Fransman’s sights set on coloured vote
THE ANC will be targeting the coloured vote in the Western Cape, says Marius Fransman.
Fransman was re-elected the party’s provincial chairperson for the second time at its provincial conference at the CPUT Bellville campus at the weekend.
Faiz Jacobs is the new secretary, Khaya Magaxa deputy chairperson, Maureen Gillion treasurer and Thandi Nanyikivana deputy secretary.
After being elected, Fransman said the new executive was going to lead the charge to win back the Western Cape from the DA.
“To win the Western Cape, the executive committee must mobilise ANC supporters and get our firsttime voters registered with the IEC,” he said.
“We need to take back what is ours and this needs to be done two months from this conference.”
Fransman said part of their strategy to win the Western Cape would be to fight for the province’s municipalities and the metro. Asked how he felt being elected unopposed, he said: “Humbled.” The two-day conference started on Friday night after a delay that lasted more than nine hours. The party’s provincial spokesperson, Yonela Diko, blamed the time it took to register delegates for the delay at the conference. The conference was delayed mainly because accreditation of the 670 registered delegates took much longer than expected.
“The process itself is a very rigorous and thorough process to ensure a very smooth conference, which in fact is what we are having and appreciating. We had to make sure the process ran smoothly regarding getting the delegates and capture everything to be thorough.
“Going forward, however, enough time must be set aside for delegates, and enough space between registration and the actual start of conference is critical.”
Besides the newly elected chairperson of the province, all other positions were contested and the elections of the those four members of the provincial executive took place yesterday.
ANC supporters at the party’s eighth provincial conference want change and stronger leadership from the new provincial executive committee elected at the weekend.
Incumbent leader Marius Fransman was elected unopposed as the ANC’s Western Cape chairperson on Saturday while Khaya Magaxa was elected deputy chairperson last night. Faiz Jacobs is the new provincial secretary, Maureen Gillion was voted in as treasurer and Thandi Nanyikivana is the new deputy secretary. The conference was held at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology and only commenced after a nine-hour delay.
While the 700 delegates voted behind closed doors yesterday afternoon, ANC supporter Johan Petersen said he wanted a stronger leadership that could take the city and province back from the DA.
“A good solid leadership is the only thing that can take us forward. The leadership now needs to be stepped up.
“With the majority of the province being coloured, there is also still a belief that they are better off under DA rule. The ANC needs a leadership that will also be there for our people,” he said.
Petersen said change was also needed within municipalities when it came to service delivery. “There needs to be improvement in these structures (so) that people can see work is being done. This is especially important in rural communities. The people there are very poor and the mindset is that national government is not looking after them,” he said.
Petersen added that during the election process there had been some rivalry between certain groups, but they would pledge their support to the new committee.
One of the ANC Boland region caucus members, Cupido Jacobs, said the new leadership needed to be capable of taking the party forward in the province as well as the communities, especially when it came to service delivery.
“Unemployment among the youth is also a huge challenge in the Western Cape, which needs to be addressed,” he said. ANC provincial spokesperson Yonela Diko said people felt the party was not doing what they were supposed to (be doing) in the province. “People feel the ANC need to exert themselves in this province and they require a leadership that is more assertive to bring the kind of change we want. Delegates are expressing this through their votes and aligning themselves with specific people they feel are capable of leading them,” he said.
Diko added earlier that the race aspect could not be ignored, but through the new leadership there would be a racial balance. “We are likely to have an equal number of black and coloured people in leadership. I’m happy that we could have two women in the leadership as well,” he said.
Diko said this election was important for next year’s local government elections because if they won the metro they stood a good chance of winning the province. “During this election, the people on the outskirts of Cape Town were very vocal. In this province, the power of the ANC is in our branches, not in the city.
“The branches in Boland and Overberg are telling us that they matter, and our chairperson is responding to that. We cannot give the impression that certain areas in the Western Cape are ignored,” he said.
Delegates are aligning themselves with people they feel are capable of leading them