By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
The African National Congress (ANC) has announced that it will launch its manifesto in Tshwane ahead of the local government elections.
Briefing the media on Thursday, Transport Minister Fikile Mbalula, who is the party’s head of elections, confirmed the launch would take place on 27 September.
“In compliance with the Covid-19 protocols and regulations, the ANC manifesto launch will be held in Tshwane with only or less [than] 500 people in attendance. The manifesto launch will be followed by the rollout of localised manifesto launches in the metros and the rest of local municipalities,” Mbalula said.
Mbalula labelled the coalition of opposition parties in the City of Tshwane a failure, hence the move to launch the manifesto there.
“We [are] going to Pretoria, we [are] going to Tshwane – the city we lost in the hands of the coalition of the Democratic Alliance [DA] and the EFF [Economic Freedom Fighters]. We are going back to ask our people to give us a mandate and majority rule in the City of Tshwane for what has happened in the past five years. since the coalition took over, it is for everyone to see for themselves,” he added.
Mbalula said the ANC would continue dealing with candidate disputes even after the election voting day has passed.
The ANC’s branches have been finalising their community meetings on the candidates preferred by communities to lead them as councillors.
Mbalula said the ANC electoral committee, chaired by former president Kgalema Motlanthe, had established rules for the candidate selection process, with guidelines on the resolution of disputes.
“The directive of the electoral committee is that all disputes should be lodged with the provincial list committees [PLCs] and appeals against the PLC verdicts should be lodged with electoral committee for final decisions,” he said.
Mbalula is confident that the party will be able to meet the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) deadline of submitting election candidates.
The IEC’s decided to re-open the voters’ and candidates’’registration processes after the Constitutional Court ruled that elections should be held between October 27 and November 1.
“We are satisfied that all our processes are proceeding according to schedule and will meet the timelines as set out by the Independent Electoral Commission,” said Mbalula.