Supra Mahumapelo's political future hinges on pending court judgment

North West political strongman Supra “Black Jesus” Mahumapelo on Sunday morning declined nomination as ANC chair for the province.

Mahumapelo is believed to be behind a court action seeking to stop the ongoing provincial conference in Rustenburg.

In the action, it is argued that the gathering is unlawful and illegal and should be halted owing to it being “called” by the interim provincial committee (IPC) whose members the court ruled should not be allowed to vote in a separate court action on Friday.

Mahumapelo declined nomination for the top position, paving the way for Nono Maloyi and Bushy Maape to become the two candidates for the post.

On Saturday evening, the North West high court was meant to hear arguments on why the gathering should be interdicted.

At the core of the court action is an argument that the provincial interim committee had no mandate to organise the conference as its mandate expired in May 2020.

The ANC national leadership said the conference will continue as planned until ordered otherwise by the court since Luthuli House believes it has followed its constitution in convening the gathering.

The conference is expected to elect the new provincial top five on Sunday morning, should the court not have delivered judgment or dismissed the application.

The litigants argued that the ANC has failed to fulfil its constitutional mandate to convene a provincial conference within nine months. They believe all decisions and actions of the IPC should thus be declared illegal and unlawful.

“The preparations leading up to the calling and convening of the ANC's North West provincial conference scheduled from August 12 to 14 and the notice calling for such conference was issued and done by the illegitimate IPC, whose term ended as far back as May 2020,” the applicants argued.

“It is now common cause that the term of the members of the IPC has now been declared to have lapsed. Therefore their status and participation at the provincial conference is not that of voting delegates or non-voting delegates.

“It has now been confirmed by the court that the IPC members term ended in May 2020, therefore their existence and presence at the provincial conference is in violation of the same ANC constitution that the ANC NEC and its substructures has failed to uphold.”

The applicants further submitted that the ANC should stop the conference “or postpone it to a future date in order to allow the ANC to cure these fatally defective irregularities” and start everything from scratch without the participation of the “illegitimate” IPC that led processes to the ongoing gathering.

Failure to do so and going ahead to elect new leadership, they argued, will lead to further court action seeking to nullify the conference outcome.

Mahumapelo said he would only comment on Sunday, apparently after the court judgment.

TimesLIVE 

Support independent journalism by subscribing to the Sunday Times. Just R20 for the first month.