Footage of delegates at an ANC regional elective conference in KwaZulu-Natal was shared on Saturday on social media, immediately making it clear that deep divisions still exist in the ANC.
According to journalist Siphamandla Goge, delegates sang a pro-Zuma song and also demanded to know what North West Premier Supra Mahamapelo has done wrong to be asked to stand down.
It’s understood that President Cyril Ramaphosa conveyed the message to Mahumapelo that he should resign or will be recalled. However, he still has strong pockets of support in the ANC throughout the country.
Greater KwaDukuza regional chair Ricardo Mthembu, however, said they supported Ramaphosa. He was tabling his political report as the outgoing regional chair.
In the last week of April, the ANC’s leadership announced the KwaZulu-Natal province and its regions could go ahead with their planned elective conferences.
The ANC in KwaZulu-Natal has been split into two factions since its 2015 provincial conference where new leadership was elected. One camp backs Ramaphosa, the South African Communist Party, and former ANC provincial chairman and axed premier Senzo Mchunu.
The other group – who say the elective conference needs to run as soon as possible – supported former African Union commission chairperson Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma for ANC president in December 2017 at the national elective conference, and support former president Jacob Zuma as well as Sihle Zikalala.
Zikalala opened the 7th Greater KwaDukuza regional conference on Saturday. He spoke, among many things, of the need for the ANC to unite and bring together all races, particularly by appealing to the Indian vote again.
Zikalala was provincial ANC leader until January when the party suspended the leadership after the Pietermaritzburg High Court found that the 2015 elective conference, won by Zikalala against Mchunu, was null and void. An interim structure was set up and co-led by Zikalala with Ramaphosa backer Mike Mabuyakhulu. Their mandate was to ensure the provincial elective conference was held by the end of April, but they failed.
After an exhaustive consultative process by ANC top leadership, the party’s secretary-general Ace Magashule told media: “I think we are all agreeing throughout the regions that we are ready for regional conferences. We are ready for provincial conferences. We are ready and happy that our structures are busy ensuring that there’s unity and cohesion in the province.”
He added that despite the challenges “we are not tiring”.
“The provincial task team comrades are working together to forge unity so that we are able to score a decisive victory in elections next year…. we reporting back, we not ending here… this is the year of unity and renewal… we are highly impressed by the leadership of KZN,” he added.
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