Surprise support for Zuma

2007-11-25 10:12

Johannesburg - Supporters of President Thabo Mbeki and his ANC deputy, Jacob Zuma, were on tenterhooks as nomination results from various provinces trickled in slowly on Saturday afternoon.

By Saturday evening, only Mpumalanga, North West, the Free State and the Western Cape had decided on their candidate for the ANC presidency.

The Northern Cape, Limpopo and the Eastern Cape were delayed from making their decisions due to several disputes over conference credentials, alleged irregularities during the nomination process in some branches and computer glitches.

KwaZulu-Natal, a known Zuma stronghold, and Gauteng were scheduled to hold their nominations this morning.

Out of the four provinces that had announced their results by Saturday evening, Mbeki and Zuma were tied with each winning nomination from two provinces.

Zuma beat Mbeki with 263 votes to 37 in Mpumalanga. But it was in the Free State where Zuma pulled off the biggest surprise, getting 287 votes to Mbeki's 76. Earlier predictions had indicated a close contest.

Mbeki's bid received a strong boost from North West where he beat Zuma by 186 votes to 88.

A similar thing happened in the Western Cape, the ANC's smallest province. Mbeki won 142 votes to Zuma's 87.

Although voting had not taken place in Limpopo, the electoral commission told delegates that Zuma and Mbeki had each got 192 nominations.

Although it was still too early to predict the outcome of the ANC national conference based on these figures, several trends are emerging from the results.

What they highlight is that the race for the presidency is mainly between the two men as none of the "compromise candidates" made a significant impact in the four provinces.

Sexwale and Ramaphosa

Mvelaphanda founder Tokyo Sexwale did not feature as a presidential candidate in the North West and Mpumalanga. He received one and two nominations, respectively in the Western Cape and Free State.

Businessman Cyril Ramaphosa also struggled. He got five votes in Mpumalanga, three in North West and two each in the Free State and Western Cape.

The results also show that in the provinces where most of the delegates chose either Mbeki or Zuma, the rest of the top six positions go according to the lists that have been circulated by each camp.

For instance, Mpumalanga has chosen Kgalema Motlanthe as Zuma's deputy, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma as national chairperson, ex-unionist Gwede Mantashe as secretary-general and Speaker Baleka Mbete as his deputy. Former Mpumalanga premier Mathews Phosa was nominated for the treasurer-general's position.

The pro-Mbeki North West has voted for Dlamini-Zuma as deputy president, ANC strategist Joel Netshitenzhe as national chairperson and defence minister Mosiuoa Lekota as secretary-general. It has also opted for Public Works Minister Thoko Didiza as Lekota's deputy and Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka as the treasurer-general.

Although Mbeki and Zuma were tied on Saturday afternoon, Msholozi enjoyed a slight edge as he has also been nominated by the ANC Youth League - which is regarded as a province in the ANC for purposes of voting. But the league will have only 68 of the more than 4 000 votes at the conference.

'Bullying'

Zuma can also bank on KwaZulu-Natal. Its leadership and delegates made it clear on Saturday that they were not about to change their long-held decision to back his bid.

For Mbeki, victory was expected from the Eastern Cape late last night where he was said to enjoy support from 314 branches out of about 400.

The province was one of several that had to delay proceedings after problems with registration processes. Eastern Cape ANC secretary Siphatho Handi said the delay resulted from the complexity of the registration verification process.

The Northern Cape was in a worse situation as its conference had to be adjourned for hours to allow the provincial leadership and the ANC's national office to sort out several disputes over alleged irregularities in the branch nomination processes.

Delegates from the Siyanda region accused the pro-Zuma provincial leadership of "bullying" some branches into voting for their preferred candidate.

There were also claims of missing registration records that would have indicated who would have qualified to attend the Limpopo conference from this region.

Of the 35 branches in the Siyanda region, Mbeki was nominated by 24 branches while Zuma was nominated by 11. A solution to the problem had not been found at the time of going to press.

In Limpopo, the meeting was delayed by five hours as a result of computer problems, said secretary Cassel Mathale.

- City Press