SUSPENDED ANC Secretary-General Ace Magashule has been booted out of the party’s national executive committee (NEC) meeting after key allies of President Cyril Ramaphosa raised concerns about his participation.
A defiant Magashule said he was taken aback by his removal from the NEC virtual meeting because he is still the Secretary-General of the party following his appeal of the decision to suspend him earlier this week.
“I organized the ANC NEC meeting. The meeting was convened by me but because we were on Zoom I was just switched off,” Magashule told the media afterwards.
ANC MP Bongani Bongo, who is facing criminal charges, was also kicked out of the virtual meeting.
The supporters of Magashule and Bongo argued that two party senior leaders remained in their position.
Bongo and the co-accused appeared briefly before the Nelspruit Magistrate’s Court to face 69 charges including fraud, corruption and theft. The charges relate to the sale and purchase of farms for eMalahlani and Msukaligwa municipalities in 2011.
Bongo was a senior official at the Mpumalanga Human Settlements Department’s legal unit at the time.
“I am still the Secretary-General of the ANC. I will do my work. I will hold meetings and campaign,” said Magashule.
Shortly after Magashule’s removal, Ramaphosa delivered his political overview.
According to a leaked NEC audio of the meeting shared with EWN, Limpopo’s ANC chairperson Stan Mathabatha praised Ramaphosa as one of the best presidents to have served the ANC but slammed factions accusing the party president’s supporters of sowing division.
Mathabatha in the leaked audio claims some of those defending Ramaphosa have been holding factional meetings across different provinces.
The NEC is in a special meeting discussing the integrity commission’s reports the step aside resolution, the upcoming local government elections and the suspension of Magashule.
On Friday, Magashule told the SABC News that the resolutions of the ANC should not be factionalised.
“There are these dominant people who think they are the ANC; the ANC is the people’s movement. I will never allow any individual to take the ANC from me, we joined it together,” said Magashule.
Magashule described his suspension as an Apartheid-style banishment order.
“The ANC for the first time banishes people, under Apartheid they say; stay at home, don’t talk to anybody, don’t do this. It is a banishment order, you cannot do this under democratic South Africa,” said Magashule.
- Inside Politics
