Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka has dismissed media reports that she summoned African National Congress (ANC) Women’s League delegates from Mpumalanga to her Pretoria office to chide them for nominating Jacob Zuma as party president.
The Sunday Times ran a report this weekend stating that Mlambo-Ngcuka had summoned delegates from Mpumalanga to her office, where, the newspaper said, she told them that voting for Zuma would reverse Mbeki’s good work.
”The deputy president has not ‘summoned’ the reported people. It is regrettable that the newspaper did not bother to verify this point with anyone in her office, which is a basic journalistic tenet,” her spokesperson, Thabang Chiloane, said on Monday.
”Should a verification of the matter had happened, it would have been clear that this matter was false and mischievous.”
He said it was sad that the newspaper did not want the truth to stand in the way of what they thought was going to be a good story.
”It is distressing for a newspaper of the Sunday Times‘ standing to neglect to do basic journalistic verification of facts.”
He told the South African Press Association that there was no such a meeting on the deputy president’s programme. — Sapa