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ANC's dilemma: Leadership crisis deepens as MK party threatens KZN coalition stability

ANC's dilemma: Leadership crisis deepens as MK party threatens KZN coalition stability
Chris Makhaye
By Chris Makhaye
13 Dec 2024
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The current ANC KZN leadership has been described as ‘the weakest ever’ but the party’s national leaders have postponed a decision on whether to disband it.

The sword of Democles is hanging over the six-month old KZN government of provincial unity – made up of the IFP, ANC, DA and the NFP as the MK Party continues circling around other KZN rival parties’ members, promising carrots and chocolates to those that can help it collapse this government.

About two months ago, the MK party appointed former ANC KZN premier Willies Mchunu as its KZN leader and tasked him with getting the party – which won 45% of the provincial vote – to govern the province.

The current four-party KZN government, led by Premier Thami Ntuli, has a majority of one seat in the 80-seat legislature. If any of the partners pull out, the government will fall.

Read more: KZN coalition government here to stay, differences being ironed out, insists ANC

Floyd Shiivambu, MK party general secretary, this week alluded to top-level secret talks under way to topple the KZN government and replace it with an MK party-led one.

“We are talking with several parties with a view of forming a government in KZN,” Shivambu told journalists, adding that they expected the results of these talks to bear fruit within the next few days or weeks.

According to retired academic Professor Musa Xulu, the MK party’s latest strategy was trying to convince Mbali Shinga, the NFP’s sole KZN legislature member, who is also the current KZN MEC for Social Development, to quit her post in the KZN cabinet, thus allowing the MK party to call for a vote of no confidence in Ntuli which, if successful, will force the dissolution of the KZN government.

It’s believed that the MK party then hopes it can get Mchunu elected as the premier, who would reappoint Ntuli to her old position or deploy her to another one.

NFP president Irvin Barnes has previously expressed his frustration with the coalition government. 

Read more: KZN coalition government on shaky ground as MK looks to muscle in

“It is still early days to predict whether the MK party will win in this gamble and if they win, how long would its own government last, given all the instability around that party itself? It has been shifting and changing members,” Xulu said.

We are here to stay

On Friday, KZN premier Thami Ntuli reiterated his earlier statement  that his government is here to stay and his party, the IFP, is not negotiating any deal that will see the GPU collapsed and or reconfigured.

“I have heard those rumours of talks but I am certainly not part of it. As far as I am concerned this government (the GPU) is here to stay for five years.

“I want to assure the people of this province that we are performing our duties to the best of our abilities. Every action we have taken so far is part of a well-considered plan — designed to address the immediate challenges, to build a foundation for long-term, sustainable growth. We are focused on restoring livelihoods, creating jobs, and ensuring that no community is left behind as we navigate this journey together. All the parties that form the GPU are working together for the people of KZN,” said Ntuli.

The precarious state of KZN ANC

The current state of KwaZulu-Natal ANC came into sharp focus this week, a year after former president Jacob Zuma walked away from the party, which he dubbed “the ANC of Ramaphosa”, taking with him many Zulu-speaking ANC supporters to form the uMkhonto Wesizwe (MK) party.

The MK party is preparing for its first anniversary bash on Sunday at Durban’s Moses Mabhida Stadium after a resounding success in the 29 May elections, where it won 45% of the KZN vote and became the third-largest party in the country, after the ANC and the DA, all of which came just less than six months after its formation.

Zuma enjoys strong support from KZN voters. In the first democratic election in 1994, the IFP won control of KZN with just over 50% of the provincial vote, against the ANC’s 32%.

The ANC won the province for the first time in 2004 when Zuma was the party’s deputy president. In 2014, when Zuma was president, it increased its share of the vote to 64% before dropping back to 54% in 2019 after Zuma resigned as president in 2018.

Read more: How Zuma’s MK party ruthlessly outmanoeuvred the ANC in KZN

The IFP, whose vote dropped to a low of 10% in 2014, garnered 16% in 2019 and continued to win strong support in the 2021 local government elections and recent by-elections.

The MK party was responsible for the ANC losing its national majority for the first time, declining nationally from 57% in 2019 to a paltry 40% in the 2024 vote.

