Cape Town - The congress of South African (Cosas) students has given the ANC leadership an ultimatum to re-instate suspended Western Cape ANC chairman, Marius Fransman or risk having their Cape Town headquarters occupied indefinitely.
Fransman has been stripped of his membership for five years after the party found him guilty of abusing his office for the purpose of attempting to obtain a sexual favour from a Stellenbosch woman and for making public statements which brought the ANC into disrepute.
Louisa Wynand, 21, has accused Fransman of sexual harassment while they were travelling to the ANC’s January 8 celebration in Rustenburg.
Cosas is demanding the ANC bring back Fransman and to stop treating Cosas members as strangers.Cosas’ Dullah Omar regional chairman, Buntu Real Joseph, said students across the province were urged to gather at Sahara House at 2pm Thursday to show their “disgust” with the ANC’s National Disciplinary Committee.
“Factionalism has become a defining characteristic of the ANC in the province and injustice has played a role in trying to kill our leaders,” Joseph added.
Cosas said they still had trust in Fransman’s leadership and capabilities to unite the province. “We have seen in the 2014 elections under his leadership an increase of 3 percent, but in the 2016 local government elections, in his absence and under the leadership of the UID faction, we faced an embarrassment and a drop to 25 percent,” Joseph said.
Cosas regional secretary Lungile Ngubane said they were prepared to stay for as long as needed to get Fransman back in his post. “We’ve urged students to come with their books to the ANC office, come and study, but we will not move until the ANC brings Fransman back,” Ngubane added.
Ngubane said they would stay for the weekend or longer until their demands were met. “The ANC offices are our home; we will go there and occupy our home until our demands are met,” said Ngubane.
Acting ANC provincial chairman, Khaya Magaxa said while the party respected the right of people to protest, it would not tolerate any disruption to its daily operations. “Whatever they do they must not come to disrupt processes in our offices,” he said.
Cape Argus