The special meeting of the African National Congress’s national executive committee will be convened on Wednesday to discuss the suspension of its former chairperson Mosiuoa Lekota, who has threatened to start a breakaway party.
”The meeting starts at 2pm in Johannesburg,” said ANC spokesperson Jessie Duarte.
The decision to suspend Lekota, the former defence minister, and Mluleki George, his former deputy, was taken by the party’s national working committee on Monday.
Last week Lekota went on Talk Radio 702 and, in what ANC president Jacob Zuma described as a ”media show”, accused the ANC of deviating from past policy and said he was ”serving divorce papers” on the ruling party.
Former Gauteng premier Mbhazima Shilowa, who resigned alongside Lekota and a string of Cabinet ministers out of loyalty to to axed former president Thabo Mbeki, is expected to make an announcement on his future on Wednesday morning.
It has been widely speculated that Shilowa may join a new political movement.
The ANC has also suspended five senior regional members in the Western Cape for undermining party unity and discipline.
The five members included Mbulelo Ncedana and Ebrahim Sawant, the axed secretary and deputy secretary of the ANC’s Dullah Omar region in the Western Cape.
Ncedana was among the organisers of a public meeting of disgruntled ANC members in Langa, Cape Town, on Saturday which was addressed by Lekota.
Mbeki resigned on September 21 after the NEC decided to remove him from office.
The decision came after a ruling by Judge Chris Nicholson that he could not exclude the possibility of political interference in the decision to prosecute Zuma on fraud and corruption charges.
‘Radical action’
Zuma, meanwhile, vowed ”radical action” against Lekota on Tuesday.
”Unfortunately, comrades, as we prepare for elections we have to deal with the shenanigans of some elements within the ANC who [want] to break away and form a splinter party,” said Zuma.
These people could not accept the democratic process that led to the appointment of Zuma over Mbeki, and the subsequent recall of Mbeki by the ANC as the country’s president, he said.
”Today we are seeing patterns of behaviour which can best be described as charlatan,” Zuma said.
”They go around the country attempting to cajole the membership of our movement into a rebellion against our organisation. We are not going to tolerate that.
”While recent events have been painful, they should not be used to undermine the ANC and its leadership.”
Zuma accused the splinter group of trying to ”steal the Freedom Charter”, the document that sets out the ANC’s priorities and goals. ”In fact, they want to steal the Freedom Charter which is unlawful. It belongs to the ANC.”
He said ”serving divorce papers” meant the party did not mean much to Lekota. ”What does that mean? You are defeated in a democratic process and you take such action?”
Zuma said a special national executive committee meeting on Wednesday would discuss the matter ”and take very radical decisions”.
”Our view is that we can’t allow people who are bitter about democratic processes to sow disunity and confusion within our structure,” he said.
Members were supposed to rally behind their leaders and ”loyal members know how to raise issues in the party. The ANC is not a liberal organisation where people can do as they please and nothing happens.”
The party would act ”very decisively” to rid itself of factionalism, he said, adding that history had been ”very unkind” to breakaways from the ANC who realised they were on their own.
”It’s cold out there if you are out of the ANC, very cold,” he said, urging unionists not to take the disenchanted group seriously. – Sapa