hlanganani will make an extremely valuable contribution to the DA Legislature Caucus as a whole and in his new role as DA KZN Spokesperson on Agriculture and Rural Development (DARD) and Ad Hoc land affairs. (For a full DA KZN MPL portfolio list view here)
The DA remains KZN’s only effective opposition. The addition of an experienced member to our provincial caucus will fortify our resolve to hold the ANC executive to account. Only the DA has demonstrated that we can do this.