FORMER ANC president Thabo Mbeki said on Monday that it was impossible to renew the governing party amid high levels of opportunism and self-serving careerism.
Mbeki, who was addressing the ANC Eastern Cape’s three-day extended provincial executive committee (PEC) meeting in East London, said former ANC president Nelson Mandela raised concerns about careerism way back in 1997.
He said two decades later, the ANC has not been able to deal with the issue of careerism in a satisfactory manner.
At the Mafikeng Elective Conference, Mandela warned the ANC about ‘mercenaries’ and ‘staff riders’ who would align with the movement for personal gain.
“When we say renewal, can you renew the ANC with those careerists in our midst? The answer is no,” Mbeki said.
“If you have Thabo Mbeki as a careerist, how do you get rid of him?”
Clarifying his absence from the campaign trail in the previous elections, Mbeki said he did not campaign for the ANC in the past few years because there were many wrong things in the organisation emanating from the Polokwane Elective Conference in 2007.
“In 2009, 2011, 2014, 2016, I didn’t campaign for the ANC. But I voted. But 2019 I did because the leadership of the ANC used to tell a false message of a good story to tell. I couldn’t go around and tell people that we have a good story to tell when we didn’t,” said Mbeki.
Mbeki added that it was wrong to combine the position of provincial chairs with Premiership, pointing out that while Ace Magashule was chair of the Free State, he was not appointed Premier.
He said he raised the issue during the meeting with provincial chairperson Oscar Mabuyane and he agreed with him that it was wrong to combine the position of provincial chairperson with the premiership.
Mbeki said the decision to move from this position in Polokwane in 2007 was entirely wrong.
“In the Free State we had Beatrice Marshoff and Winkie Direko as Premiers. Ace Magashule was the chair but we couldn’t appoint him as a Premier. The decision to combine this is wrong,” said Mbeki.
- Inside Politics
