Winnie withdrew presidential bid as she wasn’t popular enough – Mbeki

In an interview on eNCA, former president Thabo Mbeki has weighed in on the debate started by the Economic Freedom Fighters that the late Winnie Madikizela-Mandela should have been South Africa’s first female president.

The EFF said that the liberation movement should hang its head in shame that she did not rise to the top job.

Mbeki, who had a troubled relationship with Madikizela-Mandela (he once, in a televised incident in 2001, angrily pushed her and knocked her cap off as she tried to embrace him), said on Tuesday that this was an oversimplification of the matter.

Mbeki said Madikizela-Mandela’s attempt to become deputy president in 1997, the first step towards becoming state president in 2004, failed simply because she was not as popular as the man she was up against, Jacob Zuma, and she had entered her bid far too late in the process. She had not been nominated by branches and wanted to stand at the elective conference itself.

For that she would have needed a nomination from the floor, which ultimately did not transpire.

“Now in her case, because she had not been nominated by anybody … she had to be nominated from the floor … 25% of delegates need to nominate you in order to stand. She asked for an adjournment, she wanted to do some canvassing first.

“But it was completely out of order. The people who supported her knew the rules and ought to have prepared themselves.”

He explained how the process of nominating and seconding should have worked, but he declined her request to canvass for votes because it was unconstitutional in the ANC.

When she then asked for a chance to speak, Mbeki explained: “I said fine. So she came and she addressed the conference. She apologised to the people who supported her; she apologised to the chair. She didn’t think anything was wrong with the ruling. She declined the nomination, and that was the end of the matter.”

EFF leader Julius Malema had claimed on Tuesday that some “ANC men blocked her because they feared her”.

“Winnie Mandela wanted to stand against Jacob Zuma in Mafikeng, but Zuma was backed by men who did not want her. If Zuma had not opposed her, she would have been the ANC deputy president.”

In an earlier interview with the SABC, Mbeki had also spoken about how Madikizela-Mandela had disobeyed orders from ANC leadership to disband her controversial Mandela United Football Club, which in the 1980s was notorious for necklacing people suspected to be traitors.

Madikizela-Mandela was convicted in 1991 of kidnapping and being an accessory in the 1989 assault of Stompie Seipei‚ one of four boys who were kidnapped by the bodyguards. Her six-year jail sentence was reduced to a fine and a suspended two-year sentence on appeal.

He nevertheless said that her contribution to the struggle deserved special recognition, but that she was also part of a bigger collective.

“Yes‚ indeed‚ recognise individuals‚ but let’s also recognise that these are not people that worked as individuals. These are people that worked in a collective.”

Madikizela-Mandela died on Monday aged 81 at the Netcare Milpark Hospital in Johannesburg after a long illness. She will be given a state funeral on April 14.