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Tender wars mirror Limpopo ANC battles

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The run-up to the Limpopo ANC provincial elective conference has been complicated by battles over tenders, which resulted in running battles and injuries on the streets of Polokwane last week.

The matter is complicated by the entrance into the fray of the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), which supports the Polokwane mayor.

The EFF has accused Capricorn District Municipality Mayor John Mpe and ANC treasurer Danny Msiza of bankrolling a group known as the Radical Economic Transformation Forum (RETF) against Polokwane Mayor Thembi Nkadimeng.

Mpe and Nkadimeng are going toe to toe for the position of chairperson of the Capricorn region, whose conference is supposed to be held next month before the provincial one.

Last Monday there was blood shed on the streets of Polokwane when EFF provincial secretary Jossey Buthane led the party members in clashes with RETF adherents.

Several people, including ANC Polokwane councillor Papas Maakamedi, were seriously injured.

The EFF and the RETF have given different versions of the events that led to the clash.

According to the EFF, members of the RETF went around the city harassing and closing down the businesses of people with contracts with the Polokwane municipality.

Buthane, together with a group of members, followed the RETF adherents to a hotel where they were having a meeting with Polokwane municipal officials, the South African National Roads Agency and Basil Read, which is involved in the multimillion-rand construction of the city’s eastern bypass road.

Scuffles broke out and spilled on to the streets.

ANC provincial spokesperson Aluwani Netsianda told City Press that the EFF should desist from interfering in the internal processes of the ANC.

“The RETF is not a structure of the ANC and I don’t know where those allegations come from because it cannot influence the branches of the ANC. We dismiss those allegations. The EFF just wants to clamour (sic) on the good name of the ANC,” Netsianda said.

However, EFF provincial leader Rendani Munyai, in an interview with City Press, insisted that Mpe and Msiza were behind a campaign against Nkadimeng – camouflaged as a project to fight irregularities in tender allocations in Polokwane.

Munyai said the party was only involved in the matter because the RETF was harassing black businesspeople doing jobs with the Polokwane municipality.

“Those people are going around closing down businesses of our fellow black brothers and sisters. But if you check, it’s a fight between two factions of the ANC. One is fighting the Polokwane mayor and the other supports the Capricorn district mayor.

“We are getting involved to defend these black businesspeople who are trying to put bread on the table for their children. There is no way that we are involved in those tenders – they must just bring proof,” Munyai said.

But RETF leader Johnz Mamabolo accused the EFF of having a problem with the organisation because the two organisations are contesting the same space on economic freedom.

“We also know that in our effort to unblock opportunities, we got into a pot in which some EFF leaders had interests in tenders – they are benefiting. They are personalising our struggle. They are diverting our goal – of including small contractors into the main economy – into a political war,” Mamabolo said.

He denied that the organisation was being bankrolled by Mpe and Msiza.

Mpe denied being behind the campaign against Nkadimeng: “The EFF has become interested in ANC matters. They have become an armed wing of a person that is contesting in the ANC. If they have tenders in Polokwane, they must declare.”

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