As the ANC gets increasingly shunned and side-lined by mainstream political parties at the coalition talks, the party is also imploding within, with some of its branches in Gauteng accusing leaders of manipulating candidate lists.
On Monday, ANC members from Ekurhuleni marched to Luthuli House in Johannesburg to voice their concerns about candidate lists during local government elections.
ANC members also marched at a number of ANC offices across the country, particularly in KwaZulu-Natal and the Eastern Cape.
Fiery ANC member Oniccah Maphisa is also leading an offensive against Greater Joburg ANC regional secretary Dada Morero over his inclusion as possible ANC mayoral candidate in Johannesburg.
Maphisa and the ANCWL in the region have raised a red flag over Morero being among the three people the party has interviewed.
Maphisa and the ANCWL believe that Morero has effectively become a referee and a player in the process building up to him making the cut in the final three.
She has since called for a national general council of branches in Gauteng to raise concerns about nomination of mayors.
Maphisa is regarded as one of the key supporters of Ace Magashule and the RET faction of the party who are calling for party president Cyril Ramaphosa to be disciplined over his controversial CR17 campaign funding.
The RET faction, seen as being aligned to former president Jacob Zuma and Magashule, has been in a turf war with the CR17 or the so-called Rebuild, Renew, Unite (RRU) faction, which is seen to be aligned to Ramaphosa.
On Tuesday, the ANC Joburg called on Branch Executive Committees (BECs) and Branch Task Teams (BTTs) in the 135 branches of the ANC to distance themselves from “factional and unconstitutional meetings illegally convened by comrade Oniccah Maphisa”.
“Structures of the ANC that has objections of concerned about nomination of Mayors are within their rights to engage the upper structures in considering due regards to processes in the movement,” the ANC Greater Joburg said in a statement.
“The region will engage the province based on rule 25 of the ANC Constitution in dealing with this kind of a conduct by Comrade Onica Maphisa. To this end, we call upon ANC members and structures to remain discipline and desist from participating in such counter-revolutionary gatherings and invest our energies in renewing and rebuilding.”
ANC spokesperson Pule Mabe said on Tuesday that the ANC was getting deeply about what appears to be staged protests outside Luthuli House.
Mabe said the ANC was currently seized with delicate coalition talks and urged all its members throughout the country to exercise restrain during this period.
“The ANC has on countless occasions expressed its commitment to resolving candidate disputes across the country following the 2021 local government elections,” said Mabe.
“The ANC has placed it on record that should it be found that there where instances of manipulation on candidate selection such will be reversed and appropriate action taken against those implicated.”
ANC branches in Gauteng are also planning a series of protests against the ANC GP leaders over the poor performance of the party during the local government elections.
ANC head of elections Fikile Mbalula has said the reason for the party’s poor performance can be attributed to a low turnout and the party losing support to opposition parties, mainly the EFF and Action SA.
Mbalula also maintains that the poor running of some municipalities had made it tough for the party to campaign.
As coalition talks about hung municipalities continued this week, Ramaphosa supporters raised concerns that the EFF seemed to be offering municipalities controlled by RET forces – such as Ekurhuleni and eThekwini – in a desperate move seen by some as part of a bigger plan to topple the party president.
This after the RET grouping within the ANC in KZN openly expressed hope that their candidates in current mayor Mxolisi Mkaunda and Zama Sokhabase are being considered for the mayoral position in eThekwini.
The coalition talks between the ANC and EFF collapsed on Tuesday.
The ANC Youth League (ANCY) accused EFF president Julius Malema of a desperate attempt to strong-arm the ANC into agreeing to a policy shift on matters that have nothing to do with local government.
This after the EFF demanded among other things that the ANC agree to the cancellation of student debt, nationalisation of the Reserve Bank and expropriation of land without compensation.
“South Africans must not be deceived by Malema’s unwarranted attack on the ANC as it is an expression of frustration after his opportunism and uncontrollable appetite to put his dirty paws in the cookie jar was not satisfied through these negotiations,” reads the ANCYL statement.
“He also wanted to use the lousy 23 seats his cult got in the city of Tshwane to govern a council with a total of 214 councillors while the most seats went to the ANC followed by the DA. This is a clear indication that the scoundrel’s opportunism knows no limits and respects no laws.”
In the City of Johannesburg, a party needs 136 seats from 270 to form a government and the ANC has the biggest share of the seats with 91 including 87 ward and four proportional representation (PR) councillors.
To continue governing Johannesburg, the ANC will require 45 votes from smaller parties to form a coalition government.
The DA is the second biggest party in the country’s economic hub, with 71 seats – 43 wards and 28 PR.
Former Johannesburg mayor Herman Mashaba’s ActionSA will be the third largest party in council with its 44 PR seats and the EFF has 29, all PR.
In the capital, the City of Tshwane, 108 councillors will be needed to form a government and the ANC secured 75 of the 214 council seats while the DA has 69.
The EFF has 23 councillors, ActionSA has 19 and FF+ 17.
The ACDP will have two council seats while nine other parties will have one each including GOOD, PAC, PA and COPE.
In Tshwane, the DA can look to ActionSA, FF+, ACDP and Cope to form a coalition government, while the ANC has a tough task to find 33 more seats. A pact between the EFF, GOOD, PAC and PA would not be enough.
In Ekurhuleni, 113 councillors out of 224 are needed to form a governing coalition and the ANC’s 86 means the party will need 27 other seats.
The DA won 65 seats in the municipality east of Gauteng while the EFF secured 31 followed by ActionSA with 15.
- Inside Politics
