The accusation was contained in his organisational report, which was presented at the party's marathon regional conference in Mthatha, Eastern Cape, at the weekend.

The conference, which started on Friday, was called off on Monday night because claims of election rigging made progress impossible.

The region is the second-biggest for the ANC and a powerful kingmaker.

"During the elections, branch meetings were held at which nominations of candidates took place," Sabona said.

"This process was conducted under the programme of action endorsed by the regional executive.

"But the resident provincial executive members formulated their own programme parallel to the region's programme."

Sabona's report claimed that the names of candidates from the Ingquza Hill sub-region were completely changed without the regional executive being told.

The report also stated that 17 changes were made to the proportional representation list.

This affected the deployment of ANC members to other councils.

In the OR Tambo district municipality, the list was said to have been changed completely.

"There were new names [and] we do not know where they come from.

"Now we are waiting for a decision from the task team led by Nkosasana Dlamini-Zuma," Sabona said.

He said that the apparent manipulations destabilised his region and led to certain ANC councillors undermining the provincial executive committee and appointing their own candidates.

The provincial executive wanted Mcebisi Mthombela as chief whip but councillors elected Zola Mevana instead, he said.

A similar situation occurred in Port St Johns when ANC councillors elected Bulelwa Nokhanda as chief whip instead of the province' s preferred candidate, Pikolomzi Langa.

Dlamini-Zuma, who is believed to have completed her investigation into the allegedmanipulation of candidate lists, was to have met the members of the provincial executive, the list committee and some regional members, at Luthuli House, Johannesburg, on Monday.

The meeting was cancelled because the provincial executive said it could not attend because of delays at the chaotic OR Tambo conference.