Ghost branches haunt Mpumalanga ANC amid rising tensions

Tensions are running high in Mpumalanga over who should replace former provincial chairperson and premier David Mabuza and two other former ANC provincial executive committee (PEC) members who were elevated to the national executive committee last December.

Yesterday members marched to party headquarters at Luthuli House asking for the ANC to intervene to ensure that an elective provincial general council (PGC) is held to fill the vacancies left by Mabuza and others.

The PGC was supposed to elect members who would replace Mabuza, former PEC members Candith Mashego-Dlamini and Violet Siwela. The positions became vacant when Mabuza was elected as ANC deputy president and Mashego-Dlamini and Siwela were elected as NEC members.

Mabuza also became deputy president of the country.

Yesterday members from different ANC branches throughout Mpumalanga came in buses to demand that the NEC disband the ANC provincial leadership structure, which they accused of being responsible for sowing disunity in the party by establishing fake branches in the province.

The group’s spokesperson S’fiso Zulu said the ANC NEC had asked that the province’s PGC be held by August 26, but the PEC delayed it for no reason.

The PEC had suggested that the PGC should be held on September 19, a move that the branches rejected.

“As branches we were ready for the PGC at the weekend but it was not held,” said Zulu.

A co-ordinator for the aggrieved branches, Mfanakhona Mkhaliphi, said they handed a memorandum to the ANC.

“We want the current PEC to be disbanded. We want leaders who will take a mandate from us as branches and not people who want to set up ghost branches,” Mkhaliphi said.

Mkhaliphi said some of the candidates for the positions of ANC provincial chairperson were being intimidated when they held campaign meetings.

With the fractious KwaZulu-Natal now sorted after the recent elective provincial conference, it appears Mpumalanga is going to remain divided about who should be the next leader of the province.

Although Free State elected a PEC, the structure is not recognised by many members who claimed the structure was not elected according to the party constitution.

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