The ANC has called a special national executive committee (NEC) meeting on Thursday evening to finalise its list of public representatives, a day before submitting it to the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC).
This is the meeting that is supposed to decide whether to chop people on the list who are facing criminal charges and other forms of wrongdoing, and also whether to adopt the recommendations of the integrity commission in this regard.
The integrity commission has made findings against several senior ANC leaders, some of whom are in the higher echelons of the either the party or the ANC-led government.
The special NEC meeting comes just three days after the party held another NEC meeting on Monday, which discussed the same list.
The extended NEC on Monday gave the party’s top seven national office bearers, led by President Cyril Ramaphosa, the task of deciding the fate of those facing charges or fingered by the commission.
According to a source with knowledge, the top seven opted to call for a full NEC after apparently getting cold feet around the list process.
They believe, the source said, the task of deciding who gets chopped is too delicate to be decided by just the seven of them and the Motlanthe-led electoral committee.
The NEC meeting on Thursday evening is meant to pay special attention to nominated ANC members who have been flagged by the Zondo commission.
Fireworks are expected at this NEC meeting, which would be the first meeting where members go toe-to-toe since their election into the structure in December 2022.
It is also meant to look into those who have not been mentioned by the Zondo commission but have serious allegations that can later come back to “embarrass” the organisation.
“Remember the first act of removal has to do with the duplicates around those nominated on both the national and provincial lists, and those have been removed,” said an NEC insider.
I doubt the NEC will say to Zweli [Mkhize], 'go'. It didn’t remove him back then, why would it do that now? If someone says 'I’ve taken it on review', then that’s an appeal which suspends everything. You can’t remove that person from the list and that is only fair.
— ANC NEC member
“The second act of removal is to avoid embarrassment. Let’s say you have beaten your wife or girlfriend, and we can see this thing will come back to bite us, you can remove the person by mutual agreement — but that’s where the integrity commission comes in.”
But the ANC NEC meeting on Thursday evening is not expected to make many changes to the list that is said to be 99.1% complete.
ANC NEC members who are close to the decisions of the party say that figures such as Zweli Mkhize and Zandile Gumede, who appear high on the KZN provincial list, cannot be removed from the list because they have been serving as members of either parliament or legislatures, despite calls to step aside.
“You cannot remove a person from a livelihood because there’s no step-aside [rule] in legislature — they’ve been there. They can be stopped from holding positions like minister or chair of a committee, but that’s it,” said a senior NEC member.
“Zandile cannot be removed from the legislature now because she’s been serving all this time. You will have to have enough reason why someone who’s a member of the legislature must be removed from the list.”
This NEC member said Thursday night's meeting will have a difficult time telling someone like Mkhize that they must be removed from the list.
“I doubt the NEC will say to Zweli, 'go'. It didn’t remove him back then, why would it do that now? If someone says, 'I’ve taken it on review,' then that’s an appeal which suspends everything. You can’t remove that person from the list and that is only fair,” he said.
Some senior ANC leaders, however, argued that the Zondo commission should not be treated as a court of law, and that there’s a long-standing, international rule that commissions, unlike courts of law, are not bound by evidence.
This leader made an argument that sports minister Zizi Kodwa can therefore not be removed from the list because no court has found against him.
The ANC leader cited a Law Society writing that argued that a person’s rights cannot be taken away by virtue of their names being mentioned in a commission.
“The Law Society (in LAWSA vol 2, part 2, paragraph 169) said: ‘The argument that recommendations of a commission do not affect existing rights because they decide nothing in themselves has been rejected. It is now accepted that serious repercussions can flow from the report of the commission. For example, very damaging findings of fact could be made in respect of people who are named.
“In addition, a commission’s report may accuse or condemn persons who may then be subject to civil or criminal proceedings. The whole process, it has been held, is potentially prejudicial to a person’s rights of personality.”
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.