KwaZulu-Natal Premier Lionel Mtshali is expected to make an announcement on Monday on whether he will bow to ANC threats and reinstate three ANC members of his provincial cabinet.
On Saturday, the Inkatha Freedom Party’s national coordinating committee met to discuss the African National Congress demands. The council finally decided to leave the decision up to Mtshali, a leading member of the IFP.
Mtshali sacked ANC MECs Dumisani Makhaye and Mike Mabuyakhulu last year and replaced them with Democratic Alliance members, further weakening the tenuous co-operation agreement between the ANC and the IFP.
Last week, the ANC demanded Mtshali reinstate the pair as well as former education MEC Gabriel Ndabandaba or face unspecified action.
Ndabandaba lost his seat in the executive when he defected from the IFP to the ANC.
After gaining what appears to be a majority of the seats in the house during the recent round of floor-crossing at provincial and national level, an ANC-led alliance hinted it might use this majority to oust Mtshali if he did not reinstate Makhaye, Mabuyakhulu and Ndabandaba.
On Thursday, the KwaZulu-Natal legislature passed a resolution calling on Mtshali to convene a meeting of IFP and ANC leaders in the legislature to resolve the crisis.
IFP national representative Musa Zondi said on Sunday, however, that the resolution passed on Thursday was ”laughable”.
”It is a resolution fraught with difficulties. Political parties are autonomous bodies. A political party cannot be directed to do anything,” he said.
He questioned how Mtshali would be able to engineer a meeting between the two parties as relations had broken down last May.
”The ANC voted in favour of Pietermaritzburg over Ulundi — that was a rock in the road. Now with the floor crossing legislation there is another boulder in the road. The authors of the resolution were naive.”
He said the national coordinating committee had given the premier its full support at Saturday’s meeting.
”We have given him the authority to take a decision that would be binding on the party but we have asked him to protect the interests of the KwaZulu-Natal people. The long term interests of the province must be taken care of,” Zondi said.
A statement released by the committee on Sunday said demands that Mtshali discuss the composition of his cabinet with ANC and IFP leadership were dictatorial.
”…these matters are his exclusive constitutional prerogative in respect of which Parliament may not dictate,” the statement read.
The council said the premier must exercise his constitutional discretion to ensure that the province’s interests were placed above party interests.
”Premier Mtshali has the authority of this Committee to take whatever action is necessary and advisable under the circumstances to ensure that the will of the people is respected, the premiership is not usurped and that mulitparty democracy promoted not only in KwaZulu-Natal but in the whole of South Africa.”
The council also endorsed Mtshali’s statement that KwaZulu-Natal needed a stable government lead by like-minded leaders. – Sapa