ANC NEC to grill Duarte and Mashatile

ANC acting secretary-general Jessie Duarte is likely to come under attack from the two ANC factions during a crisis special sitting of the party’s national executive committee (NEC) as anger could boil over the party’s failure to submit some of its candidate lists for the local government elections.

According to an ANC source, some were gearing to grill party treasurer-general Paul Mashatile to demand that he account for the party’s financial crisis.

The financial woes had been long coming since the time of Jacob Zuma, when Luthuli House skipped staff salary payments and defaulted on paying its service providers.

Already the ANC’s failure to submit its candidate lists in some municipalities is blamed on the President Cyril Ramaphosa by the radical economic transformation (RET) forces.

They said had the suspended party secretary-general Ace Magashule been around, the mistake wouldn’t have happened.

The ANC will hold a marathon special NEC from today until Monday, followed by a party lekgotla.

It’s understood on top of the agenda would be how the party failed to meet the registration deadline, which experts like Sanusha Naidu said was due to the historic “messy” manner the ANC was run.

The problem caused a public embarrassment to the party. Duarte, as the head of administration at Luthuli House, was central to ensuring the candidate process was carried out without fail.

She could find herself caught between the two warring factions.

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The RET faction, aligned to Zuma and Magashule, believe she has been won over by Ramaphosa camp. But the Ramaphosa side would also have an issue with the late submission, which almost put the party into disrepute.

Now, the governing party is unable to contest in 35 municipalities and 93 wards because it was unable to upload candidates lists by the 23 August deadline.

Duarte said the ANC experienced technical glitches during the submissions and was unable to finish, but the Electoral Commission of SA (IEC) refused the party’s request to be allowed to upload after the deadline.

Both ANC camps were likely to come down hard on Duarte, who is acting secretary-general after Magashule was forced to step aside due to corruption charges he faces in the Free State.

The Zuma faction is expected to vent their anger against her because, according to some, Duarte had sold out to the Ramaphosa side.

It was she who delivered Magashule’s suspension letter on behalf of the top six and the national working committee and issued a warning to him about violating his suspension conditions.