STATEMENT OF THE FREE STATE COPE PROVINCIAL INTERIM LEADERSHIP GROUP (PILG) DURING ITS SPECIAL SESSION ON 16 MAY 2010 ON ITS CALL TO THE NATIONAL LEADERSHIP OF COPE TO POSTPONE OUR NATIONAL CONGRESS SCHEDULED FOR 27 - 30 MAY  

COPE in the Free State Province, during its special session of 16 May 2010, discussed among other things, the recent audit of our membership by our national office as well as the general state of readiness for the national congress by all our structures. 

Having done so, we unanimously agreed to call on our national leadership to seriously consider postponing the May national congress for the following reasons: 

• We are firm believers in thorough and unadulterated democratic process both within the ranks of our party and without.

• All Provinces except the Eastern Cape have less than 50% of their total number of branches accredited to attend the national congress. The former will have over 91% of branch delegation while other branches in the same Province have been disadvantaged because of a particular view they have about issues of national leadership.

• Our total membership as the Free State of about 9000 has not been acknowledged, despite our request for a recount of our actual forms. Instead, we are said to be around 6000. A point we gainsay.

• The logic and the appeal that greeted the birth of COPE have been seriously undermined under the current climate. We need to take one step backwards in order to take more steps forward.

• The inexplicable and sudden rise in membership in Provinces that have been struggling to recruit such as the North West, which incident requires a careful relook, is cause for great concern.

• The uncertainty around financial resources to hold the national congress itself only contributes to more chaos and uncertainty.

• The current climate is divesting our members and supporters of all morale and hope.

For these and many other reasons, we strongly urge our national leadership to postpone the national congress, pick up the pieces and go back to the drawing board in order to put the unity and cohesion of COPE first. 

In the meantime, we will be meeting with our constitutional structures, to inform them of our view and carry them along in the process. 

If our call for a postponement is not heeded, we will have no option but follow in the footsteps of Limpopo and Mpumalanga Provinces, and take a very painful decision but necessary decision of not participating in the national congress, which we believe is being rushed without regard for what will become of COPE in the aftermath of all that.

We further believe that untrammeled or unbridled ambition to be elected and occupy positions on the part of anyone, is the single most serious threat to the health of COPE, as these individuals seem to be driven more by the desire to take over the whole our party and lose its soul. 

COPE belongs to the people and we implore our leadership, once again, to be guided by the dreams and aspirations of all COPErs and South Africans, to build a party that can truly boast to be a beacon of hope for all who voted in the last election, as well as the 5 million that registered but did not vote and the 7million that chose not to register. 

It is not too late in the day for sanity to prevail. Only true leadership will make this happen. 

Statement issued by Sello Dithebe, Head of Communications & Spokesperson COPE Free State, May 17 2010

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