Johannesburg - Now that she is free of the “ANC aliens”, former MP Makhosi Khoza wants to spend her time teaching children how to unravel intricate puzzles in mathematical sciences.
She believes this “noble cause” is the best way to continue the legacy of the former ANC president and liberation icon Oliver Tambo, “instead of singing Umshini Wam”.
“I want to to bring mathematical fun into the classroom, to teach children how isiZulu is based on equation and science of numbers, in honour of Tambo who loved maths so much, rather than singing Umshini Wam’.”
Khoza revealed this on Friday in an interview after she announced on Thursday that she was quitting the party she had been associated with since her pre-teen years.
An exhausted but resolute Khoza, who has been giving a flurry of interviews since her announcement she was leaving the ANC, said teaching was part of finding internal peace from the troubles of being “persecuted” by the party she spent more time with “than her biological parents”.
Teaching was also part of finding solace from her unfulfilled quest to save the party from its quagmire because of “corruption”.
“It’s not like I’m grieving. I’m exhausted. I tried everything. At some point, I felt always that I’m going insane trying to save the ANC until I threw in the towel,” said Khoza, adding the book she has written on medical formulations was about to be published soon.
When she bade the ANC goodbye, the outspoken Khoza lamented how the once revered liberation movement had become “alien and corrupt”, and said she wanted to free herself from the “ugly, nasty, self-serving, factional and unprincipled contestation for positions”.
Her resignation was expected to be one of the dominant issues at the ANC’s national executive committee meeting this weekend.
Khoza explained she had consulted widely before renouncing her membership and that she was overwhelmed by messages of support.
She revealed that she had received nearly 10 000 e-mails of support by late on Friday.
Among the prominent people she had spoken to was Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, former president Kgalema Motlanthe, ANC stalwarts Gertrude Shope, Sheila Sisulu, Smangaliso Mkhatshwa and Mavuso Msimang.
“I must tell you, if there was one person who phoned me and we sat on the phone for hours, it was Mama Winnie Mandela.
“Whenever I go through pain, I always imagine her and I say ‘if this woman went through what she went through, who am I?’
“And when you get support like that, for me it’s very important.
“And the support I get from the likes of Barbara Masekela, Lindiwe Mabuza, it’s unbelievable. These are all phenomenal women and men of the ANC that I know.”
Shope, Sisulu, Mabuza and Masekela said in a joint statement on Friday that Khoza’s decision to resign should be taken seriously because it “must have been taken after a process of deep soul-searching and agonising on her part.
“The characterisation of the ANC as a corrupt organisation, the betrayal of the fundamental values and principles of the ANC, the continued looting of state resources, undermining and compromising state-owned enterprises as well as the systematic weakening of state institutions of democracy are all the shenanigans she was challenging.
“We support Makhosi Khoza’s prerogative to resign from the ANC as mothers who have nurtured Makhosi as our daughter whom we have seen growing within the ranks of the ANC,” they said.