ANC secretary-general Fikile Mbalula has dismissed as “reckless” a letter — written a week before the party’s abortive Eastern Cape elective conference — alleging misrepresentation and procedural breaches.
Mbalula described the contents of the letter, penned on March 19 by ANC provincial secretary Lulama Ngcukayitobi and sent to the party’s top leadership, as a product of “internal political contestation”.
The Eastern Cape High Court issued an interim interdict on March 26, preventing the three-day conference, scheduled to take place last weekend, from proceeding. The gathering was later postponed to allow all legal challenges — centring on alleged irregularities in the conference run-up — to unfold in court.
Serious allegations were tabled in a manner that treated them as though they were already fact, when many of those allegations had not yet been tested through the internal processes created by the ANC constitution and the revised conference guidelines for that very purpose
— Fikile Mbalula, ANC secretary-general
Ngcukayitobi’s letter caused divisions within the ANC, with the party’s Eastern Cape provincial executive committee distancing itself from it. He was expected to contest for the position of ANC provincial chair against his former ally and premier, Oscar Mabuyane, who had indicated he would seek re-election.
Responding to Ngcukayitobi on April 1, Mbalula wrote: “The secretary-general’s office must state plainly that the manner in which your letter was framed, escalated and circulated was reckless in its effect.
“Serious allegations were tabled in a manner that treated them as though they were already fact, when many of those allegations had not yet been tested through the internal processes created by the ANC constitution and the revised conference guidelines for that very purpose.”
Ngcukayitobi declined to comment on Thursday, saying the secretary-general’s letter did not warrant a response.
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