Zero+to+hero+in+an+afternoon,+Sunday+Times



=Zero to hero in an afternoon=


 * //Delegates’ upset undoes ANC leadership’s plan to sideline party’s deputy president//**


 * S’THEMBISO MSOMI AND PADDY HARPER**

Sunday Times, Johannesburg, 03 July 2005
AT LUNCHTIME on Thursday, former Deputy President Jacob Zuma looked like a broken man. He sat by as his fall from grace was discussed in front of about 1500 delegates on the first day of the ANC’s National General Council (NGC) gathering in Pretoria.

To judge by the ANC’s organisational report, delivered by ANC secretary-general Kgalema Motlanthe, Zuma was down and on his way out: the National Executive Committee (NEC) had accepted his offer to withdraw from party activities until after his corruption trial was over.

But only hours later, the situation was reversed.

By Thursday night Zuma’s supporters had swung things in his favour, rejecting the withdrawal offer — something they were convinced had been forced on Zuma by the party’s leadership.

Despite the best efforts of the party’s top leadership, a showdown over Zuma had been inevitable.

As thousands of ANC supporters arrived at the University of Pretoria’s Sports Centre on Thursday morning — some wearing yellow pro-Zuma T-shirts — it was clear to all that the controversy surrounding Zuma’s axing as the country’s deputy president was to dominate proceedings.

The tension was palpable, even as President Thabo Mbeki and Zuma marched onto the stage together, accompanied by other senior party officials and bodyguards.

The decision to have the top six leaders walk into the hall together seemed carefully calculated to avoid Mbeki’s potential embarrassment by Zuma supporters, although party officials deny this.

A day earlier, a special NEC meeting had been held to discuss how the controversy was to be handled at the NGC — the first national meeting of ANC branches and other structures since Zuma was fired.

The NEC had decided that Motlanthe, during his organisational report to the NGC, would read an eight-page statement explaining the party’s position to the delegates.

Just a few minutes before Motlanthe began reading the statement, Mbeki slipped out of the hall for a few minutes.

By the time he returned, it seemed there would be no trouble from the delegates — some of whom had earlier in the day chanted “Jacob Zuma, my president” and “we don’t want the capitalist agenda because it destroyed Zuma”.

Zuma seemed uncomfortable as he sat at the main table, listening to Motlanthe’s blow-by-blow account of events from soon after his financial adviser, Schabir Shaik, was found guilty of fraud and corruption, up to the time when the National Prosecuting Authority announced that Zuma would be charged.

He sat with his face cupped in his right hand, fiddling with documents in front of him as Motlanthe — two rungs below him in the ANC hierarchy — read out what amounted to a eulogy for a man whose career in the party had taken him from the poverty of rural Nkandla to the second-highest office in the land.

The ANC was “understandably greatly pained” by the controversy surrounding its deputy president, but it was important to maintain “unity, cohesion and organisational integrity” when dealing with the matter, Motlanthe told delegates.

Then he set out the NEC’s proposals on how the NGC should handle the Zuma crisis. They included:


 * Accepting Mbeki’s decision to axe Zuma from his Cabinet as this fell within the President’s constitutional prerogative;
 * Not formally discussing the corruption case brought against Zuma by the National Prosecuting Authority “until such time as the due legal process” had run its course; and
 * Accepting Zuma’s request to withdraw from participating in ANC structures pending the outcome of the case.

Only a few delegates, mainly from Zuma’s stronghold, KwaZulu-Natal, murmured “hhayi bo” (hell, no!) when Motlanthe read out the proposals.

Mbeki stared straight ahead while Motlanthe wrapped up his report, studiously avoiding eye contact with Zuma, his friend and comrade of some 30 years.

The NEC seemed to have scored an important victory.

Then the closed evening plenary session began ... and the delegates had their say.

What had been scheduled to be an open session on the presentation of discussion documents was cut short as security officials locked down the conference venue.

