ANC secretary in South Africa threatens to sue Mbalula — Daily Maverick
In South Africa, Lulama Ngcukaitobi, the secretary of the African National Congress (ANC) in the Eastern Cape province, is threatening to file a defamation lawsuit against the party’s secretary-general, Fikile Mbalula. As Daily Maverick reports, Ngcukaitobi’s lawyers are demanding that Mbalula withdraw by 12:00 p.m. on Tuesday, September 22, claims about the provincial secretary’s alleged responsibility for the late submission of election lists.
Dispute over the lists
In a report presented by Mbalula to the ANC leadership, including President Cyril Ramaphosa, responsibility for problems with the lists in the Eastern Cape province was placed on its leadership and personally on Ngcukaitobi. According to the report, cited by the Sunday Times, the province’s final list reached the ANC operations centre at 4:31 p.m. on August 28 — 29 minutes before the 5:00 p.m. deadline set by South Africa’s Electoral Commission.
According to the publication, Mbalula claimed that the party’s data processing centre did not have enough time to process the list, verify it against available data, make changes and submit the municipal lists to South Africa’s Electoral Commission. The report also stated that the working file was last saved at 2:31 p.m., while correcting 35 identification numbers had already taken more than four hours.
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Ngcukaitobi’s position
Ngcukaitobi’s lawyers called the claims attributed to Mbalula false and damaging to their client’s reputation. They also denied the suggestion that Ngcukaitobi altered a list of candidates already approved by the ANC National Executive Committee. The lawyers’ letter said that Ngcukaitobi knew of only one case in which Mbalula personally instructed that a list be changed: Andile Lungisa was removed from the proportional representation candidate list in the Nelson Mandela Bay municipality.
The ANC failed to complete the submission of candidate lists on time in six municipalities. The Electoral Court dismissed the party’s challenge against the Electoral Commission, affecting 181 ANC candidates. The party decided to appeal the ruling, while the commission continued compiling the final candidate lists for local elections scheduled for November 4.
Ngcukaitobi’s lawyers also said that Mbalula is trying to shift responsibility for the failure, although he is the party’s administrative head. They link the crisis to his interference in the work of ANC structures in the Eastern Cape province. The Eastern Cape High Court in Makhanda had previously found the interim provincial task team appointed by Mbalula in May to be unconstitutional, unlawful and invalid. If the statements are not withdrawn, Ngcukaitobi plans to apply to the High Court to have Mbalula’s actions declared defamatory.
