Cape Town - Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma is to be sworn in as an MP, the office of the ANC chief whip has confirmed.
Nonceba Mhlauli, spokesperson to ANC chief whip Jackson Mthembu confirmed to News24 on Friday evening that she would be sworn in but said they were still waiting for a date from the speaker's office when this will take effect.
According to eNCA she will replace Pule Mabe, who resigned from Parliament earlier this month.
Mabe hung up his gloves just two months after being deployed as whip in Parliament’s finance committee, replacing now Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs Minister Des van Rooyen, City Press reported.
ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe told News24 that Dlamini-Zuma did not ask to go to Parliament, but the party leadership discussed it and felt it would be unfair to keep her out.
"Before she left for the African Union Commission (in 2012) to be chair she was in the top 20 on the (ANC's) national list of people to go to Parliament," he said.
When asked if she was headed for a cabinet post, Mantashe said: "I don't deploy to government, only to Parliament".
Also read: If I don't win, I'm ready to be led - Dlamini-Zuma
Meanwhile in Mbekweni outside Paarl, the OR Tambo lecture Dlamini-Zuma was due to deliver was cancelled, without much protest from the less than 100 in attendance.
ANC Women's League coordinator in the Western Cape Nosakhele Jelele explained that Dlamini-Zuma was in the area the whole day, had to leave due to an emergency and that there was confusion about the venue. Some people went to De Doorns, about an hour's drive away.
