ANC KZN PRESS STATEMENT

The African National Congress is preparing for its 53rd National Conference which is scheduled for the 16th - 20th December 2012. This conference will be a pilgrimage as it takes place at the time when the ANC celebrates its centenary, therefore providing an opportunity for the movement to undergo introspection on the journey it has travelled since 1912 up to now. This National Conference will also take us to end of the second decade of democracy in South Africa which will be in 2014. 

We are now entering the crucial final phase of the preparations for the National Conference which includes the process of elections of delegates to attend the conference and the nominating for the National Executive Committee (NEC).

The early phase of our preparations for the conference included making sure that all our branches were in good standing and with paid up membership. In October 2011, we embarked on an intensive mass recruitment campaign with an intention of reaching 350 000 members by June 2012.

Although we did not reach this target, we are happy that our intensive recruitment drive was a resounding success as we now have 331 020 members in KwaZulu-Natal. Although many people have been projecting the end of the ANC, our organisation has confounded the prophets of doom by continuing to grow in leaps and bounds.

The growing number of people who join our organisation clearly shows that the ANC remains the only movement that carries the interests of our people.

It is worth noting that our recruitment campaign would not have been successful were it not for dedicated and united cadres of our movement. Our Volunteer Core Movements (VCMs) worked tirelessly on the ground, targeting new members and also encouraging existing members to renew their membership.

Each VCM comprises of ten members and all VCMs are attached to IEC voting districts. Their work is co-ordinated by BEC members and they have been recruiting on weekly basis. The VCM are tasked to carry campaigns of the organisation on the ground, this include Imvuselelo Campaign.

The process of recruitment we have outlined shows that our membership grew exponentially because of hard work and that it did not shoot up overnight as reported by some media organisations. It is worth mentioning that our recruitment campaign is part of the on-going Imvuselelo Campaign, a huge national recruitment campaign which saw the ANC reaching a million members before its centenary in January this year. As part of the recruitment campaign, the ANC in the province conducts door-to-door visits across the length and breadth of the province.

The ANC in KwaZulu-Natal does not take the growth of membership as the issue for the National Conference but it is a reflection of the growth and acceptability of the movement by the people. The ANC continues to build structures even in areas which have been not accessible before.

We know that having the highest membership comes with huge responsibilities. This means that ANC members in our province need to act in a humble manner, a characteristic of a cadre who truly understands the principles of the organisation. We are fully aware that having the highest membership does not mean that we must be arrogant and not respect other provinces.

That is why we have on-going engagements with other provinces to ensure that there is maximum unity and robust engagements leading to the 53rd National Conference, which we strongly believe will be a watershed conference for the ANC.

In the next few days, we will have a joint Provincial Executive Committee meeting with Gauteng. We are doing this because both provinces believe that thorough preparations are necessary for the success of the conference. This meeting will deal with policy proposals and our approaches on leadership issues, amongst other matters. We have also had very successful joint PEC meetings with other provinces in the past few months.

Also, as part of preparations for the conference, the ANC KZN has engaged all sectors such as Non-Government Organisations, civil societies and Community based organisations on policy discussion documents. We also have a line-up of public debates, public lectures and cadre's forums which also form part of the preparations. This has ensured that the ANC reaches out to all ordinary members of the community to solicit their views on ANC policy position.

To us, for the 53rd conference to be a watershed conference, it needs to take concrete decisions which will help South Africa to move to a higher level. In the past 19 years, we have scored success on deepening democracy and create visible and act institutions of democracy and humans rights. We however are lacking behind on socio-economic transformation. This continues to deplete the live of the majority of our people, hence the National Policy Conference resolved on second phase of transformation which should entail decisive intervention on the economic transformation of the country.

Nomination process

As we all know, the nomination process takes place at all three levels of the ANC, through a process of nomination from the branch to the provincial level at which the final list of nominees will be ratified prior to the conference. Throughout this important process, each branch, province and league is entitled to nominate one person for each of six official's positions and no more than 80 people for the remaining NEC positions. The nominations will take place during branch general meetings (BGMs) which will start as from today.

Our approach in this regard is to allow branches space to nominate any leader they wish to nominate. The key principles that guide us are from the "Through the eye of the needle" but also include the following:

Continuity and Change: in that we will work to ensure that there is continuity of leadership and only change where change is really necessary.

Collective Leadership and Responsibility: this mean that the ANC leaders are elected as individuals but once they are elected they become one body which work as a collective and share equally responsibility. This includes subjecting oneself to the decisions of the collective.

Accessible: leaders should always be accessible and available to serve the people with dedication and be with the people where it is joy and in struggles of pain.

Reflection of a demographic: if we are to succeed in building a non-racial, non-sexist society, our organization will need to have a leadership that reflect this ideal society.

We have called for the reduction of the NEC from 88 to 66 which was supported by many provinces and even endorsed by the NEC. However, we have since been engaged by various comrades advising that due to the membership is growing we should not reduce the capacity of the movement to serve those members. It is a view we have to accept given its logic. But we are still firm that for a person to be elected to the NEC that person should have served in lower structures; this will curb parachuting which comes with opportunism.

We are happy that our province is ready to conduct all these processes and we have no doubt that we will finish them well on time before the cut-off date. Our provincial nomination conference will be held on the 24th - 25th November 2012.

Statement issued by Sihle Zikalala, ANC KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Secretary, October 3 2012

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