Zuma scrambles to undo huge KZN setback

01 October 2017 - 00:06 By QAANITAH HUNTER, SIPHE MACANDA, Olebogeng Molatlhwa and THABO MOKONE
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President Jacob Zuma.
President Jacob Zuma.
Image: Alaister Russell

President Jacob Zuma sourced his own legal opinion, in addition to another one commissioned by the ANC, in his desperate bid to defend his key allies, the ANC’s KwaZulu-Natal provincial executive committee.

Zuma caught senior ANC leaders by surprise when he produced his own legal opinion during a national executive committee meeting on Friday.

Zuma told the meeting that the ANC should appeal a Pietermaritzburg High Court judgment that nullified the election of the KwaZulu-Natal  PEC — to, he intimated, teach the rebels a lesson.

The PEC is key to in Zuma’s plan to anoint former AU Commission chairwoman Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma as his successor.

The PEC has provided a platform for Dlamini-Zuma to campaign in the province and provincial leaders have openly lobbied for her candidacy.

Although both legal opinions advised that there was a prospects of success should the court decision go on appeal,  the national executive committee instructed the party’s  top six to instead meet with the PEC and the rebel group “to find a political solution”.

ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe confirmed that the national officials would spend two days in Durban starting with a meeting with the PEC today.

Read the full story in the Sunday Times

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