Suspended man 'right leader'
2003-06-13 15:53
Johannesburg - The suspended Pan Africanist Congress MPL in Limpopo, Maxwell Nemadzivhanani, is the right leader to take the troubled party into the future, his lobby group said on Friday.
"He is the man who can take it to greater strides," lobby group spokesperson Mbuyiswa Gantsu told reporters in Johannesburg.
The group is calling for Nemadzivhanani's reinstatement to enable him to contest the Pan Africanist Congress' deputy presidency at the party's congress in Soweto at the weekend.
Gantsu said it would be unfair if the PAC national executive committee (NEC) did not lift the suspension.
"The congress should lift his suspension because he is the man who can unite the party together with the secretary-general Thami ka-Plaatjie."
The party's national disciplinary committee recommended in May that Nemadzivhanani be expelled from the party after he was accused of bringing it into disrepute. The charges included making statements in the media that embarrassed the party and its president, and wrongfully spread rumours that the Limpopo leadership was suspended until the auditing committee finished its work.
Reinstatement
The lobby group would meet with the NEC on Friday afternoon to ask for Nemadzivhanani's reinstatement.
"We hope the NEC will ratify the matter.
"We hope that on Saturday when the congress starts, Nemadzivhanani will be part of the NEC and a full PAC member," said Gantsu. Nemadzivhanani was not able to brief the media due to his suspension.
The PAC is holding a three-day congress at Vista University's Soweto campus, after the congress in Umtata in December last year was nullified after it was discovered that some candidates for the presidency had brought under-age members to vote for them.
At the time the contenders for presidency were Motsoko Pheko, Ka-Plaatjie, and Stanley Mokgoba.
PAC spokesman Waters Toboti told Sapa the main focus of the congress would be the election of the party's leadership and next year's national general elections.
He said there were PAC members who had indicated to him that they wanted to contest the available positions but said he hoped there would be only one nomination for the presidency.
"I hope this time the number will be reduced and it will be easier if one person can stand."
On Nemadzivhanani, Toboti said no suspended person could stand for the elections.
Same trap
A political analyst at the Centre for Policy Studies, Steven Friedman, said the challenge that faced the PAC was to produce a credible process.
"(The) PAC needs leadership that will give it credibility. Nobody takes it seriously, even though there are people who believe in its ideals," he said.
Friedman said many more than one percent of the electorate agreed with the PAC on issues like land but "the question is can it deliver on its promises when it fails to run the party properly?
"We will see tomorrow if they will get their acts together," he said.
Friedman said the PAC had a larger following than South Africans thought, but voters were not sure it was capable of delivering on its promises.
The party adjourned its congress last year with the hope that it would come up with something concrete for the next congress, but it fell into the same trap.
"The PAC needs to change its political profile and the current leader Stanley Mokgoba tried by exposing corrupt officials, but he failed to attract voters," he said.
- SAPA