'ANC elective conference like icing a rotten cake'

The leadership election at the upcoming December ANC elective congress is akin to putting icing sugar on a rotten cake‚ Save SA convenor and long-time ANC member Sipho Pityana has said.

“If you take a rotten cake and you put icing sugar to it‚ it does not stop to be a rotten cake. So the December event‚ for all terms and purposes‚ is about putting icing sugar on a rotten cake‚” he said.

Speaking at the Daily Maverick’s The Gathering discussion in Sandton‚ Johannesburg‚ on Thursday‚ Pityana said what the ANC has failed to accept was the fact that it was corrupt‚ bankrupt and rotten to the core.

Pityana said chances were that the ANC and ultimately the country will have a leadership with tested and proven credentials in corruption in various spheres of government.

“If we are going to be led by the same calibre of people who produced a Jacob Zuma and the kind of corruption that we have seen‚ it is highly unlikely that the trajectory is going to be different after December‚” he said.

Pityana said the nation should be reminded that the ANC had its back against the wall and that this was only because the people have risen and are challenging and questioning it.

Not pulling any punches‚ Pityana said the ANC had lost its hegemony in society and its ideological anchor.

Fellow panellist and Democratic Party leader Bantu Holomisa said all the candidates currently vying for the top ANC leadership position were the same people who brought the current party leader Zuma into power.

“All the presidential candidates‚ they have been there protecting President Jacob Zuma and have been threatening the caucus and today they want to be president of South Africa? Give me a break‚ please‚” he said.

- SowetanLIVE