ANC rebels may have to be taken back into the fold

24 July 2016 - 02:00 By QAANITAH HUNTER
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Zandile Gumede, chair of the eThekwini ANC.
Zandile Gumede, chair of the eThekwini ANC.
Image: Supplied.

The ANC in eThekwini may be forced to reconcile with popular rebels who are contesting elections as candidates in more than half of the 110 wards.

At least 58 incumbent councillors of the ANC who have not been selected as ANC candidates for the August 3 elections are taking on the party as independent candidates.

These candidates pose a serious threat to the ANC in the metro as they are well-known local leaders who have deep roots in party structures.

Should these candidates be re-elected in their wards, the ANC may have no choice but to waive disciplinary action as it would need them to vote with the ruling party in the council.

The rebel councillors have started working together and have organised themselves to campaign effectively. Their campaign is largely funded by their municipal salaries.

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Their campaign posters can easily be confused with those of the ANC.

Thulani Kunju and Musa Dludla are longtime ANC activists who are now taking on their own party.

They say they were the victims of a purge because they did not support ANC mayoral candidate Zandile Gumede in her bid to become the ANC chairwoman in the region - a battle that has divided the party.

In her door-to-door campaign, Gumede emphasises what the "real ANC" is.

"We made an announcement and told everybody that those independent [candidates] are not ANC. You can't contest ANC and still be ANC," she told the Sunday Times.

Gumede denies that those who are now independent candidates were purged because of factionalism. She cited two candidates, in wards 29 and 19, who were once vehemently against her in the ANC leadership race in the region but have remained ANC candidates.

"Those who were removed were councillors who did not want to work and they did not consult the structures of the ANC," Gumede said.

Those former ANC councillors now standing as independents had been ousted by their own branches, she said.

Kunju served as an ANC councillor from 2009 in the Bambayi area of eThekwini - historically seen as a no-go area for other political parties.

He claimed that ANC internal processes showed him to be the most popular candidate but he was unfairly left out because he belonged to the wrong faction.

"The person they made a candidate is not from here ... he is just from Nando's. He works in Nando's and now he must be the councillor," Kunju told the Sunday Times this week.

He said community members approached him to stand as an independent because they believed in him as a leader. "We have to do this because they imposed someone on us ... we are still very loyal to the party."

His message to voters is little different to that of the ANC and any unassuming voter would not realise that he was no longer a representative of the party.

Kunju said he enjoyed the full support of the ANC and its alliance structures in the area. "The whole BEC [branch executive committee] is with me ... they come to [my] campaign meetings."

He claims to have support from the SACP, of which he is a district leader.

The SACP, an ANC alliance partner, took a decision to support independent candidates if an ANC candidate was imposed on a community.

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In the past, independent councillors have been largely unsuccessful in this municipality. In the 2011 local government elections, only one independent councillor made it onto the council.

Dludla, who is standing as an independent candidate in ward 110, which includes Avoca Hills, said the imposition of candidates had divided the ANC.

"I went through all the processes of the ANC ... we had a BGM [branch general meeting], I came out No1.

" I went through a screening committee and got the highest mark. When we went to the community, I was the popular one. But then Zandile Gumede came with her own candidate."

Dludla said ANC members and other community members were shocked that a "nobody" had been made the ANC candidate.

"If the ANC [leaders] knew who they wanted, they should have said there won't be contestation. They should have just brought the person they wanted."

Dludla said the ANC would lose to independent candidates in eThekwini because it was ANC members who had convinced them to stand independently.

"It is not easy if you use someone that is not popular, just because it is payback for them supporting you," he said.

hunterq@sundaytimes.co.za

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