In KZN, the ANC crashed from 54% in 2019 to only 17% in 2024, from the commanding height of government to being a junior partner in the KZN coalition government led by the IFP and also including the DA and the National Freedom Party (NFP). The MK party is not part of the government, despite winning the most votes.

To disband or not to disband


The ANC’s national working committee had been tasked with finding solutions in both KZN and Gauteng, where the party also shed a huge amount of votes, with some of the party’s leaders appearing to support a call to disband the leadership of the two provinces so that interim structures can begin to stop the decline.

ANC secretary-general Fikile Mbalula was widely expected to pull the trigger on one or both provinces, but the decision has been kept in abeyance, at least until after the party’s January 8 Statement.

But this matter has sharply divided the ANC camps, especially before the expected succession battle in the 2027 ANC elective conference, where Mbalula is widely expected to challenge ANC deputy president Paul Mashatile for the party’s presidency.

Read more: ‘The situation is dire,’ says Mbalula as ANC considers disbanding party’s KZN leadership

While campaigning in Pietermaritzburg before a crucial by-election this week, Mashatile reiterated his opposition to the disbandment of both the Gauteng and KZN provincial leadership. Mashatile supporters are banking on both provinces to propel him to the highest position in the party and possibly, country.

He said the party’s meetings with both provincial structures were not aimed at disbanding them, but merely to find solutions to ongoing challenges and problems.

Also, some NEC members are believed to be wary that dismissing the provincial leaderships would benefit Zuma and his MK party, who have indicated that they would welcome any member chased away from the ANC, whom they call “granny’s party”.

Attempts for comment from the KZN ANC spokesman Mafika Mndebele were unsuccessful. However, some members of the ANC in the province were speaking about these matters in public and on social media.

‘Weak leadership’


A senior ANC member in the Tolomane Mnyayiza region (South Coast), who spoke on condition of anonymity, said: “This provincial executive is the weakest ever. They didn’t have any election programme ahead of the May poll… That is why we lost so dismally.

“But other comrades are also asking what purpose would disbanding this leadership achieve when a provincial conference can be brought forward so that a new leadership can be elected early in the new year. That leadership can have a fresh mandate to take the party forward,” he said.

Read more: KZN ANC needs to replace ‘wrecking ball’ leadership as Zuma’s MK Party triumphs at polls

KZN provincial secretary of Cosatu Edwin Mkhize said the arrogance of the ANC provincial leadership was responsible for the state of the party in the province.

“We were the first one to come out in June and say that we, as alliance partners, are not given the recognition and respect we deserve. Even during the election campaign, neither Cosatu, the SACP nor Sanco in KZN were given active roles to campaign for the ANC. Neither did we see any tangible campaign from the leadership.

“So, when the results were tallied, we were very sad but not surprised. The egos of some within the leadership [were] so much up that they thought they could pull everything on there, forgetting that we are all together in this democratic revolution for the majority of the people in this country.

“We, as alliance partners, were not consulted when the ANC provincial leadership entered into the coalition government. We have been complaining about this and we did so again three weeks ago when there was a KZN provincial alliance meeting,” Mkhize said, adding that he did not want to speak about speculation of dissolving the KZN ANC provincial leadership.

Themba, Mthembu, SACP KZN secretary, was not available for comment this week as he was attending the SACP national conference, but he recently told a meeting of intellectuals that the SACP was deeply unhappy about the formation of both the GNU and its KZN incarnation.

ANC succession


Zakhele Ndlovu, an independent political analyst, said the matter of whether to disband came at the wrong time when ANC factions were flexing their muscles ahead of the next conference.

“The ANC finds itself in a huge dilemma. On the one hand it is fighting a losing battle on the ground and on the other there are those who say the entire leadership, including Ramaphosa, must take a fall for a huge drop in the electoral support.

“The KZN ANC leadership thought they could contain Zuma and the MK party and it seems they did not know the extent of the damage that Zuma and MK party were doing to the ANC support base. By the time they woke up, it was too late.

“The question now is whether you fire that leadership and start a renewal project and risk further division or you keep and allow further slide. The next few months will be crucial in knowing which direction the ANC is taking,” Ndlovu said. DM

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