Pretoria - Tshwane ANC regional chairperson, Dr Kgosi Maepa and secretary Eugene “Bonzo” Modise are facing a revolt from some members of the governing party’s regional executive committee (REC) who accuse them of taking unilateral decisions on the replacement and appointment of councillors.
The latest political bickering and infighting in the region surfaced at the weekend after it emerged that a faction opposed to Maepa and Modise convened a meeting last week behind the back of the pair, sparking speculation that the gathering was part of a plot to oust them.
In a statement circulated on social media, authored by party spokesperson Bafuze Yabo and REC member Tlangi Mogale, both Maepa and Modise were accused of working outside the mandate of the highest decision-making body in the region.
Yabo and Mogale described the statement as the outcome of the “meeting of the ANC Greater Tshwane Regional Executive Committee meeting held on February 4, 2021”,
According to two REC members who spoke to Pretoria News on condition on anonymity because they were not allowed to speak to the media, participants in the virtual meeting resolved to rescind the decisions taken by Maepa, Modise and the caucus chief whip in council, Aaron Maluleka, on the recent replacement and appointments of councillors.
They claimed the decisions were taken without the regional structure’s approval.
The sources, who are also ANC councillors in the City of Tshwane, added that the letter was condemned during the virtual meeting because it “was written outside of a mandate of the regional executive committee and was written unilaterally by the regional secretary”.
The group accused Maepa of not consulting with the REC before making decisions that required the structure’s approval.
Modise was accused of having penned a letter in which he made untested allegations against some members of the regional and provincial structures “while casting aspersions on certain individuals in broad strokes”.
He was further accused of grossly misrepresenting facts in the organisational report and minutes of the most recent meetings.
“The meeting also took a dim view (of) the appointment of the acting ward councillors without a report requesting concurrence and/or approval from the regional executive committee,” read part of the statement.
Maepa declined to comment on the meeting and its outcomes while Modise dismissed it as an elaborate plan to “misrepresent, disrupt and destabilise the ANC”.
“I don’t want to comment on the things I don’t know anything about. It will be like chasing the shadows. I don’t know the origin of that meeting. The ANC meetings, what I know, are called by the chairperson of the ANC and the regional secretary,” Maepa said.
Maluleke said Modise’s comment was sufficient and represented him too.
However, Mogale claimed that Maepa and Modise had sent apologies and it was not known why they didn’t attend the meeting.
According to her, the meeting was allowed to take place because it quorated and the members saw it fit to convene it after Modise and Maepa allegedly failed.
Asked whether the meeting was organised to plot against Maepa and Modise, she said: “ANC meetings are not convened to plot against people.”
Hitting back at his critics, Modise said: “We are aware that there is a clear intention to misrepresent, disrupt and destabilise the ANC in Greater Tshwane as we approach local government elections, expected to take place in the second half of the year.”
He added: “You can’t write a letter to branches while you are the spokesperson. The spokesperson does not speak to branches. The person who speaks to branches is the secretary. Pule Mabe has never spoken to branches. The late Jackson Mthembu never spoke to branches. Zizi Kodwa never spoke to branches.”
Modise warned against taking the party back to “the horrors of the 2016 local government elections”.
In those feuds, widespread protests engulfed various parts of the city, stalling schooling and business activities.
At the time, the infighting within the ANC in Tshwane had threatened to degenerate into similar violence which rocked the region in the run-up to the municipal elections in 2016.
Back then, factions behind then mayor and regional chairperson Dr Kgosientso Ramokgopa and the late MPL Mapiti Matsena, his party deputy at the time, had fought bitterly over the mayoral candidacy.
The branches had nominated Matsena as the preferred candidate, prompting the ANC national executive committee (NEC) to impose current Minister of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development Thoko Didiza as a compromise candidate.
Didiza tried to unite the two warring factions in the region without success.
Eventually, the ANC went on to lose City of Tshwane to a coalition led by the DA, and it was widely believed that its supporters had abstained from voting because of the internal fighting.
A political analyst at the Tshwane University of Technology, Professor Mashupye Maserumule, said since 2016 the ANC in Tshwane had never really healed itself from deep divisions.
“Those divisions … are still here. That is why they are re-emerging,” he said. The recent political fight, he said, boiled down to problems linked to the contestation of the leadership in Tshwane “in the view of the elections that are coming,” Maserumule said.
“I think what is critically important in the ANC in Tshwane is (for them) to make sure that they confront their issues and … start to put in place mechanisms that could institutionalise cohesion. If they cannot act with speed, indeed, what we saw in 2016 is most likely to repeat itself.”
Maserumule maintained that Maepa’s leadership did not clearly bring about cohesion within the party.
“Even when he was leader of the opposition in council, there were instances where many of the councillors of the ANC were not happy with how he was managing the coalition politics of Tshwane.”
Pretoria News