Delegates’ tags were checked and toilets and other potential hiding places scoured to ensure that all journalists had been ejected before the debate on the NEC’s proposals could begin.

The first delegate to speak out was Nkosinathi Mthethwa, an MP from KwaZulu-Natal who chairs the Minerals and Energy portfolio committee in the National Assembly in Cape Town.

From his opening comments, it was clear that party leaders were in for a torrid time.

Delegates steered clear of the first NEC proposal — seeing it as a ploy to get the NGC to endorse Mbeki’s decision to fire Zuma — and focused instead on Zuma’s withdrawal from party structures.

Eastern Cape delegates were next to take on the ANC top brass, with other provinces and ANC structures — including its youth and women’s leagues — following suit.

Alliance partners Cosatu, the SACP and the SA National Civic Organisation did the same, demanding that Zuma be reinstated to his party positions.

None of the top-ranking Zuma supporters spoke — neither Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi, Youth League president Fikile Mbalula, nor Young Communists League boss Buti Manamela.

The task of going toe-to-toe with the party leadership was left to the foot soldiers.

Throughout the heated debate, chaired by national chairman Mosiuoa Lekota, Mbeki and other senior leaders watched quietly as seven of the nine provinces demanded that Zuma continue to play an active role in party structures and activities, despite the corruption charges.

Only delegates from Gauteng and the North West supported Zuma’s withdrawal. Gauteng provincial secretary David Makhura was heckled by delegates from KwaZulu-Natal and other provinces as he tried to address the gathering.

S’bu Ndebele, the ANC’s KwaZulu-Natal chairman and a key Mbeki loyalist, watched helplessly from the podium with fellow NEC members as his province — the biggest in the ANC — ran amok.

The ANC leadership explained that Zuma himself had asked to be withdrawn from the NEC, the National Working Committee and the many other ANC structures on which he serves, in order to concentrate on his case.

But many of his supporters clearly believed he had been forced by the leadership to withdraw.

When Zuma finally took the floor, he told delegates that the decision to withdraw from party structures had indeed been his own, but that he had only made it because he had felt that he did not enjoy any support from his National Working Committee and NEC colleagues.

Since the branches wanted him to continue, he said, he was willing to do so — and hoped that the NEC had “learnt its lesson”.

There was resounding applause from delegates, some of whom later hosted a party to celebrate their “victory”.

Zuma’s reinstatement effectively gives fresh impetus to his bid for the ANC presidency at the party’s next National Conference in 2007, even if his corruption trial is still before the courts at the time, which seems likely.

After the closed session, Lekota told the Sunday Times that Zuma would still have the right to accept nomination as he had not been found guilty of any crime.

“What grounds would we have to say he cannot accept nomination, if conference were to come and the trial is not finished?

“In [some] cases, one accused is found guilty and another not. These things happen in court,” he said.

While Zuma will be free to use ANC platforms and structures to build his presidential campaign, he will be hampered by having to spend time on his defence.

The Shaik trial lasted a marathon eight months — in addition to preliminary hearings and time spent briefing lawyers.

The openly defiant spirit among Zuma supporters continued throughout the NGC this week.

Yesterday morning, new T-shirts proclaiming Zuma’s innocence were distributed, ahead of an anticipated reopening of the issue by the ANC leadership at a plenary session today.

While Zuma supporters are on a high now, they are aware that this week’s “victory” is set to unleash a bitter fight-back by those backing Mbeki on the issue.

An NEC meeting is on the cards to discuss disciplinary action against hecklers and demonstrators, and those who distributed pro-Zuma propaganda — a clear violation of the ANC’s constitution and its NGC rules.

On Friday, Lekota said that disciplining offenders would be left to branch, regional and provincial structures, but that the ANC would move “with absolute conviction” against those who had violated its ground rules.

A battle may have been won, but the war, it seems, is far from over.


 * From: http://www.sundaytimes.co.za/articles/article.aspx?ID=ST6A128100