{"id":162373,"date":"2017-03-07T09:22:23","date_gmt":"2017-03-07T07:22:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=162373"},"modified":"2017-03-07T09:22:23","modified_gmt":"2017-03-07T07:22:23","slug":"presidential-race-could-tear-the-anc-in-two","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/162373\/presidential-race-could-tear-the-anc-in-two\/","title":{"rendered":"Presidential race could tear the ANC in two"},"content":{"rendered":"

The ANC faces a potential split after its elective conference at the end of this year, with the losing candidate possibly breaking away from the party.<\/p>\n

Speaking to Bloomberg<\/a><\/strong>, ANC deputy secretary general Jesse Duarte said that a major split of the ANC has happened after every elective conference, with Mbeki supporters forming the Congress of the People (Cope) in 2007, and the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) forming in 2012.<\/p>\n

While Cope’s support has dwindled over the years, the EFF has gone from strength to strength since it started, contributing to the continuing decline of support for the ANC, which reached its lowest point (54%) in the most recent elections.<\/p>\n

According to Duarte, despite calls from ANC leadership to shut down active campaigning, there is an intense battle for the ANC presidency going on between the two leading candidates – Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma and Cyril Ramaphosa – that could have disastrous consequences.<\/p>\n

The concern, Duarte said, is that the losing candidate and their supporters could break away from the party – which could drag the ANC’s overall support to below 50% in the 2019 national elections.<\/p>\n

The deputy SG said that the ANC needs to manage its internal elections better to avoid the current trend of slate politics. Proposals will be put forward at the party’s policy conference in June.<\/p>\n

Dlamini-Zuma and Ramaphosa have emerged as the two leading candidates for the ANC presidency, with the the former getting public support from the ANC Women’s League, and the latter getting support from Cosatu and ANC chief whip Jackson Mthembu.<\/p>\n

It is understood that Dlamini-Zuma is president Jacob Zuma’s preferred candidate.<\/p>\n

\n

Read:\u00a0Ramaphosa takes a swipe at Zuma\u2019s ANC \u2013 says it is time for change<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The ANC faces a potential split after its elective conference at the end of this year, with the losing candidate possibly breaking away from the party.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":158425,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-162373","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162373","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=162373"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162373\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":162375,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162373\/revisions\/162375"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/158425"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=162373"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=162373"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=162373"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}