ONGAMA MTIMKA | Integrity rules for ANC members could help party's renewal

If the rules announced by former president Kgalema Motlanthe are implemented, they may help the ANC to add some steam to its renewal efforts in a more genuine way than has been the case previously.

Speaking at a media briefing recently, Motlanthe outlined how the party would implement the resolution from the last conference regarding the creation of an election committee “to make rules for and manage selection of candidates for ANC public representatives, and leadership positions”.

The committee was created ahead of the local government elections in 2021, led by Motlanthe, and was partly responsible for ensuring that ward councillor candidates had wider acceptance by their communities by involving residents in the selection process, a move which caused ructions in the party as the power of gatekeepers was reduced, albeit not completely.

The rules of the elections committee come very late as far as intraparty leadership selection processes are concerned because many leaders in provinces and regions have been elected to office even though they might have failed if the rules outlined for the national elections were followed.

Even if they come very late since the 54th conference, the reforms of the election processes of the ANC seem poised to give the party a better stint in managing internal democracy and might just be what was needed to have a truly meaningful renewal exercise.

For too long, the ANC has neglected internal electoral reform at a practical level as a vital aspect of efforts to renew the organisation and has clung to archaic practices that bred all kinds of dark and undesirable practices and consequences.

One of the major takeaways from the rules is the addition of a vital step between the nomination of candidates by branches or provinces and their final acceptance by the electoral committee as eligible contestants for positions in the party. The step entails the screening of names to determine whether they qualify for leadership based on integrity and high moral standing and it ends the practice that a person nominated by branches must stand regardless of how they fair against the values of the party.

Moreover, it appears that the gatekeeping power of regional and provincial power brokers has somewhat been curbed by the introduction of the more free and open nature of running for office in the party, although this will be just over three months to the national conference.

Allowing access to the rank-and-file membership of the party for candidates to campaign freely has the potential to make ANC internal voter decisions based more on what the candidates have to offer rather than who candidates are aligned with in the region and province who may control branch voter behaviour.

A number of measures used by power brokers and gatekeepers to shield “their” delegates from the potential influence of others have been outlawed going forward along with any special treatment of delegates which might be construed as akin to vote buying.

To ensure that there is a feedback loop for accountability, a “special whistle blowing site will be set up” to encourage whistle-blowers to object to the candidature of certain contestants or presumably report any deviation from the rules, and this is very important in preventing the rise of the unscrupulous and deterring potential bending of the rules.

The new rules, procedures, and the guidelines for running internal campaigns signal a major step in a party in which majoritarianism had become tyrannical and resulted in the evasion of written guidelines regarding the calibre of leaders that are desirable to lead the party.

Through blind majoritarianism, the aspirational values enshrined in the constitution of the party, resolutions on organisational renewal in various conferences, and principles in Through the Eye of the Needle, were completely disregarded and rogues were elected to office on many occasions.

Until the national executive committee (NEC) approved the rules presented by Motlanthe at its recent sitting as he announced, the party had neglected to link its aspirational values for desirable leadership qualities to some effective criteria for qualifying or disqualifying candidates nominated for office.

Introducing qualifying criteria to determine the acceptability of candidates nominated for office was the most basic and most potentially consequential measure that should have been introduced along with the integrity commission in 2012. How this most obvious measure was not introduced earlier is completely baffling.

• Mtimka is a lecturer in the department of history and political studies at Nelson Mandela University