The ANC has postponed a special meeting of its national executive committee (NEC) scheduled for Wednesday amid a fallout over the dissident MPs who voted with opposition parties during a National Assembly sitting on Tuesday.
The NEC meeting was expected to discuss disciplinary action to be taken against the five MPs who voted for the adoption of Section 89 Independent Panel’s report. The report found that President Cyril Ramaphosa may have violated the constitution in his handling of the burglary at his Phala Phala farm in 2020.
Presidential hopeful Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma led a small group of ANC MPs who defied the organisation’s instructions to have the impeachment process into Ramaphosa abandoned.
Other candidates vying for ANC presidency, Zweli Mkhize and Lindiwe Sisulu, abstained from the vote and were not in the National Assembly when the matter was debated and subsequently voted on.
Acting secretary-general and treasurer Paul Mashatile told NEC members in a circular that a new date for the meeting of the organisation’s highest decision-making body between conference would be communicated.
“As per our communication of 8 December 2022, the special NEC meeting will not proceed on Wednesday, 14 December 2022. The details of the next special NEC meeting will be communicated,” wrote Mashatile.
The ANC elective conference is expected to mull over issues of ill-discipline, among others, when it gets under way at the Nasrec Expo Centre near Soweto from Friday until Tuesday.
Knives are already out for Dlamini-Zuma, former mineral resources minister Mosebenzi Zwane, former North West ANC chairperson Supra Mahumapelo, and ANC MP Mervyn Dirks who all voted openly with opposition parties on Tuesday.
Dlamini-Zuma told journalists after the vote that she is unfazed by the possibility of being dropped from Ramaphosa’s cabinet as cooperative and traditional affairs minister. It is understood that Ramaphosa’s supporters want Dlamini-Zuma and others expelled from the ruling party.
ANC chairperson Gwede Mantashe warned before the National Assembly sitting that those who will opt to vote with opposition parties should leave the governing party.
“Ask Makhosi Khoza what happens when you defy the ANC. She had to leave. If you defy the ANC, you will have to leave, because it means you don’t have respect for the organisation, you are an individual. Conscience is okay, but we have a political system,” Mantashe told Sunday World on Saturday.
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