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ZIWAPHI • VOL 4 NO 11 • 21 - 27 May 2010

NELSPRUIT

President Jacob Zuma, in his capacity as leader of the ANC, will be in Mpumalanga on Sunday to launch the party’s national Imvuselelo (revival) campaign.

Addressing a press conference in Nelspruit on Wednesday, provincial secretary of the ANC Lucky Ndinisa said Zuma would attend a campaign rally at the KaMhlushwa Stadium near Malalane, addressing the crowds on “building and consolidating the unity of the movement towards 2012”.

“The event is expected to be attended by [national executive committee] NEC members, who will arrive in the province on Friday, and just more than 20 000 members of the ANC,” said Ndinisa.

He added that the campaign was aimed at implementing a Polokwane resolution to ensure that the party recruit and register one million members by 2012. At the time, the party had 600 000 registered members.

Ndinisa refused to say whether the ANC had chosen Mpumalanga as the campaign’s launch pad to address infighting between party factions in the province.

In March this year, Mbombela local municipality mayor Lassy Chiwayo said tender irregularities surrounding the building of the Mbombela Stadium had caused friction in the ANC.

“It is unfortunate that the 2010 Fifa Soccer World Cup initiative, instead of bringing much-awaited hope and joy to our people, has brought death and pain to some of our families, divided the province and the municipality. The biggest casualty in the process is the ANC because of the sheer greed of some of our leaders,” Chiwayo had told journalists during a press conference after members of the regional executive committee had decided to recall him.

By “death and pain”, Chiwayo was referring to the assassination of Mbombela municipal speaker Jimmy Mohlala, who was shot and killed in January last year after blowing the whistle on stadium tender irregularities.

In a press conference last week, the ANC Youth League accused the provincial executive committee of being “unnecessarily soft” on people who were causing divisions within the movement.

League provincial secretary Isaac Mahlangu said there were provincial executive members who were “moles and sympathisers” of COPE.

“They are causing confusion in the ANC, they are advanced propagandists who are also using SMSes to confuse our members,” said Mahlangu, referring to an SMS doing the rounds in Nelspruit claiming premier David Mabuza’s farmhouse near Barberton had been raided.

The league also denied rumours that the NEC might dissolve the provincial PEC because of infighting.

“Those who dream for PEC dissolution, they are advised to go to the nearest cemetery, dig for themselves a grave and wait for the Almighty to finish them off,” said Mahlangu.

On Wednesday, Ndinisa denied any divisions and said the PEC had been caught off-guard by the league’s statement.

“We were surprised by their statement that there are divisions in the ANC and that we need to appoint genuine members ... we decided to call them to the next PEC meeting to explain themselves,” Ndinisa said.