Pretoria - The ANC treasurer-general Paul Mashatile’s push to become the deputy president of the party got a major boost after his supporters made a sweeping victory at the North West provincial elective conference over those supporting President Cyril Ramaphosa.
The North West province is now likely to be the second province after Gauteng to back the nomination of Mashatile ahead of the party’s national elective conference in December.
Like Gauteng, supporters of Mashatile in the North West named their faction Adiwele similar to that one led by Lebogang Maile in Gauteng.
After the unanimous victory, the group broke into the Adiwele song and chastised Ramaphosa’s supporters who only managed to secure a few seats in the ANC provincial executive committee (PEC).
However, it was not all lost for Ramaphosa, as a few members who competed against the incumbent provincial chairperson Nono Maloyi secured the highest votes in the PEC elections but not enough to determine the political direction in favour of the president.
One of Ramaphosa’s ardent supporters and Premier Bushy Maape withdrew his candidacy for the PEC. Maape lost against Maloyi for the provincial chairperson position.
However, some of the people who also featured in Maloyi’s rival slate, MEC for Economic Development Kenetswe Mosenogi and MEC for Finance Motlalepula Rosho, made it to the PEC.
Two other MECs – Saliva Molapisi and Agriculture MEC Desbo Mohono – were also elected to the PEC.
Delivering his closing address, Mashatile urged members to mobilise voters and ensure that the ANC achieved more that 50% of the vote in the 2024 national elections. “50 percent is not enough. We need more than 50 percent. We cannot hand over power to others. People love the ANC, we cannot disappoint them.”
Earlier, Maloyi, in his inaugural address, gave the strongest and clear indication of his intentions to purge rogue party members serving in the North West provincial legislature and municipalities across the province. He said some of the potential victims were hell-bent on serving their own interests and colluding with opposition parties in the legislature and municipalities.
Maloyi’s comments came after the conference heard shocking details about the state of the ANC in the province. In the organisational report, presented at the conference, delegates were told that some of their branch leaders were members of organised gang groups while others were also members of rival political parties.
This was also berated by Maloyi who said some of the branch chairpersons and secretaries were not active members of the party.
“They do not serve the ANC. The only thing they do is to visit the ANC’s provincial and regional officers and demand certain government tenders,” Maloyi said.
He admitted that ANC rivalry over the years was caused by greed, corruption, hatred among members, including the spreading of lies against some of the members, saying “all these must come to an end now”.
“I was sitting in the dispute resolution committee of the ANC in the province. Some of the people who lodged disputes ahead of the conference were not members of the ANC. Some of them contested against the ANC in local government elections while others had a dual membership of the ANC and Patriotic Front.
“Some of them admitted that they were working with the opposition against the ANC,” Maloyi said.
He urged the ANC’s head of organising, Nomvula Mokonyane, to assist them to cleanse rogue people from the ANC, setting a deadline of September 30.
Maloyi lambasted his party councillors who made a failed attempt to support a vote of no confidence against their own ANC mayor at Lekwa Teemane in Christiana last week, saying they had to intervene.
He also made an undertaking to get rid of people who were appointed by ANC councillors as financial officers, municipal managers and other senior positions in the municipalities but had no relevant academic qualifications.
Pretoria News