Lights out for Limpopo’s leaders?
2013-03-17 18:14
Sabelo Ndlangisa, City Press
Polokwane - Limpopo’s Premier and ANC chairperson, Cassel Mathale, is set to
become the biggest casualty at the party’s national executive committee
(NEC) meeting this weekend.
Mathale and the entire Limpopo ANC leadership are expected to be
given the boot, with an interim leadership being put in place to run the
troubled province.
The province was rocked by vicious in-fighting ahead of the ANC’s elective conference in Mangaung in December.
The provincial leadership courted disaster when it publicly threw its
hat into the ring in support of Kgalema Motlanthe, then ANC deputy
president, to replace President Jacob Zuma as the party’s president.
There were bitter battles between those who backed Motlanthe and those who wanted Zuma for a second term.
A source in the Limpopo provincial executive committee said they had
already heard that the NEC had recommended their dissolution.
The source, who asked not to be named, said some people had already
been approached to sit on the provincial task team that will take over
if the NEC accepts the recommendation and sacks them.
There are several high-profile leaders from Limpopo on the NEC who
could lead the task team, including former central bank governor Tito
Mboweni and Arts and Culture Deputy Minister Joe Phaahla.
ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe said the NEC would discuss a
report of the ANC’s national working committee, which visited troubled
provinces like Limpopo, North West, Eastern Cape and Free State.
Northern Cape will not be discussed, even though its chairperson,
John Block, faces numerous criminal charges and its Premier, Hazel
Jenkins, has been ill for more than a year.
Sabelo Ndlangisa, City Press
