Johannesburg -
The ANC Youth League National Task Team (NTT) has lost the plot, says former ANCYL deputy president Ronald Lamola.
He insists the task team lacks political and ideological clarity.
In a scathing letter addressed to the task team and ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe, Lamola says the NTT is changing the ANCYL’s values, culture and traditions.
The task team under national convener Mzwandile Masina is distorting history and wishing away the ANCYL’s leadership collective and programmes under ousted leader Julius Malema, he continues.
It is behaving as if the youth league existed only until Sports Minister Fikile Mbalula’s tenure, according to Lamola.
This comes after the task team acknowledged only the ANCYL under Mbalula and his predecessor, Public Enterprise Minister Malusi Gigaba, during its 69th birthday celebration at Seshego in Limpopo at the weekend.
ANCYL task team co-ordinator Magasela Mzobe said on Wednesday that Lamola was “out of order” and expected “personal glorification” from the task team.
Lamola, who was Malema’s deputy, accused the task team of “liquidating” the youth league by disbanding 90 percent of its structures since taking over in March.
This came after the task team disbanded the Gauteng and Eastern Cape ANCYL structures just a few months after doing the same with the Limpopo, Northern Cape, Free State and North West provincial executive committees.
The ANC national executive committee (NEC) appointed the NTT after dissolving the ANCYL NEC led by Lamola.
In his letter, seen by The Star, Lamola said: “Our role as the current generation is to plot for the future and not to distort history for political expediency.
“Even if you have problems with a manner in which the 23rd and the 24th congress generation (Malema) led the youth league, it does not give you a right to erase history.”
On Wednesday, Lamola confirmed that he authored the letter. He added that the task team behaved as if its mandate was to relaunch the ANCYL in the same way it was when various youth structures were merged in 1991.
“Ninety percent of the structures of the youth league have been dissolved. Does this not represent a complete liquidation of the structures? It therefore means now that new values, new culture and new traditions will be introduced. That’s the mission,” Lamola said.
Mzobe dismissed Lamola’s assertion, saying the task team had always acknowledged and re-asserted conference resolutions taken under Malema’s leadership.
He said Lamola had suddenly found the “energy” to insult the task team after its successful rallies in Limpopo and KwaZulu-Natal.
“He must just say that he wants self-glorification, which we have no time for. We really don’t have time to glorify him as an individual. We have all the intention in the world to defend the conference resolutions,” Mzobe added.
He insisted that only the league’s “living” presidents were honoured at the Seshego rally.
“Everyone knows that Ronald refused to be acting president after Julius was fired. He was telling everyone that he’s not acting president but deputy president. They were appealing even after that matter was closed”.
The Star