"We had planned with women from the alliance... to unpack this [gender] issue, but... in the commission they said no," African National Congress Women's League treasurer general Hlengiwe Mkhize told reporters at the ANC's policy conference in Midrand.

"What we need... is a gender summit, which will look at power relations in all respects, so that it is not only women who are talking about these issues..."

She said the ANC's proposed second phase of the country's transition had helped "to jack up our ideological position."

"In terms of this second phase, what really are we going to hope [for] and come up with on the way to Mangaung? Is there is something that we can put out there to women?" she asked.

A document on the "second transition", later dubbed the "second phase of the transition", is one of the ANC's 13 policy documents under discussion at the four-day conference.

It has become synonymous with Zuma's reported bid for a second term as president.

The ANC's head of policy Jeff Radebe said on Thursday that the commissions had accepted the "content and the thrust" of the second transition document, despite media reports earlier that it had been rejected by several provinces.