Democratic Alliance (DA) leader Mmusi Maimane said former president Nelson Mandela's dream was of a non-racial South Africa.

Addressing a small gathering while on the campaign trail in Meyerton in the DA-controlled Midvaal Municipality on Monday, Maimane said: "The dream of Nelson Mandela is that white, black and Indian people work together to get a prosperous South Africa," he said.

In his speech he mocked racial criticism of the DA by the African National Congress (ANC): "Those who say black people this side, and white people this side, that it still apartheid.”

Maimane told the small group of people gathered on a dusty street corner outside the Sicelo Stadium that ANC leaders in the Eastern Cape "even stole money from Nelson Mandela's funeral".

He was referring to former Buffalo City mayor Zukiswa Ncitha and a number of other former councillors and ANC leaders in the region who were up for fraud following the misuse of money meant for Mandela's funeral in 2013.

Maimane said social development minister Bathabile Dlamini was right and that the ANC is united by "smallanyana skeletons".

'Smallanyana scandal'

There was an outcry last week over the DA's use of Mandela's voice in one of its television advertisements, with members of the Mandela family lodging formal complaints with the Electoral Commission of South Africa.

Current Midvaal mayor Bongani Baloyi, who is, once again, the DA's mayoral candidate for the upcoming elections in the municipality, mocked ANC chairperson and National Assembly Speaker Baleka Mbete, who was campaigning in the area on Sunday.

"Others say we don't deliver but this [the Sicelo Multipurpose Hall] proves that we deliver," he said.

He said Mbete's claims that people would vote ANC was aimed at the neighbouring Emfuleni Municipality and not Midvaal. "I am also not sure if she was sober. They are hearing voices, voices in their head," he said.

Baloyi also claimed the R400-million that "disappeared" in the Emfuleni Municipality made Nkandla look "like a smallanyana scandal".

He was referring to a complaint the DA submitted to the Public Protector last week claiming that a number of projects that the ANC has already paid for have not been delivered yet, attributing this to "corruption and maladministration".