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Johannesburg - Six of the African National Congress's (ANC) nine provinces have declined in membership numbers since 2012.
This was according to the organisational report presented to the national general council by secretary-general Gwede Mantashe during a closed session on Friday.
The Western Cape, North West and Northern Cape were the three provinces where numbers had increased.
In his report, Mantashe said the administration and systems of the ANC's membership had presented challenges over time.
KwaZulu-Natal as the ANC's biggest province has lost 173621 members since 2012 with the number dropping to 158199. The Eastern Cape as the second biggest province dropped from 187585 to 124050.
The province, which has always been seen as one of the traditional ANC strongholds, has reached its lowest number since 2007 when it had 153164 members.
Gauteng was down from 134909 to 87759, while Mpumalanga lost 35930 members bringing the number in the province to 96799. Limpopo dropped from 161868 to 84413 and Free State down from 121074 to 51088.
Earlier on Friday, ANC president Jacob Zuma told the NGC, while delivering his political report, the party's membership numbers had dropped from more than a million to 769870.
