Political has-beens to co-lead KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng
21 February 2025 - 05:00
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The ANC’s lack of imagination in turning its fortunes around never ceases to amaze. This week it reached new levels of ridiculousness.
For months after last May’s general elections, it has been promising strategies to strengthen its structures in two provinces — KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng — where it lost the most votes.
On Tuesday, it stopped short of disbanding its structures there. In a clumsy move, it pulled in its political has-beens — Jeff Radebe and Amos Masondo — to co-lead KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng. Simultaneously, it marginalised its provincial secretaries in both provinces. It left its employees in the state untouched, at least for now.
Both Masondo and Radebe, men of advanced age, are retired from active party politics and have spent the past few decades in national politics, not provincial activism. It is not immediately clear how they can reinforce agile men such as Panyaza Lesufi and Siboniso Duma.
In a strong and united party, a deployment of veterans might serve a useful purpose. However, the ANC is a divided house that is showing disturbing suicidal tendencies.
The move, dubbed reconfiguration, hardly qualifies as one designed to strengthen. It also shows the ANC continues to refuse to accept why it lost support. Corruption, lack of service delivery and the insurgency of Jacob Zuma, its former president, cost it electoral support.
Within no time Radebe and Masondo will have rings run around them by various factions. This augurs badly for the party’s readiness to claw back losses in next year’s local government elections.
Support our award-winning journalism. The Premium package (digital only) is R30 for the first month and thereafter you pay R129 p/m now ad-free for all subscribers.
EDITORIAL: ANC’s crazy recovery plan
Political has-beens to co-lead KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng
The ANC’s lack of imagination in turning its fortunes around never ceases to amaze. This week it reached new levels of ridiculousness.
For months after last May’s general elections, it has been promising strategies to strengthen its structures in two provinces — KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng — where it lost the most votes.
On Tuesday, it stopped short of disbanding its structures there. In a clumsy move, it pulled in its political has-beens — Jeff Radebe and Amos Masondo — to co-lead KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng. Simultaneously, it marginalised its provincial secretaries in both provinces. It left its employees in the state untouched, at least for now.
Both Masondo and Radebe, men of advanced age, are retired from active party politics and have spent the past few decades in national politics, not provincial activism. It is not immediately clear how they can reinforce agile men such as Panyaza Lesufi and Siboniso Duma.
In a strong and united party, a deployment of veterans might serve a useful purpose. However, the ANC is a divided house that is showing disturbing suicidal tendencies.
The move, dubbed reconfiguration, hardly qualifies as one designed to strengthen. It also shows the ANC continues to refuse to accept why it lost support. Corruption, lack of service delivery and the insurgency of Jacob Zuma, its former president, cost it electoral support.
Within no time Radebe and Masondo will have rings run around them by various factions. This augurs badly for the party’s readiness to claw back losses in next year’s local government elections.
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