ANC outlines plans for WCape
2009-09-25 15:36
Cape Town - The ANC says it is to conduct an audit of all its Western Cape branches as a first step to regaining control of the City of Cape Town and the province.
"Obviously we have to start internally, because without proper organisation our work is going to be very difficult," the party's interim leader in the province, Membathisi Mdladlana, said on Friday.
"Our first phase in our programme is to audit all our branches. There are serious problems in those branches.
"There are branches that belong to certain individuals with money. This is not peculiar to the Western Cape, but it is probably more pronounced in certain areas."
Preliminary findings were "scary", said Mdladlana, who a member of the ANC's national executive and minister of labour.
Speaking at a media briefing in Cape Town, he said that in some areas there were so-called branches with only six members, a violation of the ANC constitution.
Healing needed
There were also fly-by-night branches formed on the eve of provincial congresses.
And it was "disgusting... to say the least" that there was only one ANC branch in Cape Town's huge and largely coloured area of Mitchell's Plain.
"As President [Jacob] Zuma said, we are sick, we need healing. And that's what we have been brought here to do, to heal the ANC in the Western Cape.
"It's going to be difficult, it's not going to be nice," he said.
Focusing on core issues
An important part of the ANC's programme in the province would be a focus on the core issues of education, health, housing, crime and job creation.
The ANC intended in the interim to teach the Democratic Alliance, which currently controls the Western Cape, how to be an effective opposition, Mdladlana said.
There would be a province-wide "political education campaign", and support for ANC-led municipalities and ANC councillors to improve service delivery.
"We cannot meekly accept being governed by today's democrats who are yesterday's oppressors," he said.
Mdladlana said Zuma would visit the province next month to talk to civil society groups.
- SAPA