With the ANC engaged in serious talks with a number of political parties in a bid to find a suitable bedmate to assist it regain majority control of the National Assembly, the party has vowed not to compromise on some of its policies.
The party said it would “rather be relegated to the backbenches of parliament as an opposition party”, rather than compromise on some of its policies, including the thorny renewal policy.
ANC Eastern Cape chair Oscar Mabuyane, who also serves in the party’s highest decision-making body between conferences, the national executive committee, said they would never get into bed with anyone that had “cult tendencies, disruptive, selfish”, and whose party was “formed on tribal lines”.
Party bosses are meeting on Monday and Tuesday to map a way forward to a coalition government.
The party, which garnered just more than 40% of last week’s vote, its lowest outcome ever, will also not adhere to any demands for the removal of its president, Cyril Ramaphosa, as suggested by some political parties as a condition for any coalition talks with the ANC.
Mabuyane said even though the ANC was in talks with many parties who had approached them, they were not that desperate and would not get into bed with a party that did not have the best interests of SA’s people at heart.
The renewal policy was adopted a few years ago as the party’s way of cleansing itself and dealing with rogue elements within its structures.
Some of those who have been victims of the policy, have had to step aside from all party activities, while some were suspended and others expelled after being charged criminally for various alleged transgressions.
“As the ANC in the province, we firmly believe in renewal, and we will never drop renewal on the basis of expediency.
“We accept the setback, it’s a learning curve, we’ve got to go back and plan, but we are not going to enter into coalition to drop the renewal.
“We are not that desperate, and if it means the ANC must go to the backbenches to protect its renewal, and restart itself, that is well and good,” he said.
In a veiled reference to former party president Jacob Zuma and his uMkhonto we Sizwe Party (MKP), Mabuyane said the ANC would not bow to pressure or go to bed with “disruptive people”.
“We are not going to partner with opportunists, people who are disruptive, people who are reversing gains that we had done or achieved.
“We are not going to be blackmailed on those kinds of issues.
“We can’t really be trapped with the ultra-leftist tendencies, because ultra-right and ultra-left are almost the same, they go and come together and become a mess.
“We are going to look at people who are progressive and who believe in patriotism,” he said.
Mabuyane, without naming any political party, said the ANC would shy away from those who had “cult tendencies”.
“The ANC has collapsed because of the mess of corruption, because of a cult.
“This is a cult issue, a counterrevolutionary act that we have been seeing playing itself out there, so we are not going to allow that, people must not be members of another member.
“People should instead be members of the ANC. The ANC rather die its natural death if people choose to be members of other members.
“You cannot be a priority and the people of SA secondary.”
Mabuyane said while the ANC remained the majority party nationally, “we are just concerned about the regression of what we seek to build as a united, nonracial and non-sexist society, in the hands of those built along tribal lines”.
“When you see organisations built along tribal lines, and all that, it’s a very serious regression and we are concerned about that, because it undermines what our forebears and our traditional leaders saw when they said all of us must unite.
“This reminds one of when white people had made black people fight against each other.
“It seems we are going back to that now, out of selfish interests and out of self-aggrandisement by certain opportunists.
“We would prefer people who would appreciate that we need to have a united country, characterised by people who understand selflessness and are prepared to sacrifice.”
MKP provincial coordinator Mawande Ndakisa had denied widespread claims that his party was tribalistic, saying most of those who voted it into power in KwaZulu-Natal, were from the Eastern Cape but based in that province.
Ndakisa, a former prominent ANC member said; "Unfortunately the renewal policy in the ANC was defined for certain very few, while others were defined outside renewal.
"The cabal that saw itself taking over (the ANC national elective) conference in Nasrec one and two, defined renewal for all the other people except themselves.
"It never applied to any of them, and they then defined themselves as angels among all of us."
While Mabuyane sounded skeptical about prospects of a coalition national government, he said the party would not turn away any suitors and would talk with “whoever comes with sober minds”.
“The ANC surely will not shut its doors to anyone, but we have seen the mess already at local government level with coalitions.
“When you deal with people who have got tantrums in a coalition, you have a problem.
“So we’ve got to think deeply and think seriously about that.”
Mabuyane said the ANC’s drastic regression in polling figures and the emergence of new parties was not a train smash.
“It’s not a train smash. We have seen these things.
“All these parties have been breaking away and the ANC is getting used to that and always finds a way to recover.
“So we are going to recover even from this.”
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