Tag: ANCYL

Zuma wants to socialise land ownership, move away from ‘will buyer, willing seller model’

Johannesburg – In terms of the Constitution, the state has to ensure that citizens are able to obtain land rights, President Jacob Zuma said at the ANC’s policy conference on Tuesday.

“Our position is that the current willing buyer, willing seller model must be reviewed,” Zuma, who is also the ANC’s president, told delegates at Gallagher Estate in Midrand.

“It tends to distort the land market through inflating the prices of land earmarked for restitution.”

Zuma said the model made land reform expensive and delayed land restitution to the poor. A wide range of proposals had been submitted to the conference.

“[This will] enable faster movement on this matter, within the confines of the Constitution and the law,” Zuma said.

The ANC Youth League wants expropriation without compensation, and said it would push for a policy change at the conference. This has caused tensions between the ANCYL and opposition parties.

The youth league also wants the nationalisation of mines.

On Tuesday, Zuma said ANC delegates had to deliberate on how the state could obtain an equitable share from mineral resources.

“The state exercises sovereignty over the entire mineral and petroleum resources within the republic,” he said.

“In the same vein, Article (2)(1) of the United Nations Charter of Economic Rights and Duties of States, grants states full permanent sovereignty, including possession and disposal over all their natural resources.”

Zuma said the country needed to go “back to the basics” and take difficult decisions that it could not take in 1994. The structure of the apartheid economy had remained largely intact, and had not allowed for higher or inclusive growth.

“We must create a thriving mixed economy, where the state, private capital, co-operative and other forms of social ownership complement each other in an integrated way to eliminate poverty and foster shared economic growth,” he said.

“To achieve inclusive and labour absorbing growth, the state must play an active role in the economy, driving development especially in neglected areas.”

– SAPA

Malema appeal postponed

The appeal hearing of three ANC Youth League leaders was postponed on Thursday, ANC national disciplinary committee of appeals (NDCA) chairman Cyril Ramaphosa said.

League president Julius Malema, spokesman Floyd Shivambu and secretary general Sindiso Magaqa were scheduled to submit their appeal presentations to the NDCA at the African National Congress headquarters at Luthuli House, Johannesburg.

Ramaphosa said the three asked for the hearing to be postponed because their lawyer was not available.

“The NDCA turned down the request and insisted on the continuation of the hearing.”

The appellants then asked for a new legal representative, and the committee agreed to this, on the condition that the new lawyer be available within an hour. Advocate Muzi Sikhakhane arrived soon afterwards, but asked for time to familiarise himself with the heads of argument, Ramaphosa said.

“The NDCA agreed to postpone the hearing with a proviso that the new legal representative will submit the appellants’ heads of argument by the 18th April 2012 in writing.”

He said the ANC would need to submit its heads of argument two days later.

“The parties have agreed that the appeal will proceed through written submissions rather than oral hearing.”

Unnamed sources told the SABC that Malema’s lawyers had not arrived for the hearing because they had not received key documents relating to the national disciplinary committee’s previous sitting, which expelled Malema.

Malema was expelled from the ANC in November 2011 for sowing division in the party and for bringing it into disrepute. He was found to have done so by unfavourably comparing the leadership style of President Jacob Zuma to that of former president Thabo Mbeki and for remarks about bringing about regime change in Botswana. He remains ANCYL president until all options to overturn his sentence have been exhausted.

Shivambu was also found guilty of sowing division and bringing the ANC into disrepute. He was suspended from the ANC for three years for swearing at a journalist and for issuing a statement calling for a change of government in Botswana.

Magaqa was suspended for three years for making derogatory remarks about Public Enterprises Minister Malusi Gigaba. This was suspended for three years on condition that he apologise to Gigaba within 15 days. Magaqa apologised to Gigaba, in a statement sent to the media, on March 10.

Last week when the ANC’s national disciplinary committee suspended Malema from the party for calling Zuma a dictator. The conditions of the suspension prohibit him from exercising any duty as an ANC member, president of the ANCYL or member of the Limpopo provincial executive committee. He would face fresh disciplinary proceedings in this matter.

The two disciplinary proceedings were separate.

The ANCYL remained defiant, with provincial leaders insisting Malema remained its president. Should Malema’s appeal fail, he could ask the ANC’s national executive committee to review the matter. Failing this, he could attempt to raise his concerns at the ANC’s elective conference in Bloemfontein later this year.

Last month, Malema said he would seek redress in the courts if he was expelled. Until then he had consistently rejected the idea of taking legal action against the ANC.

ANC spokesman Jackson Mthembu said the party frowned on its members taking it to court.

“We are against anyone who takes the ANC to court because we do have a constitution in the ANC and we abide by the constitution,” he said. – SAPA

ANC welcomes Malema’s latest suspension

No ANC member is bigger than the organisation’s constitution, the party said on Wednesday in welcoming Julius Malema’s latest suspension.

“We welcome and respect the decision as we do with all decisions arrived at by constitutional structures of the ANC,” spokesman Jackson Mthembu said in a statement.

On Wednesday the African National Congress’s national disciplinary committee (NDC) announced it had temporarily suspended ANC Youth League president Julius Malema from the party, to investigate charges relating to comments he made on Friday.

