Cape Town - No one is entitled to positions in the ANC, the party said after the Ses’khona People’s Rights Movement on Thursday pulled its support before the local government elections.
The discord stems from unhappiness over the ANC’s candidate lists with Ses’khona, claiming its candidates had been promised positions, but had since been cut from the list submitted to the IEC.
ANC provincial spokesman Jabu Mfusi said the party appreciated the support it had received from the movement, including its contribution to “championing issues of sanitation and better services in poor communities”.
The ANC would continue to engage with Ses’khona to find common ground, he said.
“The ANC is a self-sufficient organisation that partners with all organisations that share our vision of changing the material conditions of the poor and we appreciate Ses’khona as a partner in this context.”
Mfusi said candidate selection had been challenging and that “no one was entitled to positions in the ANC”.
“It would therefore be incorrect for any partner of the ANC, however entrenched our common vision may be, to always seek to throw their toys on the floor whenever they do not get their way.”
Ses’khona’s Unathi Mabengwana said: “The ANC used us to campaign for it in the national elections and thereafter we were thrown out of the door ruthlessly and in the cruellest manner.”
He said the movement had ended any active participation with the ANC and “will no longer promote political fortunes of any political organisation”.
One of the founding members of the civic movement, Andile Lili, is also a member of the ANC’s provincial leadership.
He said he remained aligned to the ANC, but was unhappy with the manner in which the candidate lists had been drawn up.
“I do not have the courage to encourage my comrades to vote for the ANC,” he said.
Listing wards 93, 8 and 94 as areas where Ses’khona members had been sidelined, Lili said the movement took a stand to support the ANC because it wanted to “deal with the DA”.
“If these things are not dealt with it means we as Ses’khona must go back to our masses and make sure that we fight very hard to ensure that people get the flushing toilets they were promised.”
Lili confirmed he would run as a ward councillor for the ANC in Nelson Mandela Branch in ward 95.
“Some of our members on the ground are very angry that we must endorse the ANC as and when it comes to elections, while their living conditions have never changed and are still the same.”
Lili denied that Ses’khona had been in talks with the DA about switching sides.
“There’s no way; we are the enemy of the DA on the basis of our living conditions, therefore it can never be, even if we are very angry.
“Members individually can vote and join the DA, but as Ses’khona we know how brutal the DA government in the City of Cape Town is. So on those speculations, I doubt there is any member of ours (who would join the DA).”
Ses’khona leader Loyisa Nkohla said: “We said if that is the case, do you (ANC) know and understand as members of the ANC we have a choice of being an independent, or joining EFF, or registering Ses’khona to contest the elections and have a choice to embark on a campaign don’t vote ANC’, or we have a choice of going to the so-called worst enemies, the DA, deliberately?
“Individuals had the right to associate themselves with whatever party they wanted,” he said.
Cape Argus