/ 24 November 2008

ANC looks toward 2009 elections

The African National Congress (ANC) is trying to find a suitable date for next year’s elections that falls outside the busy Easter holiday period, said secretary general Gwede Mantashe on Monday.

The party has been looking at a range of Wednesdays next year and has considered March 25 and May 6 because these fall outside of the holidays.

”Any other date may be impacted by the school holidays and the Easter weekend,” said Mantashe.

The date is ultimately set by the president of the republic.

Much of the focus of this weekend’s ANC national executive committee (NEC) meeting was on preparations for the elections, he said.

This coming weekend the party will meet to discuss its election manifesto and will include submissions and suggestions from the public.

The manifesto will be launched on January 10 and 11 in the Eastern Cape’s Amathole region.

The party’s deadline for list candidates from branches is set at December 15.

Meanwhile, the ANC defended its youth league leader, Julius Malema, on Monday, saying the media was pushing ”malemaphobia”.

Mantashe said criticism levelled at Malema was discussed at the weekend’s NEC meeting.

Apart from Malema’s ”Kill for Zuma” comments, they could not pin much else down that he could be criticised for.

The ANC was responsible for helping the league when it put its foot wrong, but felt the media was pushing ”malemaphobia”.

In response to criticism that its members were disrupting Congress of the People meetings, Mantashe said this flowed both ways. He said the ANC leaders had been subjected to some unacceptable comments at Cope meetings this past weekend.

”It is not a one-way traffic this thing of disruption,” he said. — Sapa