ANC secretary-general Fikile Mbalula has threatened to take Former African Union (AU) chairperson Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma to court unless she withdraws or provides evidence to support allegations that he paid money to delegates during the party’s 2022 elective conference.
Mbalula was speaking on Friday during the ANC’s National Executive Committee meeting in Durban.
He said his lawyers had already written to Dlamini-Zuma demanding that she either retract the allegations or substantiate them.
“There’s no political solution to charge that you have stolen money. It’s either you accept that you have stolen money, you have dished money or you clear yourself. In the future if I don’t clear myself people will say that Nkosazana once said Mbalula dished money at a conference and I kept quiet, what is a political solution to that?” he asked.
“I can’t accept that in a conference of over 5000 delegates an allegation that states that I dished out money for myself, other leader and the President to be elected. I didn’t dish out any money and that is a fact. The course of action is that the matter should be referred to integrity commission and secondly the recourse on my side is a legal route. That is my position,” he said.
The legal threat comes after Dlamini-Zuma made the remarks during an interview on the African Renaissance Podcast, while reflecting on her unsuccessful bid for the ANC presidency at the party’s 54th National Conference in 2017, where Cyril Ramaphosa was elected ANC president.
Speaking about the outcome of that leadership contest, Dlamini-Zuma said she had expected to win but was unsure what factors influenced the result.
“I thought I was going to win, but maybe money, maybe, I don’t know,” she said.
During the interview, Dlamini-Zuma said concerns about money had continued to emerge in ANC leadership contests.
She also referred to the ANC’s 55th National Conference in 2022, where Ramaphosa was re-elected party president and Mbalula was elected secretary-general.
Dlamini-Zuma alleged that money was distributed during the conference, claiming that Mbalula was involved.
“Mbalula was dishing the money in the clinic,” she said. She maintained that the alleged distribution of money was done openly.
“It wasn’t like a secret,” she said. Dlamini-Zuma said the use of money during ANC conferences was against party rules.
“As I understand, the use of money is criminal in terms of conferences of the ANC. Money was used. We all know. We all saw it. At least in 2022 we saw it,” she said.
She said the influence of money in leadership contests raised questions about the independence of elected leaders.
“Because I’ve never been bought, I don’t know how you make decisions when you were paid. In order to be where you are.
”So I don’t know how, whether you make decisions independently or you think of the money you got, I don’t know,” she said.
Mbalula has rejected the allegations, saying he did not distribute money to delegates to influence his election or the election of other ANC leaders.
In a statement on Tuesday, Mbalula said Dlamini-Zuma’s remarks had caused “deep regret” and “real disappointment”, adding that he could not allow the allegations to go unanswered.
“I Fikile Mbalula, deny these allegations in their entirety. I did not distribute money to delegates, at the facility referred to as the clinic or anywhere else, to procure my own election or the election of any other comrade, at the 55th National Conference, or the 54th National Conference, or at any conference, council or gathering of the African National Congress,” Mbalula said.
”Nothing of the sort was done by myself. I reject the allegation, and reject the proposition that the leadership of this Movement was procured with money I distributed,” said Mbalula.
He said his election at the 55th National Conference at Nasrec in December 2022 was conducted through a secret ballot process overseen by the party’s Electoral Commission.
“I was elected at the 55th National Conference at NASREC in December 2022 freely and fairly, by the delegates of the branches voting by secret ballot as Rule 12.3 of our Constitution requires,” he said.
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