The Democratic Alliance (DA) said on Tuesday while it is not opposed to a workable Budget, it opposes an anti-growth, anti-jobs and anti-poor VAT-based Budget.

DA spokesperson on Finance, Dr Mark Burke was speaking in front of the High Court in Cape Town where the DA's urgent court application to interdict the pending VAT increase will be heard.

“We oppose a debilitating and bulldozing Budget that will lead to further poverty by taking money from people who can’t afford it and giving it to people who don’t know how to use it.

“We oppose a bullying Budget that will lead to more young people losing hope when they realise they will be poorer than their parents,” said Burke.

He said the DA was opposing a “bleeding Budget”, which he said would lead to more South Africans wondering why their property values had decreased further.

The party also opposed a “blind and blundering Budget,” that it said would make it more expensive for the working class to get to and from work.

He said his party would lend its support to a Budget focussed on infrastructure investment and no new bailouts.

“…such a Budget had our support until the African National Congress (ANC) decided to steamroll a tone-deaf Budget against our advice and against our collaborative input made in good faith,” Burke said.

He said while the DA aimed for a favourable ruling in court, a victory would only get the party so far.

“In the end, there is a need for politicians to pierce through privileged pipedream plans and outdated ideology. They need to see the scale of the problem facing our people,” he said.

Meanwhile, ActionSA has claimed that, through a parliamentary reply, the DA’s Deputy Minister of Finance Ashor Sarupen has implicated himself in being intimately involved in the Budget process, particularly in drafting the original February 19 Budget speech which included the deeply unpopular two percentage point VAT increase, as well as the subsequent revision to the split 1 percentage point increase.

“Yet in recent weeks, the DA has cynically weaponised this very VAT hike in a desperate attempt to salvage its political image and to extract more influence in the Government of National Unity (GNU),” said ActionSA MP Alan Beesley.

Beesley accused the DA of waging an internal war in the GNU by “prioritising extortionist power plays and Ministerial positions in the GNU over the financial well-being of millions of struggling South Africans”.

He said the DA’s “kamikaze-style attacks” on the Budget process were never about blocking an unjust tax hike, but rather a deliberate attempt to sabotage the Budget so that the party could renegotiate its position in the GNU.

“…the truth, however, is that the DA’s Deputy Minister was directly involved in the initial drafting of the VAT increase. They knew it was coming and said nothing until it suited their narrow political agenda,” he explained.

DA national spokesperson Willie Aucamp said ActionSA's comment is a testimony of a party that is "desperately looking for relevance".

He highlighted that Sarupen had several meetings with finance minister Enoch Godongwana leading up to the budget announcement, but that in each of those meetings Sarupen made it clear that neither he, nor the DA, will support any increases in VAT or any other taxes. 

Aucamp said instead, Sarupen made proposals Godongwana to cut on spending and create a budget that will help economic growth. 

"...unfortunately these measures were ignored," Aucamp said.