Errors in registration admitted, but ANC confident of selection process
THE ANC in Kwazulu-natal yesterday said that it was pleased with its selection process of candidates for the upcoming local government elections.
According to the ruling party, most of their branches in the province had acquainted themselves well with the prescripts of the new guidelines.
Outlining the outcomes of the ANC’S provincial executive committee at a press briefing yesterday, the party’s provincial secretary, Mdumiseni Ntuli, indicated that their selection process had been informed and regulated by the National Executive Committee (NEC) guidelines, which emerged from resolutions adopted by the party at its 54th national conference in December 2017.
“The ANC in KZN is proud to have an overwhelming number of our ward candidates chosen in democratic processes, and with the involvement of our communities,” Ntuli said.
“This was a necessary and timely intervention to ensure that the ANC candidates are truly the people’s representatives, and democratically chosen by our people,” he said.
Ntuli added that the ANC’S new guidelines had undoubtedly reaffirmed “an important and cardinal principle of our movement: that the ANC is the Parliament of the people of South Africa, black and white”.
Ntuli added that they were confident that the ANC would emerge victorious in the local government elections.
But he admitted that the party’s failure to register candidates in several municipalities could see it losing its control over these municipalities in the elections.
He further maintained that the party had failed to secure registration of all PR candidates in local municipalities such as edumbe, uphongolo, Abaqulusi, Ulundi and Nongoma. It was without ward candidates in three uphongolo wards, three in Abaqulusi, four in Nongoma and two Ulundi wards.
Other areas where the party does not have candidates include the General Gizenga Maqina Mpanza region, Kwadukuza, in wards 2, 6, 10, 20, 22 and 24. In Ndwedwe, wards 11, 12, 13 and 15 are also without councillors, while in Inkosi Bhambatha, the party could not register candidates for the umzinyathi District Municipality, to name a few places.
The party’s national leadership has since applied to the Electoral Court to have the registration process opened for at least a day to ensure that they were able to field candidates for the elections.
Ntuli highlighted that the ANC’S PEC was fully behind the work done by the secretary-general’s office to petition the Electoral Court for the IEC to reopen the candidates’ registration.
“The PEC is deeply concerned that this situation might not only and merely replace the ANC as the governing party in some of these municipalities, but will undermine the advancement of the National Democratic Revolution.
“The PEC believes that the organisation has learnt some lessons with regards to the IEC electronic candidates’ registration, with its glitches and attendant mistakes, and calls on all ANC members to rally behind the NEC in fixing the challenges emanating from the registration,” he said.