KZN ANC’s leadership to back Ramaphosa after NEC meeting

The ANC leadership in KwaZulu-Natal, which earlier in the week withdrew its support for President Cyril Ramaphosa amid the political storm caused by the independent panel report, on Tuesday made a U-turn.

On Sunday, ANC provincial secretary, Bheki Mtolo, told ANC members in the party’s Moses Mabhida Region in Pietermaritzburg that KZN was not in support of Ramaphosa.

However, ANC provincial spokesperson, Mafika Mndebele, on Tuesday told The Witness that the provincial leadership’s position has been overtaken by events.

“That was before the ANC NEC [national executive committee] pronounced itself on the independent panel report,” he said.

The ANC NEC, which discussed the independent panel report on Monday, resolved to support Ramaphosa, who has since taken the report on review.

Mndebele said the KZN ANC leadership would not cling to its earlier position given that the ANC NEC has resolved to support Ramaphosa.

“The NEC’s resolution is binding on all the ANC lower structures, including the KZN provincial leadership,” he said. However, Mndebebe said that the KZN leadership’s support of Ramaphosa in his battles against the panel report should not be construed as support for his bid to be re-elected ANC president at the upcoming party national elective conference.

In as far as the ANC national conference is concerned, our position has not changed. As KZN, we want comrade Zweli Mkhize to be the next ANC president

Ramaphosa is facing allegations that he attempted to conceal the theft of more that $500 000 at his Phala Phala farm in 2020.

Established by Parliament two months ago, the Section 89 independent panel found that Ramaphosa has an impeachable case to answer to as far as the Phala Phala robbery scandal was concerned.

However, the ANC NEC, which has the power to recall a party president embroiled in controversy, resolved to side with Ramaphosa.

While support from the ANC NEC, coupled with the fact that Ramaphosa was challenging the panel’s finding in court, provides his supporters with ammunition to discredit the panel’s report, which some of the president’s backers have dismissed as flawed — it is not enough to prevent Parliament from proceeding with impeachment proceedings as recommended by the panel.

Parliament, which was scheduled to debate the report on Tuesday, will now deliberate on the matter next week.

Should 50%+1 of Parliament’s 400 MPs vote in favour of the panel report, the National Assembly would be obliged to set up an ad hoc committee to investigate Ramaphosa.

However, given that the ANC has a majority in Parliament, opposition parties, which want Ramaphosa to be investigated by the ad hoc committee, were hoping that some ANC MPs would also vote in favour of the panel report.

Should the opposition parties fail to convince some ANC MPs to vote with the opposition, the impeachment process against Ramaphosa would be discontinued.

Long-serving ANC MP Dennis Bloem, who has since joined Cope, said it was “highly unlikely” that ANC MPs would agree to vote with the opposition.

In its meeting, the ANC NEC didn’t only resolve to support President Ramaphosa, it also issued an instruction to all ANC MPs to vote against the panel’s report.

“ANC MPs know quite well that there would be serious consequences should they go against the party’s instructions,” he said.

During former president Jacob Zuma’s tenure, opposition parties tabled a total of eight motions of no confidence against him.

However, none of the motions were successful, as the ANC used its superior numbers in Parliament to block the motions.