Vote ANC decision haunts NFP

08 August 2016 - 09:07 By NATHI OLIFANT

So concerned was Zanele kaMagwaza-Msibi about losing her R1.9-million-a-year ministerial job that she offered National Freedom Party votes to the ANC in last week's elections, her detractors claim. But her spokesman denies it.The deputy minister of science and technology and NFP leader did not vote in her home town of Ulundi on Wednesday.Two days before the elections, NFP and ANC leaders announced that the NFP, disqualified from taking part, would vote for the ANC in KwaZulu-Natal. They claimed they had kaMagwaza-Msibi's blessing.The pact appears to have backfired - the IFP regained ground it lost to the NFP in 2011. "We are the sacrificial lambs on the political altar," said an angry member of the NFP national working committee, who asked for anonymity."With the NFP out of local government elections . the president knew her job was teetering on the brink and there was no way she could return to govern Zululand, and she pulled this stunt on us."But kaMagwaza-Msibi's spokesman, Canaan Mdletshe, said there was no truth to claims that she was acting to protect her job."She did not go to the ANC and she was never part of a meeting that decided to vote with the ANC."NFP organiser Bonga Nzuza, who was part of the delegation that held a joint media briefing with the ANC, said it was all about "saving the livelihoods"."I have never voted [for] the ANC but what choice do I have now? We had to save some jobs and keep our party alive."..

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