JOHANNESBURG - DA leader Mmusi Maimane said on Wednesday that South Africa needed to be released from President Jacob Zuma’s "death grip" as soon as possible.

Announcing that the party is to table a motion of no confidence in the president, he told a press briefing in Parliament that South Africa was fast approaching the tipping point.

"On almost every front, and in almost every community, our country faces unprecedented crises that threaten to undermine the progress our nation has made since 1994, and jeopardise our shared future.

"Our economy is flirting dangerously with recession with no leadership from the president to turn this around. Close to nine million South Africans still cannot find a job in order to provide for themselves and their loved ones. Zuma’s 'nine-point plan' to grow the economy and create jobs is so underwhelming even the president himself cannot recite the plan, nevermind implement it.

"Our higher education sector, essential for providing skills for the economy and helping young South Africans access opportunities, is on the brink of collapse, starved of funding and leadership by the ANC government ... President Zuma remains nowhere to be found," Maimane said.

Our SOE's are hot-beds of corruption, as we throw billions of rands down the drain to rescue these money suckers - @MmusiMaimane #ZumaOrSA — Democratic Alliance (@Our_DA) October 20, 2016

Maimane told reporters Zuma continued his personal project of state capture, flooding state institutions with “yes-men”.

The National Prosecuting Authority had become the newest weapon in Zuma’s arsenal, bringing "suspicious" charges of fraud against Minister of Finance Pravin Gordhan. This had "created a real fear that the president is determined to get rid of the one set of stable hands in government still available to navigate our country through these troubled times".

The one constant thread that runs through every crisis is Jacob Zuma himself. - @MmusiMaimane #ZumaOrSA — Democratic Alliance (@Our_DA) October 20, 2016

Maimane said: "As a nation, we must be honest and ask ourselves how long we are prepared to wait. How long can we continue to allow Zuma to break our economy, and ruin the future of millions of South Africans?"

The DA had therefore decided to table in Parliament a motion of no confidence in the president. It would do so before year-end.

The party has tried twice before for a vote of no confidence but failed.

Maimane said he knew there was scepticism when a minority party tabled a motion requiring majority support, but "we simply can’t sit by and do nothing because of the risk of the motion not being passed. We cannot render the role of Parliament and the constitutional provisions involved to be rendered useless.

He said it was a golden opportunity for the ANC to "work with us in Parliament to remove Zuma, once and for all, so we can get our country working again".