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The ANC in Limpopo might be a long way off from hosting its conference after the party’s national working committee informed it to complete numerous processes first.
But provincial chairperson Stan Mathabatha optimistically believes the much-awaited event might be held in June.
The report by the party’s secretary-general Ace Magashule noted that Limpopo should first ensure that:
. An up-to-date membership and branch audit is held and should be signed off by the secretary-general;
. The audit is distributed to all affected structures and an opportunity is provided for input and corrections;
. A dispute resolution process is completed, including a report on the outcomes; and
. Branch general meetings preparing for conferences must be held.
But Mathabatha indicated that the ANC national executive committee (NEC) would make a final decision after its deployees to the province, led by Thoko Didiza, had submitted a report and it had been deliberated on by the NEC.
The latest meeting with the deployees to resolve all the issues in the province was held more than a week ago at the party’s provincial headquarters Frans Mohlala House in Polokwane.
Mathabatha said: “The conference was supposed to be held on February 14 this year. Unfortunately, we were not ready with the audits. Audits are now being done by the secretary-general’s office. We are now waiting for the NEC decision and deployees led by Didiza are already here.”
Despite some ugly scenes at the party’s provincial headquarters late last year, Mathabatha painted a picture of a party that is more united “than before”.
Police had to intervene after angry members of the party from the Waterberg region caused chaotic scenes at the headquarters ahead of the national conference in Nasrec, Johannesburg.
They accused provincial secretary Nocks Seabi of tampering with the delegates’ list.
Mathabatha agreed that such ugly scenes did nothing to help the image of a party that was striving for unity.
But he said the party in the province was united. He said all regions had held successful conferences. The exception was the Waterberg region.
The province consists of five regions – Sekhukhune, Capricorn, Mopani, Vhembe and Waterberg.
“We’ve done what everybody could have done to unite. The party [in the province] is now the most stable structure in the country. We were able to conduct all regional conferences except Waterberg. It [Waterberg] has always been a problem and it does not start with us – from the days of [Ngwako] Ramatlhodi, [Sello] Moloto and up to the current leadership.
“We have disbanded the REC [regional executive committee] and established an RTT [regional task team] to convene the regional conference within three months and there are deployees working there full time to resolve issues. We were successful in resolving issues in other regions. We are almost united, but of course you will find factions as in all organisations,” he said.
He gave an example of a time when the alliance in the province was at its lowest point – the trade union federation Cosatu, and at some stage the SA Communist Party were fighting the ANC.
“The alliance is now strong. This is a political statement and it didn’t happen in the past,” Mathabatha said.
He did not want to be drawn into whether he was interested in retaining the chairmanship position, insisting instead that he believed in the concept of Thuma Mina, in which branches have to make their own decision on who to deploy in the leadership position.
