27 March 2009

South Africans should never have trusted the ANC with "our sacrifices, dreams, hopes and the future of our children", Allen Boesak, COPE's candidate for Western Cape premier, told party supporters last night.

"Today we give notice," he told about 1 000 members, mostly women, who had gathered at the Johnson Ngwevela hall in Langa to pray for peace during the elections on April 22.

Saying the country had reached a "crucial time" for its democracy, the cleric said he had over the past 15 years realised he should not have trusted "them", the ANC.

Former deputy president Phumzile Mlambo Ngcuka and other MPs from around the country attended the meeting.

The South African Dutch Reformed Church cleric said COPE was not ashamed to acknowledge there was a higher power and only through God had South Africa survived apartheid.

"There are those who thought they could make us forget the road we went and the sacrifices we made. We never should have trusted them. But we are not ready to give up on building a genuine democracy, not now, not ever," he said to the cheering crowd.

He prayed that God would transform SA into a strong rainbow nation that would not stop fighting to see that justice prevailed.

"Too many of our people have been left on the other side of the Red Sea, slaves to poverty, but get ready for a new generation, real change - COPE is on the move," Boesak said.

Cope's presidential candidate, Mvume Dandala, said he was not surprised that the women of Cope had arranged yesterday's meeting, saying that whenever there was trouble, "mothers stand up".

"It is the mother who feels the pain the deepest and are in the business of serious transformation, claiming the vision their husbands fought and died for," he said.

Dandala urged the women to "arise, for this is the critical hour" and encouraged them to campaign peacefully.

He spoke on unemployment, social grants, education and said affirmative action was not a strategy to fight white people but was there to "level the field".

"People talk about no food on the table but I say should we not talk about those who steal food from the table? Those corrupt people need to be dealt with and as long as we have the little breath in us we will not allow South Africa to die".

Dandala said the truth was the only manner to govern effectively and vowed to deliver.

"COPE says try this and you will not be disappointed", he said.

COPE is no threat to ANC

The ANC held its own in Wednesday's by-elections in all its traditional wards, party spokesperson Jessie Duarte said on Thursday.

The African National Congress won back all of its contested wards in the by-elections held in the Eastern Cape, Western Cape, Limpopo, North West and Gauteng provinces, Duarte told reporters in Johannesburg.

Most of the 25 by-elections were held because of defections from the ANC to the Congress of the People (COPE).

There were supposed to be 34 by-elections, but only 25 were held because of disputes in nine wards.

The ANC won back all of its own wards in the four elections held in the Nelson Mandela Metro in the Eastern Cape, while it won back two of their own wards in Gauteng, where the DA also won back two of its own wards.

In Limpopo the ANC won back all four wards contested as well as all five wards contested in the North West.

All of the by-elections held in the North West were as a result of defections from the ANC to COPE, said Duarte.

"North West is important for us because the elections weren't held because somebody died there, they were held because the new opposition said they wanted to contest the ruling party in elections," she said.

Duarte said the results showed that COPE was no threat to the ANC and that COPE's election strategy was a failure.

COPE wanted to contest the by-elections as a strategy to "shake" the ANC.

"Even the results of our traditional opposition showed that COPE is not the force the media thought they would be," she said.

The DA won two of the contested wards in the Western Cape. One of which was their own, while they won a ward from the Independent Democrats.

"It was a foregone conclusion that the DA will win in the Western Cape," said Fikile Mbalula, head of the ANC's election campaign.

"It would have been very unexpected if we had won there."

Duarte said the ANC was going to fight for the Western Cape.

"We do not feel that the Western Cape should be driven back to apartheid," she said.

The IFP won back its own ward in Ulundi, the only by-election held in KwaZulu-Natal.

These results came on the same day as the announcement of the defection back to the ANC of Cope's national elections co-ordinator, Mlungisi Hlongwane, and Gauteng organiser Siphiwe Thusi.