Former president Jacob Zuma has finally broken his silence on the ANC elective conference at Nasrec in 2017, alleging that money was used to influence the outcome of the conference.
He stopped short of pointing a finger in the direction of eventual winner, now President Cyril Ramaphosa.
The former president made the allegations on the second instalment of the new YouTube channel launched this week by him and his son Duduzane Zuma.
The latest 51-minute long instalment, posted on Thursday, comes hot on the heels of a 45-minute long video of a conversation between Duduzane and his father on Wednesday.
While the pair discuss a range of topics, including the alleged poisoning of then Mpumalanga premier and now Deputy President David Mabuza, it is Zuma’s pronouncements on the events leading to the ANC’s elective conference that stood out.
Zuma alleged that “once money played its role at the conference, it meant that the ideological stance of the ANC was being mysteriously bartered so that what emerged was the kind of ANC driven by those with money. Being ran like a business”.
He alleged that this eventuality “undermined the integrity of the ANC and what it stands for”.
President Cyril Ramaphosa narrowly won the Nasrec conference, beating former African Union Commission chairperson Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma.
The victory was however soon clouded in controversy after leaked emails from the heart of Ramaphosa’s successful 2017 ANC presidential campaign revealed that hundreds of millions was spent by the campaign.
“Nasrec (2017) was an important year for the ANC. The party was at a point where it could have picked itself up and moved up in the right direction in terms of its social task, but also if that failed, it meant that the party’s stature would have diminished.
“As much as we all were in the same party we knew each other and knew what would happen if certain characters were to be in leadership. As it played out, the unexpected happen there. I think there were very clear directions that the membership were initially taking but unfortunately, the issue of money played a part in the outcome,” Zuma said.
“Money played a part in a manner never seen before in the history of the party’s elective conferences. This is not speculation, evidence has since been made public. The ANC was turned into a business with those with the money calling the shots while those without were discarded to the wayside,” he said.
A visible passionate Zuma also maintained that his removal was unjustifiable as he had 18 months left on his second tenure.
He alleged that when he asked what exactly he had done wrong warranting his removal, there was never a clear answer, but just vague references for a need for a new direction.
“At the end of the day money won, and the party began to be ran like a business,” Zuma concluded.
While his father was more preoccupied on the video with the past, his son aired his views on the current administration’s handling of the Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic.
The younger Zuma said he disagreed with Ramaphosa’s stringent lockdown put in place to curb the spread of the virus.
He said as a result of the lockdown, even the so-called middle class was suffering along with already impoverished citizens.