ANC sets record straight on its internal elections deadlines
14 September 2021
The African National Congress (ANC) has noted a misleading headline on Eyewitness News online platform: "ANC misses its own deadline to resolve candidate disputes". While the body of the article is accurate, the headline creates a wrong inpression that the ANC has not met one of its most critical internal deadlines towards the local government elections.
The ANC is satisfied that all its processes are firmly on track and proceeding according to schedule to meet timelines as set out by the Independent Electoral Commission.
A letter from the Deputy Secretary General, Comrade Jessie Duarte, makes it clear that in the event that certain disputes have not been resolved on time, these will be attended to beyond the 1st of November 2021. So the "missing of deadline" does not arise at this stage.
The immediate task of the movement in relation to the upcoming Local Government Elections is civic education primarily focused on voter registration and to get as many eligible voters as possible to go out and register to vote.
The ANC wishes to assure its members and supporters that it will register all its candidates with the IEC by the 21st of September 2011.
The ANC Electoral Committee which is chaired by Cde Kgalema Motlanthe has established rules for the candidate selection process with guidelines on the resolution of the disputes.
The ANC is very proud of its democratic process of nominating candidates for the forthcoming local government election because this process empowers the communities with a final decision on who becomes their councilor in each ward throughout the country.
The ANC is equally concerned about the violence that mars some of our community meetings where ANC councilor candidates are nominated. We condemn in the strongest possible terms the brutal killing of three women in a drive-by shooting in Durban's Inanda township on Saturday, while attending an ANC community meeting to finalise the selection of candidates for 2021 local government elections.
The ANC conveys its condolences to the families of the deceased and urges law-enforcement agencies to ensure that perpetrators of this crime are apprehended and made to face the full wrath of our justice system without delay.
Issued by Pule Mabe, National Spokesperson, ANC, 14 September 2021
