Sunday Times red.png 'We are not ready for Zuma to leave' Factional dynamics weigh heavily on which way ANC MPs will vote in legislature By Qaanitah Hunter and others, Sunday Times, 6 August 2090 President Jacob Zuma's detractors are backing down from their threat to vote with the opposition in parliament, fearing the prospect of an early general election or Zuma anointing an acolyte to succeed him. ANC leaders and MPs this week told the Sunday Times they would toe the party line and vote against the scheduled motion of no confidence against the president because they believed Zuma's removal would result in his faction frustrating efforts to have a successor elected by parliament, which would necessitate a general election. Zuma's supporters in the national executive committee, the ANC's highest decision-making structure between conferences, made it clear last week they would not support any candidate outside their camp if the president was booted out by parliament. Even SACP-aligned ANC MPs who had threatened to abstain from voting in the motion of no confidence now say they will close ranks as they are convinced the Zuma-controlled NEC would not allow for a smooth transition. An influential NEC member said last week's lekgotla reinforced the fact that Zuma's camp remained powerful and would frustrate any move to have the president replaced by a candidate from outside his inner circle. Leadership crisis "What will happen is that he will be removed ... then the NEC would have to decide who to put there [as president], he will be in charge of that," said a senior ANC member. It was "almost certain" that, if Zuma was removed, the ANC would not find consensus on who would replace him. Another NEC member said the Zuma camp made it clear during the lekgotla that the party would descend into deeper turmoil if some of its MPs made good on their threat to vote with the opposition. "This is what they said in the NEC: 'If you are going to allow these others to vote the president out, then we are not going to support your president,'" said the NEC member. "So we are not ready. It is a crisis. That is why we have to defend the president up until we are ready because now we are not ready. "We are divided ... We will not agree about any candidate. So, we are not going to allow our public representatives to vote according to their conscience. In South Africa we have what we call party government - people [vote] ... for political parties and we deploy our ambassadors to the legislatures," he said. Zuma's cabinet would have to resign if the motion succeeded in the National Assembly. National Assembly Speaker Baleka Mbete would become acting president for 30 days, within which parliament would have to elect a new president from among its members. "If the president is voted out, there is concern that those who are close to him may not vote for the candidate that will be proposed, especially Cyril [Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa]. That would mean the ANC would not agree on a candidate while the speaker acts. "That would be a massive problem because the failure to agree on a candidate, as soon as possible, would force an election to be called, meaning the ANC would have to contest elections in a divided state," said another NEC member. From: https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times/news/2017-08-05-we-are-not--ready-- for-zuma-to-leave/ -- -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to yclsa-eom-forum@googlegroups.com or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email yclsa-eom-forum-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): yclsa-eom-forum-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com . --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "YCLSA Discussion Forum" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to yclsa-eom-forum+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send an email to yclsa-eom-forum@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum. To view this discussion on the web, visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/yclsa-eom-forum/000001d30e6b%247a1bad00%246e530700%24%40com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
