The ANC in Gauteng has not handed over material related to the Johannesburg conference to the police as directed by party secretary-general Fikile Mbalula in December. This is not in defiance. The leadership in the province says it would prefer to deal with the allegations regarding the disputed regional conference internally before involving the police.
ANC Gauteng provincial task team (PTT) spokesperson Mzi Khumalo told Sunday Times on Tuesday that they are still having talks with Mbalula about how to treat the disputes arising from the conference where Loyiso Masuku was elected chairperson, beating Dada Morero a staunch ally of Mbalula. “The matter is on the table, but we are engaging with the office of the SG and when a final determination has been made … the province will be in a position to pronounce.
Because we have not pronounced, we have not done anything,” said Khumalo. At the weekend the Sunday Times reported that Mbalula penned a letter at the end of December instructing the PTT to hand over all conference-related material, including ballot papers, to the police to probe alleged irregularities at the three-day conference, held in Johannesburg a few weeks earlier. In the letter Mbalula said his directive comes after a slew of disputes and allegations received by his office since the conclusion of the conference.
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“In light of the above, the PTT is directed to facilitate a process to have all ballot papers, boxes, raw data and consolidated data as well as the report from the elections agency submitted to the South African Police Service [SAPS] with immediate effect,” said Mbalula in the letter dated December 28. We have not decided on any investigation or anything of that nature because we are still looking at the veracity of the allegations and that will tell us exactly what action to take. “The handover to the SAPS should be in the presence of ANC security led by comrade Patrick Mathebula, ANC electoral committee and representative of the ANCVL at national level.” But almost a month later, the Gauteng PTT has still not heeded Mbalula’s directive as they say they prefer the internal mechanisms to be exhausted first.
“We are using internal processes to deal with this matter. Of course, the internal mechanism processes will mean that all affected parties get a brief and we are still there. So all parties involved will be engaged,” said Khumalo.
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