South African Foreign Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma said she would not refuse a nomination to head the ruling African National Congress and the country.
Asked if she would be available for the ANC’s top post, she told Kaya FM radio late on Thursday: ”ANC cadres never refuse when they are deployed. An ANC cadre has a responsibility to respond to what the ANC thinks they should do.”
The ANC will choose a new leader at a party congress in Polokwane next month.
President Thabo Mbeki and his rival Jacob Zuma, Dlamini-Zuma’s ex-husband, are seen as the leading contenders in the contest.
Trusted lieutenants
If Mbeki remains ANC president and therefore has the power to appoint his own successor, the country after 2009 will be run by his two most-trusted lieutenants, Dlamini-Zuma and government’s head of policy-making, Joel Netshitenzhe.
The strategy emerged in the Mbeki camp after deliberations with Netshitenzhe, who has insisted previously that he is not interested in holding any of the top positions in the party.
Referring to the election of Jacob Zuma at the Mafikeng conference in 1997, an Mbeki lobbyist in Gauteng said Netshitenzhe would have beaten Zuma to the position of deputy president had he not stepped out of the race. ”He is quite popular and very intelligent, but never a man for the limelight,” the lobbyist said.
Netshitenzhe’s nomination as chairperson of the party features on the latest list drawn up by the Mbeki camp, which places Dlamini-Zuma as deputy president after Mbeki.
An Mbeki supporter said the idea of having Netshitenzhe as president of South Africa was discussed, but dismissed in favour of Dlamini-Zuma. ”The chief has made it clear that he wants to be succeeded by a woman.”