South Africa: New Additions to ANC Make No Difference - Moeletsi Mbeki

Photo: Moeketsi Mogotsi/WhatsUpANC
Supporters of the president of the ruling party, Jacob Zuma.

Johannesburg — The addition of new leaders to the ANC top six won't make any difference to the party's fortunes, commentator Moeletsi Mbeki told The Star newspaper on Thursday.

Mbeki said the addition of Cyril Ramaphosa as deputy president and Zweli Mkhize as treasurer-general would not help the ANC improve its performance, either with service delivery and protests, or with voters.

"There is no difference between the previous and the new. Nothing new.

Ramaphosa and Mkhize have always been there," Mbeki told the paper.

He noted that Ramaphosa has been an active member of the ANC national executive committee and it was a mistake to treat him as "an unknown quantity".

"Under the leadership of Zuma, the killing of innocent people, as in Marikana, the killing of innocent demonstrators, as in Andries Tatane, and the poor administration, such as the non-delivery of textbooks, would continue. These are the same people," Mbeki said.

He argued that changes to the leadership would also not improve the ANC's electoral results as voters were being more "disgruntled and disillusioned."

"The ANC's voting popularity has been declining since Zuma took over because of the corruption, incompetence and ineptitude," Mbeki said.

  • Comment

Copyright © 2012 South African Press Association. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.

AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 130 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.

Comments Post a comment

InFocus

South Africans Losing Patience With The ANC?

After the re-election of Jacob Zuma as president of the African National Congress, analysts have questioned whether changes in the ruling party will be enough to address growing ... Read more »

South African Ruling Party Chooses Executive

picture

African National Congress President Jacob Zuma closed the ruling party's conference with a warning for dissidents after the announcement of the National Executive Council members. Read more »