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Victor, vanquished meet
19/12/2007 21:20 - (SA)
Polokwane - Thabo Mbeki and the new president of the African National Congress, Jacob Zuma, met to discuss the future of the party late on Tuesday night, ANC spokesperson Smuts Ngonyama said.
He was speaking on Wednesday minutes after Mbeki finished casting his votes for the party's new national executive.
Mbeki himself, who appeared relaxed and waved genially to watching delegates, declined to be drawn on the result of the bruising leadership contest.
Asked by a journalist how he was doing, he replied cheerfully: "All right, thanks... fine thanks."
Ngonyama said Tuesday's meeting took place in a holding room next to the vast marquee where the results of the battle for the leadership were announced.
"Yes, definitely, they have spoken. They spoke last night," he said. Meeting 'reasonably long'
"They sat down and they spoke about how to take forward our movement."
He said the meeting was "reasonably long... for any two people who are talking serious business."
Quizzed on relations between the two men in the wake of the bitter election campaign, Ngonyama said they continued to relate "in the same old way".
"There can never be any animosity or acrimony between the two. They have come a long way: they... have been plus or minus 30 years together, so that's the kind of relationship, which is a long, long, relationship."
Ngonyama dismissed a suggestion that Mbeki might now call a general election ahead of the next scheduled poll in 2009, saying that as president of the country, Mbeki still held a mandate from millions of South Africans, won through the ballot in the last general election.
"That (an early poll) is completely out of the question at the present moment," he said.
He said the ANC and national presidencies were "two distinct processes", and it would be mischievous for anyone to deliberately conflate the two. Low-key arrival
Mbeki, dressed casually, arrived at the voting station at the University of Limpopo library shortly before 17:00 and emerged 27 minutes later.
Though his arrival in his usual presidential convoy of black vehicles was low-key, a small crowd quickly assembled after hearing that he was there.
They applauded him as he emerged, and began chanting "ANC, ANC".
Mbeki waved and smiled warmly before getting back into his car and being whisked away.
As the crowd thinned after his departure one delegate asked why Mbeki was being cheered when he lost the election.
Another responded: "He has demonstrated the leadership that the ANC demands."
A Free State delegate, who voted for Zuma, said Mbeki had showed leadership in the way he associated with the newly elected top brass of the party.
"He is still showing leadership and he is still a member of the ANC," he said. Mbeki's name not on list However, another delegate seemed to feel differently.
"Former president of the ANC," he remarked loudly to no-one in particular. "We want to see Jacob Zuma."
A delegate watching Mbeki come and go told Sapa he had taken over 15 minutes to fill out his own nomination form, which involved checking off 80 names on a list twice that long.
"I filled in all the names I wanted, and I still had names left," said the delegate, from Centurion in Gauteng. "So I had to go through the list again."
Mbeki himself is not on the list. As a former president of the party, he becomes an ex officio member of the executive.
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