Cape Town – The ANC’s interim provincial committee (IPC) has dissolved the Dullah Omar Region after it could not prove it would be ready to hold its regional conference in March.
The Dullah Omar Region is the ANC’s biggest region in the Western Cape in terms of membership and population. Building up to the provincial conference in December 2021, the IPC mandated regions to urgently look into ensuring that branches were prepared, and that intensified recruitment processes were conducted.
“The IPC, having assessed the performance of the region is not convinced that in its current state, it would meet the deadline for holding a regional conference,” said convener Lerumo Kalako.
“The IPC has taken a decision to dissolve the Dullah Omar Region and mandated the interim provincial working committee to ensure that the region was assisted in preparing for its conference.”
After the bad showing in last year’s local government elections, a group calling itself the Dullah Omar Regional Activists called on the ANC’s National Executive Committee (NEC) and IPC to dissolve the region’s leadership structure.
In November, ANC treasurer-general Paul Mashatile promised to look into the complaints of disgruntled ANC members across the region, after about 100 people protested outside the party’s provincial head office at Constitution House.
But Kalako said the decision to dissolve the region was not influenced by the protests. “We had given the region until February to convince us that they would be ready to hold the conference, and they have failed to do so.”
He said they were not worried that the decision to dissolve the region would destabilise councillors and members of the party.
“It is not going to destabilise anything… We are continuing with the rebuilding process of the ANC.”
All regions are scheduled to hold their regional conferences by the end of March.
This year is a crucial one for the ANC leadership, as regional and provincial conferences will take place as a build-up to the national elective conference in December 2022, where President Cyril Ramaphosa is expected to stand for re-election.