Durban - President Cyril Ramaphosa told residents of Port Shepstone on the South Coast that failure to vote for the ANC would see them losing the gains of democracy.
Ramaphosa was in the area to drum up support for the ANC before its birthday celebrations on Saturday at Durban’s Moses Mabhida Stadium.
The party will also use the event to launch its manifesto for the general elections in May.
At the Masenenge informal settlement, residents were indifferent to Ramaphosa’s presence.
“After the ANC had removed our preferred local government election candidate Elvis Ndovela, we voted for the DA, which is now not helping us. We will vote for the EFF, which is visible here, to prevent the demolition of our shacks,” said resident Sabelo Morana.
The settlement does not have electricity and people have illegally connected it to their shacks.
Some residents at the informal settlement did not heed a plea by ANC provincial leaders, including Safety MEC Mxolisi Kaunda, to move to a soccer field to listen to the president’s message.
A group of young men who were smoking dagga just stared, without responding to Kaunda.
Ramaphosa was met with similar indifference at the Port Shepstone taxi rank.
Addressing groups of people who were wearing supplied ANC T-shirts, Ramaphosa said he would on Saturday unveil his plan to take the country forward.
“This year is going to be a real year of building jobs because we want to grow our economy, improve our children’s education, service delivery for the betterment of our people,” he said.
He said that from today, when he would conduct an ANC 107 anniversary cake-cutting ceremony at Ohlange, the northern Durban home of first ANC president John Langalibalele Dube, he would set out the future task of the ANC.
“On Saturday, we will be setting out our full task of the ANC contained in our manifesto,” he said.
He boasted about the achievement of the ANC in the past 25 years. He said people could “feel, touch, smell and see the ANC’s work”.
“This region has achieved number one in the whole of South Africa when it comes to housing delivery.
“It (the region) won the top award for building the best houses for our people.”
He said the region had built 129 housing units and “now they are going to build more than 800 units”.
He said through the ruling party’s hard work, the region got the second position in the matric pass rate in the whole province.
“It shows that the lower South Coast teachers, parents and pupils are committed in making education their number one priority.
“I am very proud that KZN is growing when it come to the pass rate. It is going up and it is improving all the time.
“The improvement that we have seen in KZN is phenomenal and we are very, very pleased that you are one of the most improved provinces when it comes to education.
“But the cherry on top is that this region came number two in the whole province,” he said.
Until Sunday, he would visit various areas of the province every day.