Deputy international relations minister Marius Fransman was unanimously elected chairperson of the Western Cape African National Congress on Saturday night at the party conference in Cape Town.
In a surprise twist, Fransman’s expected contender, former chairperson Mcebisi Skwatsha, did not oppose Fransman and said he was not available for the nomination.
The top five positions were all unopposed, according to party spokesperson Mandla Dlamini.
Fransman’s deputy is Abe Pekeur, while the secretary is Songezo Mjongile and deputy secretary Maureen Elliot, former mayor of the Overberg region. Fezile Calana was chosen as treasurer.
Some delegates disputed the decision by the ANC’s constitutional committee to allow the youth league 24 votes, despite the fact that the league in the province has been disbanded. This is said to have favoured Fransman, as the youth league delegates were said to be supporting him.
The matter was then put to a vote in which the youth league members themselves were allowed to vote.
A source close to Skwatsha told the M&G this was why Skwatsha had declined the nomination.
‘Do or die’
President Jacob Zuma addressed the conference on Saturday and did not mince his words.
He criticised delegates for failing to not only regain the region from the Democratic Alliance, but also for not working as a functioning opposition party.
Zuma, who spoke from handwritten notes, argued that the conference should not focus on questions of leadership, referring obliquely to the contest between Skwatsha and Fransman, but rather on the task of returning the organisation in the Western Cape to health.
He warned that a conference such as this one could work to address the in-fighting ailing the province — such as a scalpel in the hands of a surgeon operating on a sick patient.
But he said the congress could also work to deepen the strife that has beset the organisation in the province “like a knife in the hands of a criminal”.
‘Today it is do or die,” he told delegates.
Additional reporting by Lynley Donnelly