Zuma’s removal will cost ANC rural vote
PRESIDENT Jacob Zuma’s removal as head of state will cost the ANC votes in rural areas and divide the ruling party.
This was the argument made by Zuma’s backers, the Umkhonto weSizwe Military Veterans Association (MKMVA), ahead of the party’s first National Executive Committee meeting tomorrow.
Knives are out for Zuma, with his detractors calling for the NEC to recall him from the Union Buildings to bolster the party’s chances at the 2019 elections.
The push to oust Zuma forced ANC officials to visit KwaZuluNatal on Sunday in what was believed to be part of efforts to manage the backlash that could arise should Zuma be recalled.
Yesterday, ANC president Cyril Ramaphosa and other party officials continued with unity efforts in KZN ahead of the party’s birthday celebrations in East London in the Eastern Cape.
MKMVA president Kebby Maphatsoe said yesterday that while Zuma was no longer president after the party’s national elective conference last month, he still enjoyed overwhelming support from the party’s members and supporters.
“You may undermine Zuma but if you remove him, there are many people in the rural areas who will become angry and decide to not vote for the ANC in 2019.
“In the rural areas they love president Zuma a lot; it’s only in your suburbs here where you hear a lot of noise because of the middle class ... they have arrived.
“These people that are making noise in the NEC about Zuma, they want the ANC to lose elections,” Maphatsoe said.
He said that the ANC under Zuma had failed to properly analyse the implications of removing former president Thabo Mbeki when he was ousted in 2008, which saw Cope being formed as a splinter group by those who were close to Mbeki.
“We were angry and we did not analyse soberly, so are we going to have every five years parts of the ANC going and splitting?
Calling
“We can’t have that, and that is why we are calling on all those comrades of the NEC to really consider the mandate of the conference – that they must unite the ANC,” Maphatsoe said.
The ANC top six will meet today to finalise the agenda and the preparations for tomorrow’s NEC meeting, where they will discuss preparations for the January 8 Statement to be delivered by Ramaphosa on Saturday in East London, where the party will be holding its 106th birthday celebrations.
ANC NEC member Fikile Mbalula confirmed that the issue of Zuma’s fate was on the agenda for tomorrow’s much anticipated meeting.
MKMVA treasurer general and Co-operative Governance Minister Des Van Rooyen said the new NEC had no mandate to remove Zuma.
“We are just coming from our 54th national conference and in that conference there was no item that dealt with the recall of the current head of state. Practise has proven that it is possible for us to have a president of the country not necessarily being the president of the ANC,” Van Rooyen said.
Van Rooyen pointed out that some provincial administrations have worked smoothly with the ANC while the party’s provincial chairpersons were not premiers, including in Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal and the Northern Cape.
Both Maphatsoe and Van Rooyen have personally defended Zuma over his controversial relationship with the Guptas and are seen as allies of the controversial family.
The two have failed to make the cut in the new ANC NEC after having been part of the previous structure.
Meanwhile, Ramaphosa said yesterday that a rerun of the KZN elective conference would unite disgruntled factions in the province.
Ramaphosa made the comments at the grave site of the ANC’s founding president John Langalibalele Dube at Ohlange Institute in Inanda, north of Durban. Tribute was also paid at the grave sites of former ANC presidents Josiah Gumede, Pixley Seme and Albert Luthuli.
“We do not want a divided ANC here ... we will be working day and night to forge unity in KZN. We must proceed to unite this province .”