By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
The former Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs MEC Mxolisi Dukwana has been elected Premier of the Free State.
Dukwana received 17 votes from 24 which were cast during the election in an open ballot. He defeated opposition party leader Roy Jankielsohn, who received 7 votes.
A total of 27 of the 30 members of the Provincial Legislature (MPLs) voted whilst 3 EFF members abstained.
Two members – including the MEC for Transport William Bulwane and an EFF member – were not present in the House.
Dukwana’s election as the premier comes after ousted premier Sisi Ntombela resigned on Tuesday 21 February 2023 after the ANC PEC, led by Dukwana, redeployed her.
Ntombela was beaten by Dukwana, a staunch ally of President Cyril Ramaphosa, in the race for the ANC chair position at the provincial conference last month, and in doing so is said to have buried the political prospects of once strongman Ace Magashule.
Ntombela failed to make it onto the 30-member PEC which is mostly made up of Dukwana’s allies.
Dukwana described his election as “a day of hope and restoration”.
“It is a day to reclaim our glory and pride,” said Dukwana before outlining some of the major scandals that marred Magashule’s tenure as Free State premier.
Dukwana said this day would not have been possible without the prayers of the Vrede dairy farmers, “whose project was taken over by gangsters”.
He also alluded to the mysterious deaths of municipal workers, whose killers had not been brought to book.
He also used his speech to extend an olive branch to opposition parties, saying members of the opposition had a role to play in pointing out where the ANC-led provincial government was not doing well.
One of his first tasks is expected to be the dismissal of most of the current MECs. At the Free State ANC conference in January, ANC national chairperson Gwede Mantashe lamented what he described as a total collapse of governance in the Free State.
In August 2022, Auditor-General Tsakani Maluleke warned that the province was in serious trouble and that not one municipality had received a clean audit in the previous five years.
With this in mind, and given that Ntombela, legislature speaker Zanele Sifuba and nine other MECs failed to make it onto the 35-member Free State ANC executive committee, Dukwana is expected to wield the axe and overhaul the provincial cabinet.
The ANC has a comfortable majority in the legislature with 19 seats, compared to the DA’s six, the EFF’s four and the Freedom Front Plus’ one seat.