Skwatsha: Jacket saved my life

2008-06-13 16:05

Cape Town - The collar of his leather jacket probably saved his life when he was stabbed in the neck, Western Cape provincial secretary of the African National Congress Mcebisi Skwatsha said on Friday.

He was addressing a media conference in the wake of the attack, which took place at an ANC meeting in Worcester in the Boland on Thursday afternoon.

"The people who attacked me yesterday wanted to kill me," said Skwatsha, who had a bandage over the wound on the right side of his neck.

"If you see where I was stabbed, if you see what I was wearing, which I think actually saved my life, this jacket, this leather jacket," he said, as a party colleague held up the garment to show a slash in the collar.

"Had the knife gone straight to the flesh I would not be sitting here."

A group of people

He said the knifeman was part of a group of people who yelled insults as he arrived for the hall meeting, then stormed the venue.

He had no doubt that they were people who were "familiar with the ANC and possibly ANC members".

Police said two men had been arrested in connection with the attack, and would appear in court next week.

The stabbing comes ahead of next month's provincial conference, where Skwatsha is expected to challenge incumbent James Ngculu, an ally of Premier Ebrahim Rasool, for the post of provincial chairperson.

Thursday's meeting was called to inform the party's Boland regional executive committee, part of the Rasool/Ngculu camp, that it was being disbanded on the orders of the provincial executive committee.

'An act of criminality'

However senior members of the party at Friday's media conference sought to play down any suggestion that the stabbing was politically motivated.

"If you want to put it as a political act, you are actually legitimising it," said Ngculu. "This is an act of criminality."

ANC deputy president Kgalema Motlanthe also said that the incident was an "act of criminality", and that those who acted in a manner unbecoming of the party would be disciplined.

"Those that think the ANC is something to toy around with would really rue the day they made that mistake," he said.

Motlanthe said if the Boland regional executive wanted to challenge the disbanding, it had a right to approach the ANC's national executive committee.

Attack 'has no basis'

"So there is provision for recourse in the ANC constitution. So therefore this attack would have absolutely no basis in terms of the ANC constitution. It's not provided for."

Asked whether he was concerned about factionalism in the party in the province ahead of the conference, he said consolidating unity and cohesion in the party was an ongoing process, and one that never reached an endpoint.

However the days were gone when people could take cover under the "smoke and mirrors" of factions.

"We shouldn't use such an unfortunate incident to perpetuate the perception that there's organised factions," he said.

Motlanthe said he had attended a special meeting of the provincial working committee on Friday morning.

Deputy provincial secretary Max Ozinsky said Skwatsha's security was being reviewed.

- SAPA