Robert McBride has been nominated to stand in next year’s elections, reports Wally Mbhele
Detained foreign affairs official Robert McBride has emerged as one of the frontrunners in the race for African National Congress parliamentary seats in next year’s general election.
For a candidate to qualify for election, the nominee must win the support of more than five ANC branches. The Mail & Guardian has learned that at the close of nominations on July 10, McBride had more than the required support.
Sources within the ANC elections department – responsible for co- ordinating nominations from branches – said McBride’s support appeared to be coming from the branches he worked with in Gauteng in the run-up to the 1994 general elections.
According to a senior ANC official, the party decided to keep McBride’s nomination secret because of the political dilemma it is going to pose to the ANC, which has been seen as less than keen to secure his release from detention in Mozambique.
McBride was arrested on March 9 in the company of a discredited apartheid-era informer, Vusi Mbatha, a spy for both military intelligence (MI) and the police. McBride was apparently on a mission to investigate the illegal supply of arms from shadowy Mozambican gun-runners to South African criminal and political syndicates.
It has since emerged the arrest was a ploy by old-guard elements of the police and MI, using Mbatha as a middleman, to lend credence to a fictitious plot linking McBride to attempts to overthrow the South African government.
Despite overwhelming evidence pointing to the set-up, Mozambican authorities have pressed ahead with charges against McBride, including allegations of gun-running, association with wrongdoers and espionage.
The ANC has acknowledged that government agents have played a part in setting up McBride in Mozambique, but the party has stopped short of promising intervention.
ANC representative Ronnie Mamoepa says he does not see any problem with McBride’s nomination for a parliamentary seat as he has not been found guilty of any crime. The party “may have to see how the judicial process takes shape in Mozambique”.
As McBride will be expected to sign an acceptance form for his nomination, Mamoepa says “it could be a bit complicated. The province [Gauteng] may well consult with McBride’s lawyer and his wife on that issue.”
The McBride legal team has lodged an appeal with Mozambique’s Supreme Court to have the charges against him set aside. It is understood this process will take more than two months, and meanwhile he cannot qualify for bail.
Although hated by many white South Africans because of a bomb he planted in Magoo’s Bar in Durban during the liberation struggle, McBride has remained a popular figure among ANC grassroots structures. His profile was further enhanced in the early 1990s when he organised self-defence units in Gauteng townships racked by third force violence.
It is understood many branches are nominating him both for Parliament and for the Gauteng legislature. It is not yet clear if other provinces have nominated him for the parliamentary list.
In 1994, McBride’s name topped the list of candidates for the Gauteng legislature; he polled more votes than the former premier, Tokyo Sexwale. McBride served in the Gauteng legislature before he was moved to Parliament, whence he was seconded to the Department of Foreign Affairs.
Gauteng ANC insiders say the list of election candidates is not yet final. They hope it will be sent back to the branches in the coming weeks for the general membership to ratify.
A provincial-list conference will then be convened, where branches and regions will lobby and vote for the final list before it is submitted to the national list committee. This will be followed by a national-list conference.
When the final list has been compiled, candidates will be asked to sign the acceptance form or decline nomination. In the case of McBride, the ANC would be faced with two choices: to reject his nomination, or to send an acceptance form to Machava prison for him to sign.
ANC Gauteng secretary general Obed Bapela confirms McBride’s name is on the nomination list, but warns there are names which are going to be chopped out once the screening of candidates has been finalised.
He says the list committee has to follow certain criteria for candidates laid down by the ANC head office.