Shake-up ahead of key ANC meeting

Policy committees reshuffled with new one set up to focus on energy

THE African National Congress (ANC) is undergoing a major internal overhaul ahead of its national general council in two weeks, a mid-term review meeting that will set the tone for the next two years.

It has split its economic transformation committee into two, so that one may focus on energy, in a tacit acknowledgment that power cuts have cost the economy dearly. Energy, primary sector and infrastructure will be headed by Rural Development and Land Reform Minister Gugile Nkwinti.

The other — economic development planning — will be headed by Enoch Godongwana.

Outside experts will be consulted on economic policy.

ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe yesterday, at a briefing on the ANC’s national executive committee (NEC) meeting held this weekend, likened the new reference group to the macro-economic research group of the 1990s.

“We want to have a similar group supporting the economic cluster,” he said.

Its integrity commission has been given teeth and it can now take decisions that will have to be implemented after discussions with the top six leaders, instead of simply making recommendations.

The ANC’s internal electoral system is to be reviewed to tackle the buying of votes and voting according to slates.

The party also resolved to investigate a lobby group called the “premier league”.

The group comprising the North West, Mpumalanga and Free State premiers was discussed by the NEC when it talked about factionalism, Mr Mantashe said.

But sources who attended the meeting said the NEC resolved to have an independent team investigate the group for causing divisions and prematurely opening the debate on who would succeed President Jacob Zuma and his leadership corps in 2017.

It has been accused of influencing the elections of the women’s league and the youth league as well as provincial elections in KwaZulu-Natal.

It is understood that the premiers denied the allegations.

Mr Mantashe did not mention an investigation but said the ANC would verify the claims.

“The ANC will have to ask difficult questions: what happens if the ANC is taken over by three premiers, what happened to the other (premiers), are they sleeping on duty? Those issues when we get them, we will deal with them quietly,” he said.

As part of the shake-up, Obed Bapela, the head of the international relations committee, was replaced.

The party said yesterday it was not because he flagged the banning of dual citizenship, which had been widely panned, but that other heads were reshuffled too. The international relations subcommittee would now be headed by Environmental Affairs Minister Edna Molewa.

The reshuffle was to align each subcommittee head with their designation in government — Mr Bapela was now a deputy minister in the Department of Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs — he was previously a deputy minister in the Presidency.

The added power for its integrity commission — comprising party veterans — was aimed at protecting the “reputation and integrity” of the party, he said.

CAPE TOWN — About 2,000 South Africans lost citizenship over a four-year period as a result of acquiring the citizenship of other countries, Home Affairs Minister Malusi Gigaba said yesterday.

The disclosure that South Africans are losing their citizenship comes after a furious debate earlier this month over a suggestion that the African National Congress (ANC) intended to review the rules on dual citizenship. Deputy Minister of Co-operative Governance Obed Bapela said the party’s national general council would discuss the matter, but Mr Gigaba said the policy would not be reviewed.

Yesterday, Mr Bapela retracted his statement, saying the matter was not on the agenda of the ANC’s policy discussion conference, which is scheduled to take place early next month.

Mr Gigaba, replying to a par- liamentary question from Democratic Alliance MP Hanif Hoosen, said about 500 South Africans a year had lost their citizenship in the past four years.

Mr Hoosen had asked: “How many South Africans … lost their citizenship in terms of Section 6 of the South African Citizenship Act, and from which countries did the persons acquire citizenship?”

Mr Gigaba said: “A majority of cases relate to citizens taking up citizenship in Australia, western Europe, Canada and the US.”

The department’s website was up to date in relation to the Citizenship Act, and it was each South African’s responsibility to be familiar with the act before to taking up citizenship elsewhere, he said.

The act, as amended in 2004, makes it an offence for a South African citizen to enter or depart from SA on a foreign passport.

This means that an emigrant who acquires a foreign passport must retain and renew his or her South African passport. Thus a South African who has dual citizenship can use a foreign passport overseas, but this is prohibited when travelling into the country.

In 2004, the department had warned citizens with two travel documents not to travel into and out of the country on foreign passports, and advised them to reapply for their South African passports, said Mr Gigaba.

The Citizenship Act provides that the minister may deprive any citizen by naturalisation of his or her citizenship if the certificate of naturalisation was obtained by fraud, false representation or the concealment of a material fact.

Most cases relate to Australia, Europe, US and Canada