Western Cape ANC wants the party to improve the quality of its cadres

Expertise and relevant skills must be the basis for deploying ANC cadres to the public sector, while deployees who do not perform should be recalled and those found guilty of corruption should face harsh consequences.

These are among the policy proposals the Western Cape ANC will table at the party’s national policy conference this weekend.

“One of the things said by our branches is that cadre deployment should be based on the area of specialisation with relevant skills,” provincial policy head Nomi Nkondlo said on Tuesday.

Nkondlo said it was inevitable that a party which had won elections would deploy its people to the different spheres of government and legislatures.

However, the province’s branches and regions want the ANC to reinforce monitoring and evaluation within the organisation by ensuring individual performance is aligned with organisational objectives through regular reporting and stricter measures of adherence, said Nkondlo.

She said the Dullah Omar policy conference, for instance, felt strongly about having a “recalling provision” linked to a performance management framework so deployees who are not performing are removed from office.

“A recall must be done to demonstrate both to members of the ANC and to the public the necessary confidence and trust that poor performance is not something the ANC is rewarding. We must be able to build that in so people know when they are given responsibilities, it is not a honeymoon and you won’t stay there if you are not delivering.

“It is not something that would be weaponised and create divisions because one faction recalls people over the other, but we must be able to explain why someone is recalled and provide evidence of poor performance,” said Nkondlo.

The Western Cape ANC has not held a provincial general council to consolidate its policy positions, and has not been able to hold a provincial conference to elect new leadership.

The structure that runs the party’s affairs in the province was appointed in August 2019, three months after the disastrous May 2019 electoral performance, to rebuild the organisation and hold an elective conference within nine months, but it has struggled to turn things around.

The provincial conference is scheduled for August 31.

The party said it held regional roadshows related to discussion documents ahead of the policy conference, and branches and regions gave their input.

Nkondlo told TimesLIVE the provincial ANC deliberately approached the policy work as part of its renewal process in the province both in terms of the state of the organisation and its ability as far as opposition politics are concerned.

“This policy work has given us an opportunity to again hear people influence what would be national conversations and ensure we take the ANC back to its tradition where policies are driven from branches more than an elitist type of a discussion,” she said.

As part of the organisational renewal proposals, veterans in the province want a more stringent process for one to become an ANC member.

There have been concerns that the post-1994 ANC, with access to state power, has attracted people who join the organisation for their individual interests.

“The proposal is that there should be background checks, that the ANC should have a probation period of up to two years where the individual applying for membership is vetted and taken through ideological training and induction processes before they become a member.”

The proposal also calls for the establishment of a membership application panel that would scrutinise the application process.

“One of the things the ANC has been exposed to is having members who become a liability to the party,” said Nkondlo. “Because those kind of vetting measures are not there, you end up having people who have interests outside the existential purpose of the ANC.”

The Western Cape ANC believes the “step-aside rule” is a necessary intervention “to deal with this quality member or cadre we want to realise as the ANC”, she said.

“We believe the intentions are good and step-aside must not be confused with weaknesses in the implementation of things that must be tightened.”

The rule is part of ensuring the cleaning of the ANC and government, and ANC members should be focusing on the broader intention of a corruption-free party, she said.

“We believe it is one of those instruments you must use to ensure those who become ANC members and deployees know that any wrongdoing, the party has a tool and step-aside is one of those tools, among others.

“You will need to refine such a tool because it could be used by some for factional reasons. We want a tool that could stand the test of time. We cannot be oblivious to the reality of how the ANC has been hijacked for reasons outside what it exists for.”

The Western Cape ANC will send a delegation of 60 members to the national policy conference.

TimesLIVE

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