BFF-05 How will S.Africa’s ruling ANC conference work?

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ZCZC

BFF-05

SAFRICA-POLITICS-ANC-CONFERENCE

How will S.Africa’s ruling ANC conference work?

JOHANNESBURG, Dec 16, 2017 (BSS/AFP) – More than 5,200 delegates will
head to South Africa’s ruling African National Congress elective conference
from December 16 to 20 to pick a new leader to replace President Jacob Zuma.

The gathering is the fruit of many months of planning for the complex
process of selecting the storied party’s new president, who will likely go on
to contest presidential elections in 2019.

The secrecy around the preparations and the numerous closed sessions have
led some to raise fears that the outcome could be contested.

– Who decides? –

The electoral conference of the ANC is made up of 5,240 voting members of
which 4,731 — roughly 90 percent — are drawn from the party’s regional
branches in the country’s nine provinces.

The other tenth of voting delegates is made up of members of the
influential Women’s, Youth and Veterans’ leagues as well as the party’s nine
provincial national executive committees.

Voting delegates are half male, half female — as specified by the party’s
constitution.

– How do the provinces vote? –

Local branches select delegates to represent them at the national meeting
and instruct them of their preferred slate of six candidates for the party’s
top posts — president, vice president, chairperson, treasurer, secretary
general and deputy secretary general.

They will also go to conference with a list of 80 names for the National
Executive Committee which serves as the party’s internal legislature.

According to the official tally of pledges by the nine provinces, Deputy
President Cyril Ramaphosa leads the field with more than 1,800 nominations
while Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, Zuma’s ex-wife, has more than 1,300 nods.

But the tally is merely a guide and could be radically different from the
final vote at the conference as each delegate may alter their vote as they
wish until it is officially cast.

– How will the conference play out? –

Leadership candidates will be officially nominated on Saturday when the
gathering opens at the NASREC Expo Centre in Johannesburg.

Delegates then vote behind closed doors on the eligible candidates, with
the contender who achieves a simple majority named leader.

The process is overseen by the party’s electoral commission which is made
up of officials from the provinces and of former activists as well as an
“independent” external organisation.

The new leader then brings the conference to a close. Their first major
engagement is the January 8 celebration which marks the anniversary of the
ANC’s formation. This year it will be held in East London in the country’s
southeast on January 13.

BSS/AFP/MRI/0820 hrs