The ANC Western Cape’s road to provincial conference has officially begun with the first of five regions hosting its conference this weekend.
Long-standing ANC leader Neville Delport was re-elected unopposed as the regional secretary while Siyabulela Gxabalashe as chairperson in the West Coast.
This will be their third term in office.
Matilda Bains was, for the first time, elected deputy chairperson and Immanuel Adams as deputy secretary. Francois Kamfer was elected treasurer general.
The West Coast region, which includes towns such as Saldanha, Paternoster, Vredenburg, Velddrif, St Helena Bay and Langebaan, is among one of the larger regions for the party in the province.
Delport told Weekend Argus: “I’m very grateful that the members wanted me to remain in my current position.
“I want to serve my community, and I’m honoured.”
Bains said she was humbled.
“I’m humbled, I didn’t expect this, an arduous task is laying ahead but I’m ready to hit the ground running,” she said.
Gxabalashe said he was looking forward to serving his community for another term.
“I’m very grateful and honoured to have been re-elected ...the ANC is in the process of renewing itself and I’m so grateful to be a part of that,” he said.
The ANC’s Khalid Sayed said he welcomed the election of the top five.
“It’s a very solid team, it’s a group of ANC members who have stood the test of time and it’s also reflective of the geography and the demographics in the West Coast,” he said.
The party’s interim leader in the province, Lerumo Kalako, told Weekend Argus that even though he is happy that the region was able to elect new leadership, there remained some shortcomings.
“I’m happy with the top five, but there’s still shortcomings and weaknesses.
“That top five are not a good mixture of leadership...it could have been better,” he said.
ANC Western Cape spokesperson Sifiso Mtsweni said: “We congratulate the newly elected leadership and we are happy that democratic processes have taken place and the will of the branches emerged.”
The provincial conference of the ANC is expected to take place between August 31 and September 2.
But, as previously reported, it will most likely be postponed again as not enough branches are in good standing.
Insiders said only 151 branches meet the criteria and 284 branches are needed before conference can proceed.
Weekend Argus reliably learned that the National Executive Committee of the ANC want to reduce the 284 threshold.
“If they do get it right, it will most likely happen in October, November ... It’s still impossible now for them to go to conference,” a source said.
“I’m looking at it from a practical point of view, it’s impossible, not August ... my reading is that the conference could occur in October, should they be able to reduce threshold. If not, only next year,” the source said.
The interim provincial committee (IPC) has been in place since 2019 after the provincial leadership was dissolved.
Kalako said as far as he is concerned, it’s “all system goes”.
“We are so ready, it’s all system goes from here,” he said.
Weekend Argus.