Johannesburg – Former statesman Jacob Zuma has added salt to injury to his party’s dismal showing at the recent municipal elections, coming out gun blazing saying had he actively campaigned for the ANC, the electorates would have come in their numbers to vote for the liberation movement.
For the first time since democratic dispensation, the ruling party’s support at the polls plummeted below 50% losing municipalities that are traditionally its stronghold. In some councils across the country, the party is hanging by a thread, and it is likely to be relegated to the opposition benches.
In a leaked audio clip, Zuma calls for the head to roll, saying the top leadership had masterminded the fall of the liberation movement by going to the polls without any elected structures in many provinces mainly in KwaZulu-Natal.
“Kuyaqala ukuthi amastructures e- ANC, adilizwe onke? Throughout SA ngalenkathi siya okhethwethi akukho structure esikhethiwe? So, beningawina kanjani,” (It is for the first time going into elections that all regional structures were disbanded. How was it possible for you to win elections),” Zuma said in IsiZulu.
He further called for the party to react to the mediocre display, saying “Asime ngeyinyawo, asibuze kwileadership ukuthi konakelephi? (We must rise and stand up to the leadership, ask them what is going on).
Zuma is currently out on medical parole after the Constitutional Court sentenced him to 15 months direct imprisonment for contempt of court relating to his failure to appear at the commission probing allegations of state capture.
Since being released from Estcourt Prison, the former head of the ANC and state has been hard at work meeting his allies in the so-called RET faction.
Political commentators say the faction was hatching a plan to challenge Ramaphosa at next year’s elective conference.
After last week’s elections, 61 municipalities were left without an outright winner with parties forced to negotiate a coalition government or risk a rerun of elections. In KZN, the ANC lost its crown jewel eThekwini metro which is also the party’s biggest and influential region. The ANC’s majority was also reduced at the province’s capital Msunduzi municipality in Pietermaritzburg.
Listen to the leaked audio clip below:
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