SOUTH AFRICA: South Africa's ruling African National Congress (ANC) party opens conference in Polokwane to determine next party leader

Record ID: 454480

  • Title: SOUTH AFRICA: South Africa's ruling African National Congress (ANC) party opens conference in Polokwane to determine next party leader
  • Date: 17th December 2007
  • Summary: MBEKI SEATED ON STAGE
  • Embargoed: 1st January 2008 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: South Africa
  • Country: South Africa
  • Topics: Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA8RI9WX918UW6N3BZDFTJGM4W5
  • Story Text: South Africa's ruling African National Congress (ANC) party opens a leadership conference in Polokwane with President Thabo Mbeki facing stiff competition from ANC Deputy President Jacob Zuma, who has a significant lead ahead of the leadership vote. The winner is almost certain to become South African president in 2009.
    South Africa's ruling African National Congress (ANC) party opened a leadership conference on Sunday (December 16) which could determine who becomes the country's next president.
    Supporters of ANC Deputy President Jacob Zuma cheered as the five-day ruling ANC conference got underway in Polokwane which could see South African President Thabo Mbeki losing control over the party. Mbeki is due to leave office in 2009.
    The ANC said it would release the result of the vote for party leader on Monday (December 17), with voting due to start on Sunday (December 16).
    Inside the conference hall, supporters of Zuma, who hopes to unseat Mbeki as leader of the party, were cheered as Mbeki and Zuma walked together on stage.
    However, some of the 4,000 delegates booed ministers and aides of Mbeki's government as they arrived.
    Mbeki, who took over the party from Nelson Mandela in 1997 and then the country two years later, defended his record and criticised some party members who he said used dishonesty and lies to achieve their goals.
    Opening the 52nd ANC conference, Mbeki said that Africans had the right to "determine our own destiny without any dictation from anybody."
    "Reflecting the most fundamental positions of our movement, we have insisted on the right of the peoples of Africa, including ourselves, to determine our own destiny without any dictation from anybody," said Mbeki.
    The leadership race has produced some of the worst divisions in the ANC since the end of apartheid in 1994, pitting Mbeki against Zuma. If Zuma wins, he is almost certain to become South African president in 2009. Mbeki also reflected on the ANC's ability to lead in South Africa over the next five years. "Does the ANC have the will and capacity to lead our country and people over the next five years in a manner that will enable the nation to celebrate our centenary in 2012 together, paying heartfelt tribute to our movement, for what it has and would have done to sacrifice everything for our liberation," Mbeki said. Mbeki is barred from a third term as state president but can be re-elected ANC president, which would give him a big say over who becomes the presidential candidate in 2009. If Zuma wins the leadership race, he is almost certain to become South African president in 2009.
    Conference delegate Nontomi Nama praised Thabo Mbeki's leadership skills. "I think Mr. Mbeki is a great man, and he supersedes all the criteria, you know, when you look for leadership, and there is no other man other than Thabo Mbeki. We are confident that we are going to, all of us, flat out, for Thabo Mbeki as the president of the ANC," Nama said. But almost all bets are on Zuma to win the leadership contest. Delegate Mduduzi Memela felt certain that Zuma would be the victor.
    "But I can tell you that, at the end of this day, comrade JZ (Jacob Zuma) will be the President of the ANC," said Memela.
    A populist who was fired by Mbeki after being linked to a corruption scandal, Zuma is going into the leadership vote with a significant lead, having secured nearly double Mbeki's party branch nominations in the lead-up to the conference.
    He has been endorsed by the powerful Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), which is in a formal governing alliance with the ANC.
    Members of the South African Communist Party, also in the governing coalition, have thrown their support behind Zuma, with many saying he would reverse Mbeki's centrist policies and tilt the country to the left.
    Mbeki, described as aloof and arrogant, has won praise from the business community and a new black middle class. But many South Africans say he is out of touch with millions of poor who have yet to benefit from black rule.

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