In an extraordinary move, ANC Chief Whip, Jackson Mthembu, has gone public and called on the ANC executive leadership to step down for having failed.
The ruling party’s Chief Whip reportedly told City Press newspaper that the governing party with its current leadership is worse than its apartheid predecessors as it lurches from one crisis to the next.
Currently the ANC is divided over the pending prosecution of Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan whose fraud case is set down on November 2.
Apparently referring to Gordhan, Mthembu slammed the use of state organs to settle political scores.
Mthembu says he’s been silent for too long, and the time has now come for the ANC to make some changes.
He warned the party might find itself in the cold in the 2019 National Government Elections.
Yesterday morning, during an interview with eNCA, Mthembu reiterated his call for the NEC to step down.
“When I said the entire ANC leadership must take the fall, I meant everybody, myself included,” he told the broadcaster. “As the #ANC leadership we must take a collective fall.”
He said the way “we are pursuing Pravin, from that angle we’re worse than the apartheid regime”.
Thembu said if he was in a faction, previous ANC stalwarts like Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu and Oliver Tambo would all be in his camp, due to government’s “indefensible” actions.