Battle lines have been drawn between Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK) veteran Thandi Modise and Deputy Minister of Home Affairs Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula as the African National Congress Women’s League prepares for a future without Winnie Madikizela-Mandela.
Modise, the incumbent deputy president of the league, is now serving as the acting president after Madikizela-Mandela resigned earlier this year.
Madikizela-Mandela was convicted of several charges of fraud and theft and sentenced to five years in jail in April. The organisation’s constitution does not allow any member convicted and sentenced for more than a year in prison to serve in its leadership structures.
The women’s league will be holding its long overdue national conference in Johannesburg next weekend and the two women are expected to tough it out for the position of president. About 2 250 delegates are expected to attend the conference, which will also elect its new leadership.
According to the league, the organisation has 178 000 unverified members nationally. Its audited membership is 61 778. Besides electing a new leadership, the league will seek to redefine its role and reassert its waning influence in the ANC and its growing irrelevance to women’s politics nationally.
The women’s league was established in 1948 because women were discriminated against by ANC men who treated politics as a male domain. It used to play a key role in influencing ANC leadership battles and pushing women on to the executive. It was instrumental in securing one-third of female representation in Parliament and the ANC executive.
The only reason Madikizela-Mandela was allowed to hold a leadership position after her abduction conviction in 1992 was that her comrades saw it as an apartheid-era crime.
Women’s league insiders said this week that the ANC’s leadership was putting its weight behind Mapisa-Nqakula (46), who is a rising star in President Thabo Mbeki’s Cabinet and is seen as a mainstream ANC national executive committee insider.
Her supporters are using her perceived closeness to Mbeki as a lobbying tool, a tactic that has angered the Modise camp, who believe it is intimidatory.
”How can you lobby for support citing Mapisa-Nqakula’s close association with the president? Leaders have to be elected by the structures and by the supporters at grassroots level,” said an angry Modise supporter.
The leadership’s alleged attempt to install its own candidate is being perceived as an attempt to take control of the organisation, which since 1997 has been viewed as a ”club of Winnie supporters”.
Mike Ramagoma, a spokesperson for Mapisa-Nqakula, declined to comment on whether the deputy minister was available for the position. He said the nomination process for the leadership positions had yet to begin. ”No one has approached her to stand,” said Ramagoma.
ANC head of the presidency Smuts Ngonyama maintained that the ANC was not interfering in the affairs of the league as it had its own members and structures. ”This has nothing to do with the ANC leadership,” Ngonyama said.
Women’s league insiders said general secretary Bathabile Dlamini, who had put her weight behind Madikizela-Mandela in April in the hope that she would not be sentenced, is now also backing Mapisa-Nqakula. Dlamini, who hails from KwaZulu-Natal, is also believed to be standing for re-election as general secretary.
Insiders said provinces such as the Western Cape, which will have 305 delegates, the Eastern Cape (143) and the Northern Cape (164) are being lobbied to support Mapisa-Nqakula.
ANC Youth League spokesperson Khulekani Ntshangase, speaking on behalf of Dlamini and the Women’s League, said elections were handled by structures and candidates only declared their availability when they were ”properly approached by the structures”.
He dismissed claims that Dlamini was lobbying on behalf of Mapisa-Nqakula as ”lies”. Ntshangase also maintained that leaders are not elected ”on the basis of their friendship with the ANC president”.
Although the organisation virtually fell apart under Madikizela-Mandela’s presidency many Women’s League members appreciated the independence of their organisation during her tenure. Madikizela-Mandela was one of the few senior ANC members to speak out against the government’s dithering stance on HIV/Aids treatment and the provision of nevirapine to HIV-positive pregnant women, and regularly criticised the state’s delivery record.
The Modise camp is now looking towards Madikizela-Mandela’s supporters to rally around her. The former president’s support base is largely based in Gauteng, which will have the largest contingent — 358 delegates, followed by Mpumalanga (325), present at the conference. But Madikizela-Madikizela is said to be staying out of the fray, apparently because she feels her colleagues abandoned her when she was convicted and sentenced.
Although she is set to be honoured at the conference, a man who answered her cellphone refused to comment on whether Madikizela-Mandela would be attending the conference or on any matters related to the league.
Modise referred all Mail & Guardian queries to the league’s official spokesperson. When the M&G approached Ntshangase to comment on Modise’s candidature, he reiterated: ”It is not for her [Modise] to decide, but members must decide who do they want. At this stage, structures have not made any indication.”
The process of nominations has begun, with provinces expected to start submitting their lists to an electoral commission headed by ANC MP Makhosazana Njobe. The electoral commission is expected to announce the nominees next week.
Ironically, there has been a historical rift between Modise and Madikizela-Mandela, dating back to 1997 when both were contenders for the Women’s League president’s position.
Most female Cabinet members sit on the league executive but have not played active roles because of tense relations with Madikizela-Mandela.
Political analyst Aubrey Matshiqi expects the importance of the league to diminish in the post-Madikizela-Mandela era. He said: ”Winnie’s persona and influence within the ANC was larger than that of the league.”
Wits University political analyst Tom Lodge was, however, critical of Madikizela-Mandela’s performance, pointing out that she functioned like an independent and did not carry the league with her on issues such as HIV/Aids.
He hoped the organisation might ”function properly” in her absence. Lodge pointed out that the ANC had been extremely critical of the women’s league’s lack of organisation during Madikizela-Mandela’s tenure.
Lodge felt that if the league targeted women ”below 75 years of age”, it could become an important pressure point in influencing policy within the ANC.
He added that regardless of the league’s influence, Mbeki had been very good at empowering women and that women were well-represented in mainstream ANC structures and in the government and Parliament.
A member said: ”Part of the problem the league experienced was that it was seen either as an organisation of old women or Winnie’s supporters. Younger ANC women members did not join for fear of being labelled members of an anti-Mbeki camp.”
Modise, a former MK commander, has, however, maintained her seniority within the ANC independent of her association with the Women’s league, which has been overshadowed by Madikizela-Mandela. She, too, enjoys a reputation as an independent thinker.
When Madikizela-Mandela was sentenced Modise paid tribute to her role in the struggle against apartheid and acknowledged that ”an oversight on the part of our president has occurred and will be a lesson to all of us”.
Modise, who joined the movement as a teenager and spent many years in jail and in exile, is a widely-respected force within the women’s league.
Mapisa-Nqakula was made deputy minister after having served as ANC Chief Whip in Parliament for just five months last year. Mapisa-Nqakula was elected general secretary of the women’s league in 1993 and held the position until Dlamini’s election to the position in 1997.
League insiders say the organisation needs to be revived so that it can lead campaign on issues such such as women’s economic empowerment, rape and abuse of women and children, and provision of anti-retrovirals.
”We could become a powerful lobby group within the ANC to create sensitivity around women’s issues,” a member pointed out.
Ntshangase, speaking on behalf of Dlamini, said: ”The country is not yet fully free. The women’s league must continue to unite women across political affiliation to ensure that delivery reaches the poorest of the poor, until the day women will no longer fetch wood and water.”