CHARLES MOLELE|
THE meeting between Umkhonto we Sizwe Military Veterans Association (MKMVA) and the ANC’s national officials on Monday is expected to set the scene for an open rebellion of the party’s rank-and-file against President Cyril Ramaphosa in the next coming days.
The highly anticipated meeting comes after the ANC peace and stability subcommittee’s recommendation to dissolve the military veterans’ association.
A powerful faction aligned to former President Jacob Zuma plans to use the meeting and a series of other events in the coming week as part of a scorched-earth strategy designed to fight back and break Ramaphosa’s ‘ruthless’ grip on the party.
The pro-Zuma faction is still reeling following the suspension of ANC Secretary-General Ace Magashule from the party – an episode which has deepened the divisions and plunged the African continent’s oldest liberation movement into its most serious crisis since its founding in 1912.
The military veterans first requested to meet with the party’s national officials in November last year, but they were snubbed until last month when the association’s president Kebby Maphatsoe wrote a scathing letter to the Office of the Secretary-General on June 6.
“We find this situation deeply disconcerting,” Maphatsoe said in a letter addressed to ANC Deputy Secretary-General, Jessie Duarte.
The veterans are expected to argue that the association cannot be disbanded as if it were one of the governing party’s leagues, or provincial structures.
They are also expected to argue that the ANC’s top leadership has no powers to disband MKMVA, saying only the party’s national executive committee (NEC), the highest decision-making body between conferences, can disband it.
On Monday, ANC branches in KwaZulu-Natal are also planning to demonstrate outside the Durban high court during the appearance of former eThekwini mayor Zandile Gumede as she heads to court for her long-standing corruption case.
Last Thursday, ANC eThekwini branch co-ordinators met to ensure that supporters adhered to Covid-19 regulations and protocols when they go to the high court on Monday.
eThekwini branches loyal to Gumede are adamant that not only will she win the upcoming regional conference, but she will also unite the troubled region.
The branches also want her to contest for the position of ANC provincial chair in the next provincial conference because KwaZulu-Natal Province has never had a female chairperson, or female Premier, since the dawn of democracy in 1994.
While Gumede stands a chance to be elected to the highest positions in the province, Ramaphosa’s supporters believe she is a liability to the party and her return will hand over power back to the Zuma faction – something Ramaphosa doesn’t want to see happen as it stands to undermine his anti-corruption initiatives and leadership.
Branches in the eThekhwini region also believe that Gumede is being unfairly targeted by Ramaphosa’s powerful allies in the ANC.
“We are fully in support of comrade Zandile Gumede because she is presumed innocent until proven otherwise,” said one of her supporters at the weekend.
Gumede and her co-accused, including eThekwini municipal manager Sipho Nzuza, former chairperson of the infrastructure committee Mondli Mthembu and eThekwini deputy head of supply chain management Sandile Ngcobo, are accused of involvement in a 2016 Durban Solid Waste tender scandal amounting to R430m.
Magashule’s supporters are also preparing to stand behind him when he appears in the Johannesburg High Court next week in a bid to overturn his suspension.
Magashule’s case will now be heard on 24 and 25 June.
Magashule took the party to court after he was suspended after failing to step aside as per rule 25.70 of the ANC’s constitution.
Magashule’s supporters were initially hoping to use the upcoming national general council to hold Ramaphosa to account for his failure to implement resolutions of the 2017 elective conference in Nasrec, but COVID-19 disrupted their plans.
Instead, they are now hoping to use court appearances and other important political events to fight back and mobilize branches against the President’s purges of his opponents ahead of the party’s elective conference next year.
Ramaphosa, on the other hand, is counting on his allies in the party’s top leadership, ANC Women’s League, ANC Youth League national youth task team, the SA Communist Party and COSATU to stay in power.
A number of ANC leaders, branches and districts, have been suspended for opposing the party’s support for Ramaphosa.
In the Free State Province, once Magashule’s stronghold, Ramaphosa’s backers have also succeeded in appointing his supporters in the interim leadership structure.
Over the next few days, it remains to be seen if the developing crisis, and warring factions are likely to strain relations within the party to breaking point.
- Inside Politics
