MENAFN
*Provincial Head-Count Gives Zuma the Edge * * * *Middle East North Africa Financial Network, 16 October 2011*With the leadership race in the African National Congress (ANC) in full swing despite the official gag, the balance is currently tipped in favour of a second term for President Jacob Zuma.
The ANC's centenary national conference at Mangaung, where leadership elections will take place, is 14 months - and several elective provincial conferences - away. Much can change in that time. The ANC's national executive committee (NEC) has attempted to keep the lid on the debate because it recognises that jockeying and lobbying ahead of Mangaung could paralyse and potentially divide the party on the eve of its centenary celebrations. The NEC's August meeting acknowledged the devastation caused to the ANC by the internal wrangling in the lead up to the last elective conference in Polokwane in 2007 when Zuma trounced former President Thabo Mbeki for the presidency. Party leaders want to avoid a repeat of that chaos. But manoeuvring is taking place and gaining energy at all levels in the ANC.
The current balance in the provinces, which deliver most of the votes at ANC national conferences, offers a useful pointer on the road to Mangaung.
Individual province's positions on succession are affected by a range of factors - including patronage, and economic and financial interests of key figures in the party and the state. Equally importantly, most provinces are experiencing tension or open conflict between the two top provincial party posts - chairperson and secretary - with the divisions manifesting along the succession fault line. In Limpopo, for instance, ANC chair Cassel Mathale and secretary Joe Maswanganyi are in opposing positions on the succession - Maswanganyi opposes moves to oust Zuma.
These divisions will complicate even further the work of party powerbrokers at national level in building coalitions behind their slates - forcing them to accommodate provincial interests to a greater extent than ever in the ANC post-1990 history. Political horse-trading will be intense for the next 14 months.
ANC structures from branch level up are already feeling the pressure from pro- and anti-Zuma campaigners.
The Mvela group, which comprise senior national ANC leaders including Human Settlements Minister Tokyo Sexwale, and Arts and Culture Minister and Gauteng provincial leader Paul Mashatile, are leading the charge against Zuma with the aid of Julius Malema's ANC Youth League.
KwaZulu-Natal Premier Zweli Mkhize and his Limpopo counterpart Cassel Mathale are part of this group.
The group aims to replace Zuma with Deputy President Kgalema Motlanthe - an objective overlapping that of the youth league under Malema, the most vocal of Zuma's opponents. Both the Mvela group and the youth league recognise the need to unite behind a common slate - at least for the top six ANC positions - if they are to have any chance of replacing Zuma and the current leadership.
The youth league wants Sports Minister and former league president Fikile Mbalula on the slate to replace ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe.
For Mvela, Mashatile is a possible replacement for ANC chair Baleka Mbete. The group has not yet settled on a deputy presidential candidate - several people are vying for the post.
One scenario has Sexwale running as Motlanthe's deputy to put himself in pole position to take the party presidency in 2017 (and the state presidency in 2019). Motlanthe would by then have served as president of the party and the state for one term - a second bite at the cherry after his term as president when the ANC removed Mbeki in 2008.
Putting a consensus opposition slate together is one thing; removing Zuma quite another.
Zuma's supporters intend to keep Zuma, Motlanthe and Mantashe on as the status quo but are open to changes on the other three top six posts (chairperson, deputy secretary general and treasurer). They will use this flexibility to build as broad a consensus as possible, necessarily accommodating the ambitions of provincial powerbrokers.
An assessment of relative provincial voting power gives Zuma a definite edge over his opponents. Malema's youth league has already undertaken the provincial headcount - which is why it recognises that it needs to "take over" ANC branches to influence the choice of delegates to Mangaung, and thus the way they vote.
*KwaZulu-Natal*The ANC's biggest voting bloc, the province is solidly in the Zuma camp, despite Mkhize's flirtation with Sexwale.
Mkhize is himself vulnerable and could be replaced in provincial elections ahead of Mangaung.
*Eastern Cape*The second most influential province is Eastern Cape. Under provincial chair Pumulo Masaule (a member of the South African Communist Party politburo) the province is a safe one for Zuma. It is highly unlikely to be swayed by opposition to Zuma.
*Limpopo*The third most important province, Limpopo is tilted against Zuma - although not as sharply as Zuma's opponents suggest.
