STATEMENT OF ANC PRESIDENT COMRADE JACOB ZUMA ON ANC CANDIDATES SELECTION FOR THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT ELECTIONS

The mood of our people indicates that they realise that the ANC remains the only organisation that has the history, track record and the political will to take this country forward in its transformation process. The ANC is the only organisation that has had a mission of liberating our people and our country and of improving the lives of South Africans, especially the poor, since 1912.

We are therefore confident that we are going to do well in the elections throughout the country. In this election, the ANC started an innovative process of introducing a democratic way of nominating and selecting local government election candidates.

We took the organisation to the people in a very progressive way, and the communities were involved in the selections for the first time. This new process was bound to have some teething problems and challenges, and we have learned valuable lessons from it.

It has become apparent, in our engagements with communities and our own structures, and from people who have been calling us directly, that in some instances and in some isolated areas, the processes were unjustly interfered with and manipulated.

In the affected wards, candidates that are preferred by our structures and communities were removed from the lists. This has understandably caused anger and frustration.

The ANC leadership has taken a decision that the removal of preferred candidates from our lists should be properly investigated by a team to be set up by the ANC headquarters. The findings of this team will make it possible for the ANC to remove any candidates who were not preferred by our structures and our communities.

This therefore means that the ANC would even be prepared to go for by-elections after the elections, in areas or wards where preferred candidates were fraudulently removed. Our honesty and track record will ensure that we remove non- preferred candidates and replace them with those who were wanted in the first place by our structures and our communities.

This decision of the ANC and the corrective measures to be undertaken will bring to rest any confusion that might have been created by anybody within or outside our structures regarding removal of preferred candidates.

In the ANC, we are always able to deal with our problems internally within the organisation and will definitely correct the lists where there are problems. We cannot correct the lists before the elections as legally that process has been closed.

We therefore call on our people to come out in huge numbers and vote for the ANC on the 18th of May. We will deal with the individuals who should not be on the list after the elections. Our campaign is set to intensify as we near the election date.

We have now strengthened our campaign with the deployment of all our cadres serving the movement at local, provincial and national levels. We will be all over the country engaging our communities in build-up activities before our Siyanqoba rally campaign on 15 May 2011 at the FNB Stadium in Gauteng.

We are pulling out all stops in these build-up activities to showcase our service delivery achievements. Our message is simple and factual. We have made substantial progress in improving access to basic services to our people.

Millions more South Africans have access to water, electricity, sanitation, education, health facilities and other services than before the dawn of freedom.

There is still much more work to be done.

We are ready to work with our communities to build a functional, effective and efficient local government system. I am therefore calling upon all those who were dissatisfied and who have decided to declare themselves as Independents in this election to return and campaign for the ANC. The ANC remains their political home.

We are looking forward to an ongoing vibrant and successful campaign as we continue reaching out to our people in the coming weeks.

I thank you.

Issued by the ANC, April 28 2011

Click here to sign up to receive our free daily headline email newsletter