“The decision of the NDC derives from the constitution of the ANC, section 25.12 (c), which empowers the NDC and the national working committee under extraordinary circumstances, to temporarily suspend any member of the ANC with a view to investigate possible charges,” Mthembu said.

Malema’s ANC membership was suspended with immediate effect.

On Friday Malema called Zuma a dictator and accused him of suppressing the ANCYL.

“After due consideration, the NDC was satisfied that this utterance constitutes a very serious violation of the ANC constitution and that the institution of disciplinary action… as outlined in the ANC constitution is warranted,” NDC chairman Derek Hanekom said in a statement.

“[The NDC] concluded that such utterance could bring the ANC into disrepute.”

Malema was informed on Wednesday morning of his immediate temporary suspension and that disciplinary proceedings would be instituted against him.

Consequently Malema would not be allowed to exercise his duties as an ANC member, as president of the ANCYL, or member of the Limpopo ANC’s provincial executive committee, said Hanekom.

“He will not attend any meeting of the ANC or any of its structures, including the leagues, except for the purpose of the NDCA [national disciplinary committee of appeal] hearing and the pending disciplinary proceedings to be instituted against him.”

Malema would also not be allowed to address any ANC or ANCYL meeting.

“He will not make any public statement on any matter pertaining to the ANC,” said Hanekom.

Malema is appealing his expulsion from the ANC for sowing division in the party and for bringing it into disrepute. The appeal hearing is scheduled to take place on April 12.

SABC news reported on Wednesday evening that Malema had given the ANC an ultimatum to allow him to speak in public again.

ANCYL: Malema won’t go

ANC Youth League president Julius Malema will not be removed from his position by anyone but the structures of the league, his deputy Ronald Lamola said on Thursday.

“It is only the internal process of the ANCYL that can decide to elect or un-elect leadership of the ANCYL,” Lamola told reporters at Luthuli House in Johannesburg.

“The ANCYL will never agree that its leadership be subjected to unfair and unjust treatment or banished for narrow political purposes.”

At the ANCYL’s lekgotla last week, Malema said he would resign as the organisation’s president if the structures of league said he should.

“All leaders of regional, provincial and national executive committees… across the country rejected the offer of the ANCYL president to resign his position.”

Lamola said the ANCYL’s leaders would remain in place until June 2014, when its next elective conference would be held, because there was no constitutional basis on which to remove them.

He said the “foreign tradition” of trying to remove leaders of elected league structures without consent had to be “nipped in the bud”.

“If committees remove leaders of the ANCYL, they will one day appoint leaders of the ANCYL. That will be a complete undermining of the will of the people,” said Lamola.

Malema, his spokesman Floyd Shivambu and league secretary general Sandiso Magaqa did not attend the media briefing.

They were attending a hearing, also at Luthuli House, in mitigation of their suspensions.

They were found guilty, in November, of bringing the ANC into disrepute and of sowing division in the party, partly for making comments about regime change in Botswana.

Malema, who was found to have compared President Jacob Zuma unfavourably to his predecessor, Thabo Mbeki, was suspended for five years. Shivambu, who insulted a journalist, was suspended for three years.

Magaqa, who was found to have made derogatory and potentially defamatory statements about Public Enterprises Minister Malusi Gigaba, received an 18-month suspension, suspended for three years, on condition he apologise within five days of receiving the penalty or appealing against it.

Also suspended were Lamola, ANCYL treasurer general Pule Mabe and deputy secretary general Kenetswe Mosenogi.

On February 4, the ANC’s appeals committee announced it had dismissed attempts by Malema, Shivambu, Magaqa and the others to have the guilty verdicts against them overturned.

Asked whether the ANCYL was distancing itself from the ANC by not complying with its sanctions, Lamola said it was not.

“There will never be a time when the ANCYL will operate outside of the ANC. We will always be an organisation within the ANC.”

He said the ANCYL had subjected itself to the ANC’s internal processes.

It was upset that its structures, like the rest of the country, had to hear from the media about its leadership’s suspensions.

The ANC should have spoken to these structures before the announcement was made.

Lamola said all ANCYL national executive committee members had accepted at the lekgotla that the disciplinary proceedings had been politically motivated.

“There is no consistency of discipline in the ANC… there has been disrepute brought to the ANC by many amongst its leadership and there was no action that was taken,” he said.

“We believe that the ANC carries an obligation to educate and guide the ANCYL on all critical policy issues and not persecute the leadership for articulating the policy of the ANCYL.”

Malema mitigation to start

Arguments in mitigation of ANC Youth League leader Julius Malema’s suspension from the ruling party begin on Monday.

ANC spokesman Keith Khoza said proceedings would start on Monday, but could not confirm if they would be held at the party’s headquarters, Luthuli House in Johannesburg.

On Sunday, during a closed session of the ANCYL’s lekgotla, Malema told delegates he had received a letter from the committee informing him, league spokesman Floyd Shivambu and the league’s secretary general Sindiso Magaqa, that they had be at the mitigation proceedings on Monday at 8am. They were informed they would each have two hours to argue in mitigation of their sentences.

Last Saturday, the ANC’s disciplinary committee of appeals announced that attempts by Malema, Shivambu, Magaqa and three other ANCYL officials to have the guilty verdicts against them overturned were dismissed.

They were found guilty in November last year of bringing the ANC into disrepute and of sowing division in the party. – Sapa