As the ANC Western Cape’s provincial leadership disbands, the focus turns to the upcoming provincial conference to purge factions and form unity.
The party announced this week that following its national executive committee (NEC) meeting last weekend, a decision had been taken to disband the provincial executive committee (PEC), which has been without a permanent chairperson since the ousting of Marius Fransman in 2016.
The party also announced that it would disband the leadership of its youth league.
Spokesman Pule Mabe said the internal disintegration playing out in public made it difficult for the PEC to conduct its duties.
He added that NEC members would be deployed and that the provincial interim committee would take the province to conference.
The announcement came after an internal discussion document titled The Status of the ANC in the Western Cape - The Untenable Situation was leaked.
The report, authored by PEC member Richard Dyantyi, paints a bleak picture of a crippled organisation which he says was at war with itself and a PEC that was dysfunctional.
“The ANC in the Western Cape has been marred with serious challenges,” it reads.
“The (former) PEC is a product of a provincial congress that had fierce and bitter leadership contested, where money was a key feature to decide the final collective.
“The entire term of the PEC was punctuated by non-stop factional tendencies. The previous NEC had to send the national working committee to visit this province and meet with the PEC about three times to mediate the factional fights.”
The report also takes note of the following:
* Regions in the province were ineffective despite regional conferences held in five of the six regions.
* The poor performance at elections, with 28% in 2019, a drop from 42% in 1999.
* A lack of money for an election drive.
* The lack of programmes for the youth led to the EFF making inroads, winning all four major SRC elections at universities.
Provincial secretary Faiez Jacobs said the document had not gone through the structures of the party and that a conference would be held within three months.