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- Companies and organisations: African National Congress
- People: Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma | Gwede Mantashe
THE positions of 125 African National Congress (ANC) councillors hang in the balance after the party’s new leadership decided to implement the recommendations of a probe which discovered manipulation and fraud in the processes of their nomination.
A task team led by African Union Commission chairwoman and ANC national executive committee member Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma found problems with the nominations of ANC candidates for the 2011 local government elections across the country.
This is likely to result in several by-elections and cause upheaval in ANC branches as the party begins preparations for its 2014 national election campaign.
ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe said at a press briefing in Johannesburg on Tuesday that all the recommendations of the task team would be implemented.
"Where they say remove the councillor, we will do just that. There are recommendations that say, redo ANC processes. If the outcome of the ANC processes confirms a councillor to continue, we will allow that councillor to continue. If we see a rejection of councillors, we will remove those councillors as well."
According to its report, the task team investigated disputes in 419 wards and found alleged irregularities, manipulation of the ANC’s nomination processes and organisational problems.
The task team recommended that ANC candidate selection processes be "redone" in 125 wards.
It also recommended that, in cases where elected councillors were not nominated again following a fresh, democratic process in disputed wards, they be asked to resign and a by-election be held.
It recommended that the ANC take disciplinary action against members found to have manipulated nomination processes.
The task team said the ANC’s membership system was easily manipulated and recommended that the national executive committee establish another task team to review this.
The ANC’s national executive committee also decided — at its first meeting at the weekend since its election last month — to crack the whip on problematic ANC provincial structures, particularly in North West and Limpopo.
Mr Mantashe said the state of local government in North West was an indication of the disarray. He said 90% of its municipalities failed to submit financial statements to the auditor-general in the last financial year — ". .. let alone disclaimers and adverse outcomes, they had not submitted their reports…. "
Limpopo faced similar challenges.
"We must deal with that issue now. Nobody will accuse us of wanting to deal with it on the basis of the spectacle of the Mangaung conference," he said.
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