| SAM MKOKELI |
| Published: 2011/04/29 06:27:56 AM |
IN AN astonishing about-turn just weeks before local government elections, President Jacob Zuma says some African National Congress (ANC) candidates could be ejected to make way for communities’ "preferred" candidates.
His climb-down on candidate lists, which have become a major source of friction in the party, could throw the outcome of the May 18 poll into disarray, certainly for some ANC candidates .
It also appears to negate the frantic efforts of ANC leaders in recent weeks to persuade some local communities to accept party- ordained candidates over their own popular choices.
Mr Zuma said yesterday that a task team would be established to investigate complaints about candidates foisted on communities by party leaders, and possibly replace those with popular candidates after the elections.
Mr Zuma told journalists in Johannesburg yesterday that the task team — whose terms of reference were still to be thrashed out — would investigate irregularities with the list process and remove undeserving councillors.
That can only be done after the polls , since the lists have already been submitted to the Independent Electoral Commission.
"We can’t correct the lists before the election, as legally that process is closed," he said.
Replacing the councillors would lead to by-elections , potentially creating even more problems for a party that has fared relatively badly in by-elections in the past five years.
Revisiting the lists could blow up in Mr Zuma’s face as councillors are unlikely to walk away from their jobs. The announcement may also open the floodgates for more communities to complain that their candidates had been imposed on them .
It may be difficult for the ANC to undertake the investigation after the elections as the focus is expected to shift to the succession within the party and its youth league, and the coming leadership elections in the unions and the South African Communist Party.
Mr Zuma told a press conference: "The ANC has taken a decision that the removal of preferred candidates from our lists should be properly investigated by a team to be set up by the ANC headquarters.
"In the affected wards, candidates that are preferred by our structures and communities were removed from the lists.
"This has understandably caused anger and frustration."
He said the findings of that team would allow the ANC to remove councilors who did not get party and community support but were put on the list by regional leaders. "We will deal with the individuals who should not be on the list after the elections."
He said the ANC’s "honesty and track record" spoke for itself and it would keep its word.
He also called on those who had left the ANC to register as independent candidates to return to the ANC.
During an election drive in Bloemfontein yesterday afternoon, Mr Zuma told unhappy ANC members to "vote for the ANC and we will sort out the candidate lists later". Mr Zuma was visiting the Khayelitsha informal settlement near Grasslands in Bloemfontein when local residents handed a memorandum to him containing their grievances.
Political analyst Steven Friedman said the ANC had dug itself into a hole with the introduction of the "ill-conceived" selection process. Revisiting it after the elections "may well backfire" and encourage councillors likely to lose their jobs to organise communities behind them in protest.
By announcing that the process would be revisited, the ANC was not putting out the fire. "It is making sure that the fires continue," Prof Friedman said.
Getting communities involved in the selection process was a bad idea from the start, when the party did not have its own selection process under control.
The ANC’s election campaign has battled to take off . ANC succession tensions have also seen key organiser Fikile Mbalula — the star of its 2009 national elections campaign — sidelined.
The ANC Youth League is campaigning to install him as secretary-general in party elections in December next year, and those opposed to the idea fear the May 18 elections may give him a platform to campaign for that post. With Sapa
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