Of the five regions in Limpopo at least two - Sekukune and Waterberg (the largest voting bloc in Limpopo) - support Zuma. Deputy Arts and Culture Minister Joe Phala and Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi hail from this area. Several others in the Zuma Cabinet also hail from Limpopo: International Relations Minister Maite Nkoane-Mashabane, Minister in the Presidency Collins Chabane, and Minister for Public Works Richard Baloyi. They have maintained strong links with their home base and are likely to put up a fight in the pre-Mangaung provincial conference to oust Mathale.
Malema and the Mvela group currently have the upper hand in Limpopo. But if Mathale is removed as ANC provincial chair or Malema is expelled following his ANC disciplinary case, their grip on the branches will weaken, as will their campaign to oust Zuma.
*Gauteng*Although weak numerically, Gauteng is often described as the "brains trust" and a key mover of policy in the ANC. Under the leadership of Mashatile, Gauteng has sought to increase its influence on the ANC.
Mashatile has skilfully used the newly-created provincial chairperson's forum to exercise influence over his provincial counterparts - most vividly to isolate Malema when the youth league leader attempted to challenge Zuma at the ANC national general council in 2010. But the forum has no constitutional standing in the party - and can be disbanded at any time - and thus no direct voting rights.
Gauteng's claim that policy-development leadership, by virtue of it being home to many of the ANC's key thinkers, is somewhat overstated.
Gauteng failed two months ago to force Luthuli House to endorse its argument for an immediate opening of the succession debate.
In the run-up to Polokwane it also tried to introduce the so called "third way" option as a way to break free of the binary logic of the Zuma-Mbeki rivalry, but with no success. Sexwale's candidate as a third option received little traction - he was seen as a proxy candidate for Mbeki.
The province has also been wracked with internal divisions recently, which saw parallel structures emerge after the recent regional conferences held in Tshwane. While Luthuli House has slapped down efforts to undermine Mashatile's authority in the province, the divisions are a significant development, which indicate that Mashatile too will have an uphill battle to get all the branches to back an anti-Zuma platform.
The Gauteng vote will thus be split on the succession. Mashatile will have difficulty in delivering a bloc Gauteng vote to any faction.
*Mpumalanga*While internally divided over the leadership of Premier David Mabuza, Mpumalanga backs Zuma for a second term.
*Western Cape*In the Western Cape, provincial chair Marius Fransman came to power on the back of Zuma's decision to deal harshly with former provincial secretary Mcebisi Skwatsha's efforts to entrench his brand of Africanist politics in the province. Zuma's decision to embrace Fransman, appointed by Zuma as a deputy minister for international relations, will make Fransman reluctant to bite the hand that feeds him politically.
Western Cape secretary Songezo Mjongile is part of efforts to push Mbalula into the ANC's top six, but delegates will not automatically vote against Zuma and his core slate.
*North West*This province is split: provincial chair Supra Mahumapelo and secretary Kabelo Mataboge are in opposing camps divided by the succession fault line. Mataboge, backed by the youth league, aims to oust Mahumapelo at the pre-Mangaung provincial conference.
*Free State & Northern Cape*Free State and Northern Cape, small in terms of voting numbers, are part of Team Zuma.
*The Alliance*2012 is also an election year for the ANC's Tripartite Alliance partners, trade union federation Cosatu and the SACP. Their elections, both taking place before Mangaung, are further factors influencing the political landscape in the ANC ahead of its national conference.
The SACP has been consistently behind the Zuma-Motlanthe-Mantashe line-up. General secretary Blade Nzimande and much of his politburo currently face no serious challenge to re-election.
The political future of Cosatu general secretary's Zwelinzima Vavi is less clear - and potentially intertwined with the ANC succession.
The majority of Cosatu's 21 affiliates are also solidly behind the Zuma-Motlanthe-Mantashe line-up, despite Vavi's own unhappiness with Zuma and Mantashe.
If Vavi makes a play for a post in the ANC (as he has hinted he will), he will have to withdraw from nomination for another term as Cosatu general secretary - and enter the factional battle within the ANC.
Elements within the youth league have attempted to draw elements of Cosatu into an alliance of anti-Zuma forces across the Alliance. These forces are numerically weak and enjoy very little support in Cosatu or in the SACP.
* /Copyright Southern Africa Report. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). /*From: http://www.menafn.com/qn_news_story.asp?storyid={2a379e6a-7cef-4ce1-99d1-9b8eb4bcd7e7} <http://www.menafn.com/qn_news_story.asp?storyid=%7b2a379e6a-7cef-4ce1-99d1-9b8eb4bcd7e7%7d>*
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