Cape Town - The ANC in the Eastern Cape has asked its regional structures to carry out the verification process of qualifications of candidates for local government elections.
The provincial secretary, Lulama Ngcukayitobi, wrote to the regional secretaries to tell them they must not leave this in the hands of the province as it was creating an extra burden.
He said regions would have to conduct the verification process.
“The PEC officials and the provincial deployment committee have been confronted with a challenge of supporting documents for qualifications which have been stated next to candidates names. While some are incomplete, some are missing, and this adds an additional burden on the already overloaded provincial office to make follow-ups.
“A reminder is, therefore, issued that it is the duty of the regional deployment committees to do due diligence and background checks when it comes to qualifications of candidates. The ANC may and will subject all submitted documents on academic qualifications to a verification process,” wrote Ngcukayitobi.
The ANC has won most of the councils in the Eastern Cape.
But in Nelson Mandela Bay metro and two other municipalities, the ruling party failed to get an outright majority.
In Kou-Kamma and Dr Beyers Naude municipalities, the ANC was losing coalition partners.
The DA retained the Kouga municipality it previously won in 2016.
The ANC wants to take Nelson Mandela Bay metro back, but the DA secured more votes than them. But none of the parties received an outright majority.
The ANC has set up a team led by the head of policy Jeff Radebe to discuss coalitions with other parties in the country.
siyabonga.mkhwanazi@inl.co.za
POLITICAL BUREAU