ANC in NMBM waiting for conference clearance
THE troubled Nelson Mandela Bay Metro region of the ANC will know on Monday whether they will be able to elect new leaders later this month.
ANC provincial secretary Oscar Mabuyane said even though the national auditors managed to verify membership across the 60 branches in the Port Elizabethregion, “secretary-general [Gwede Mantashe] has not yet signed the audit report”.
He said the auditors signed and sealed their report on Wednesday, and it shows that 47 of the 60 branches in the metro would be eligible to hold branch general meetings (BGMs) and send delegates to the conference.
The conference was earmarked for December 16, along with Amathole’s one.
The Dispatch reported earlier this week that Amathole region has received clearance and 115 of the 120 branches qualified to go to conference.
“We had earlier suggested that the conference be held this month, but not a single branch has managed to convene a BGM because audits had not been signed off. Clearly it will be difficult to meet the December deadline,” Mabuyane said.
He said there will be a provincial working committee (PWC) meeting on Monday, and a decision on when exactly NMBM region would elect its new leaders will be made.
“We want the PWC to look into submissions by Monday as we were awaiting audit outcomes,” Mabuyane added.
The region has failed to convene the elective meeting for two years now, following the disbandment of the regional structure in December 2014. This was after the region failed to deal with factional fights.
Last December’s ANC branches in the region also failed to convene enough BGMs to be able to meet the 70% threshold, resulting in the shelving of the conference to date.
The instability in the region resulted in a major setback after the August 3 elections as the ANC lost control of the metro to the DA.
Mabuyane said if it meant shelving the conference again, it would be because the party wanted to clean up its house within the Bay.
“We are not going to rush that audit because our past experience was that most branch members were excluded from the processes. We want everything resolved so that every ANC member will be allowed back into the branch.
“We are doing all this to build the ANC – not just malicious compliance for the sake of preparing for conference. This is all part of our strategy for 2019 wherein we build the ANC and claim lost ground.” — zineg@dispatch.co.za