Zuma not too concerned - analyst

2008-10-15 14:03

Johannesburg - A rumoured breakaway party by former ANC chairperson Mosiuoa Lekota is unlikely to give the ANC sleepless nights, a political analyst said on Wednesday.

"You need half a million votes to get a seat in Parliament. A few thousand attending a meeting is no real indication," professor Steven Friedman, director of the Centre for the Study of Democracy, told a convention of the SA Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Johannesburg.

"I'm quite sceptical that this party is really going to get the kind of attraction to give anyone in the ANC sleepless nights," he added.

Friedman was speaking hours after the ANC announced that former Gauteng premier Mbhazima Shilowa had quit the party, on the same day that the ANC national executive committee was scheduled to discuss the suspension of Lekota and former deputy defence minister Mluleki George.

Lekota has indicated that he may start a new political party, saying the ANC leaders elected last December were leading the party away from its policies.

Lekota addressed a public meeting of between 2 000 and 3 000 ANC dissidents in the Western Cape at the weekend and earlier this week addressed meetings in the Eastern Cape, amid speculation that two ANC provincial ministers may resign.

Friedman said he did not believe ANC leader Jacob Zuma was too concerned about the talk of a new party.

"I don't think that Zuma and the people around him see this as a problem in terms of building the relationships they think are important.

"I think Jacob Zuma and the people around him have made a clear strategic calculation... to keep (ousted former president Thabo) Mbeki and the senior people around him (Mbeki) in the ANC," said Friedman.

"I think that if Lekota is going to move out of the ANC, then he (Zuma) does not want to have a relationship with him.... They are trying to get him (Lekota) to leave."

Friedman said one would hope that the ANC would show respect for the right to start a new political party but "one would not expect Mr Zuma to send Lekota a Christmas card".

"Politics is going to get rough if people break away," said Friedman.

- SAPA