Former President Thabo Mbeki urged leaders of the African National Congress (ANC) in Gauteng to focus on strengthening the organization and improving service delivery to regain the confidence of the people. Mbeki made this call during a two-day ANC Gauteng renewal workshop held in Boksburg, Johannesburg East, over the weekend.
He emphasized the importance of auditing the ANC and enhancing the quality of its members. This might involve current members reapplying for membership as part of the party’s renewal process. Mbeki shared an anecdote with delegates at the Gauteng Renewal Workshop regarding the organization’s current status.
“The chair of the ANC in the province told me, “President, what we are saying is that the kind of person you are saying should not be part of the movement actually makes up 60% of our membership in the province.” He then mentioned a specific region, to which I responded that I had heard of it. He continued, “Every single ANC branch in that province is led by a criminal.”
Now, the ANC’s provincial leadership is on a mission to regain the people’s trust, with its National Working Committee visiting branches in the last three weeks to consult on a programme of action for renewal, which it intends to devote the next six months to implementing.
The ANC got just over 35% of the vote in Gauteng in the 2024 general elections.
Amongst the interventions suggested by Mbeki to renew the organisation is an audit of the membership and consideration that existing members reapply.
“Does the ANC cease to be a mass-based organisation if it has 500 000 members as opposed to a million in terms of quality. What is the difference between 500 000 and a million? Because obviously I can imagine a process where all of us renew our membership by applying. I don’t think it will result in a mass exclusion of this membership so that it ceases to retain its mass character.”
Mbeki further urged deployees of the ANC at all levels of government to use the power at their disposal to win back the confidence of the people.
“To win back that support is to address those issues that I know that the provincial leadership did its own research before the elections and identified the challenges facing us, electricity, crime, and so on. This is to say, let us make sure that we use the capacity we have in those areas of state power in our hands to address the matters that were identified in our research.”
Gauteng ANC Chair Panyaza Lesufi warned that the renewal process would not be an easy one and indicated red flags in the drawing up of a plan of action in this regard.
“Never ever do this analysis wearing factional lenses, never ever do this analysis to protect your friends and those that are close to you. Never ever do this analysis purely because you want to protect the resources of the state to only be utilised by those who are closer to leadership and those that are in charge of government and the political leadership,” adds Lesufi.
