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SA will be doomed without the ANC — Panyaza Lesufi

Nomazima Nkosi Senior reporter
ANC chair in Gauteng Panyaza Lesufi.
ANC chair in Gauteng Panyaza Lesufi.
Image: Thapelo Morebudi.

Without the ANC, SA is doomed.

This is according to ANC Gauteng provincial chairperson Panyaza Lesufi who was speaking at the party's 14th provincial conference  at the Birchwood Hotel in Boksburg at the weekend.

Lesufi opened the second leg of the provincial conference which adjourned two weeks ago because the sitting ran over the scheduled time because of delays.

“In the absence of the ANC this country will be doomed and difficult to run. We want to ensure by the time we leave this place we have an ANC that can deal with the issues, that can be trusted again by our people, that can once again make us proud,” he said.

With 19 months  to go before the general election, Lesufi said delegates had a lot of work to do  to turn around their electoral misfortunes.

“We’re left with 19 months to the next election in our province. We’re left with 19 months to prepare this movement to be attractive to our people. We're left with 19 months to put all our structures for elections, we're left with 19 months to renew our mandate and contract to our people.

“Within that 19 months there is no time to play. We’ve no time to point fingers at each other and we need a disciplined movement and disciplined members that will marshal us to victory.

“There are many people watching us here. Many people following us and looking at us and asking if the ANC will survive or if they’ll see the end of the ANC. Many wrote the obituary of the ANC and many didn’t succeed  because the ANC will remain standing, not for today but forever,” Lesufi said.

After the 2021 local government elections, the ANC lost all three major metros in Gauteng to DA-led coalitions.

The ANC lost Tshwane, City of Johannesburg and Ekurhuleni municipalities.

During the 2006 local government elections the ANC got 62.5% of votes in Gauteng and with a sharp decline in 2021, the party dropped to a humiliating 36.6% of overall votes in the province.


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