Rustenburg - The African National Congress (ANC) risks a decline in membership numbers if it does not address factions, the South African National Civic Organisation (Sanco) in North West warned on Wednesday.
Paul Sebegoe, the provincial chairman of Sanco, said factions and divisions cost the ANC votes at the ward by-election in Rustenburg last week.
“Only 120 people voted for the ANC, we did not do enough ahead of the by-election there was no voter contact,” lamented Sebegoe.
He said ward 17 in the Rustenburg municipality was a home to what he called the “elite”. However, Sebegoe said the ANC stood a chance of wrestling the ward from the Democratic Alliance (DA) if it dealt with factions.
“The ward is viewed as a DA ward but, considering that there are black people there, the ANC should have done better. There are townhouses, blocks of flats occupied by black people … we should have at least had 4 000 votes.”
He said that the lowest voter turnout and the DA’s increased support should serve as a wake-up call from which valuable lessons should be learnt.
“The mere thought that the outcome might be a precursor of what to expect in the 2016 coming local government elections is worrying as we expect Rustenburg to be one of the highly contested municipalities,” said Sebegoe.
“Fielding of candidates who are not products of community engagements will not contribute towards a successful election campaign”.
Reacting to the poor ward by-election performance, the ANC said it was disappointed by the results.
“The outcome have taught us a lesson that Ward 17 in Rustenburg is white dominated and blacks residing there are only few labourers. We have however resolved to focus much on getting maximum votes in historically white dominated areas,” said ANC provincial secretary Dakota Legoete.
“The ANC however celebrate that signs of positive strides towards penetrating the white votes in Rustenburg are emerging.”
African News Agency
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