Durban - The ANC eThekwini went public at the weekend, announcing it wanted its chairwoman, Zandile Gumede, to be the next mayor of the Durban metro.
This emerged when the ruling party launched a regional volunteers campaign at Moses Mabhida Stadium’s People’s Park on Saturday.
The call for Gumede to be mayor fly in the face of apparent lobbying, pushing for Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs MEC, Nomusa Dube-Ncube, to take over from incumbent James Nxumalo.
Gumede heads the metro candidate councillors list submitted to the party’s list conference in Pretoria at the weekend.
While the ANC was expected to release the lists this week, the names of mayoral candidates would be made public before the August 3 elections.
Addressing thousands of volunteers at the rally, regional secretary, Bheki Ntuli, said they wanted Gumede to be mayor.
“When we sit down to consider a mayoral candidate we are to determine as the region that there is no one else other than Zandile Gumede,” Ntuli said.
Ntuli’s sentiments were echoed by the regional ANC Youth League.
“We want ma’am Zandile to be the mayor. We will go corner by corner and street by street to ensure that this happens,” said the league regional convener, Thembo Ntuli.
In an apparent endorsement of Gumede, ANC provincial deputy chairman Willies Mchunu said the candidate heading the list should lead the ruling party in the eThekwini council.
While Mchunu said he would have liked to name the preferred eThekwini mayoral candidate, he said he could not do so out of respect for the party’s procedures.
“You know who the mayor of eThekwini is. You elected the mayor as the branches of ANC,” he said.
Mchunu also said councillor nomination processes, including that of the eThekwini Metro, had been completed.
“We submitted the lists to national. There is no other list process that will take place,” he said.
The ANC’s nomination of councils has been bedevilled by protests in some parts of the province.
The protests turned violent in Durban’s Folweni and Sithebe in Mandeni, where properties were damaged, as disgruntled ANC members and communities sought to force the ruling party to listen to their rejection of candidates.
On Saturday, Mchunu called on party members to accept the outcome of the councillor nominations, but hastened to urge the disgruntled to use party platforms to raise issues.
At the mini-rally, T-shirts and bags were handed out to volunteers.
Speaking at the event, Gumede used the occasion to highlight what would underpin the ANC’s governance programme in the eThekwini Metro.
“The fight against crime, corruption and fraud will continue, and municipal officials and councillors and their families will be barred from doing business with municipalities,” she said.
“Corrupt municipal officials and councillors will be liable for losses due to their actions.”
She also said the ruling party would continue to upgrade informal settlements and overhaul ageing infrastructure.
Gumede told the volunteers to explain the ANC’s manifesto to the voters.
“We must use this campaign to reflect on where we are and what we can do in the immediate to make the ANC the fighting force needed to take our people forward in the fight against poverty, inequality and unemployment,” she said.
Daily News