ANC certain it doesn’t need Magashule for election success

The ANC believes it will do well in the upcoming local government elections despite the absence of the party’s suspended secretary-general Ace Magashule.

This comes after Magashule on Monday lost his appeal application to overturn his suspension from the ANC.

The Johannesburg High Court dismissed his application with costs.

With the election happening in less than two months, ANC spokesperson Pule Mabe welcomed the court’s ruling, saying the party will carry on as usual, without Magashule.

“Should it happen that the electioneering falls outside the review period and no different decision has been taken by the decision structure, whether the PEC or NEC or REC, then it means that those conditionalities attached to stepping aside would have to hold until such time that there’s a review,” Mabe told Jacaranda FM.

Suspension

Magashule, who remains a popular figure of the ANC, appealed the high court’s dismissal in July of his bid to overturn his suspension.

He also wanted the court to uphold his attempt to suspend Cyril Ramaphosa as party president, but the court did not rule in his favour.

In its unanimous judgment, the full bench of the high court found that no other court would come to a different conclusion on Magashule’s suspension.

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The embattled secretary-general was suspended in May, in line with the ANC’s rule 25.70, which requires all party members criminally charged to temporarily step aside, pending the conclusion of their cases.

Magashule faces fraud and corruption charges in the Free State in connection with a R255 million asbestos project while he was the province’s premier.

Candidate disputes

Besides Magashule and other several high-profile leaders’ absence, the ANC is facing further challenges over its process to nominate candidates for the elections.

It has been suggested that the ANC’s disputes over the matter may have come as a result of factional battles within the ruling party.

EWN has since reported the ANC missed its own deadline again to finalise their candidates list.

All of the ANC’s nine provincial branches are yet to resolve councillor candidate disputes, according to the publication.

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The Citizen previously reported that the ANC failed to submit its candidates in 93 municipalities to the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) by the 23 August deadline.

However, this took a different turn when the IEC last Monday announced that it would reopen the candidate registration process, after the Constitutional Court (ConCourt) dismissed its application to postpone the municipal elections to February 2022.

The candidate registration process, which notably affected the ANC, will reopen on 20 September.

This has been challenged by the Democratic Alliance.

New election date

The local elections are set to take on 1 November, with Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma confirming the date last Wednesday.

The announcement came after the ConCourt ordered the IEC to hold the municipal elections between 27 October and 1 November.

The voter registration weekend will be from 18 to 19 September. 

Applications for special votes will open 20 September and close on 4 October.

Additional reporting by Thapelo Lekabe. Compiled by Molefe Seeletsa