Lungani Zungu
Violence, death threats, and vote-rigging was the order of the day at ANC councillor elections over the weekend.
In KZN and Gauteng, several meetings degenerated into chaos on Saturday and left some people with serious injuries.
Fists flew in ward 71 in Chatsworth during the local government meeting on Saturday as people clashed over who should be the candidate for the ward and police had to intervene to stop the scuffle.
Sindisiwe Ntuli was taken to hospital with a head injury after she was hit by a brick. She was discharged after receiving stitches.
Thabo Mkhize, who was present at the meeting, accused the ANC of imposing candidates they did not want.
“I blame the ANC for this. If they listened to us many of these meetings would have run smoothly. But they chose to impose people on us.”
Gunshots were fired in Umlazi’s ward 78 where people protested against the election of Bheki Mngwengwe as a candidate for the councillor position.
They want the current councillor Meltah Zuma to be the candidate at the elections.
Police were called in to separate the warring factions on Saturday evening.
“The ANC is playing with fire. We are not going to vote for the party if Mngwengwe is our ward candidate,” said one member of the community.
He accused the ANC in the province of rigging their votes in favour of some people.
The deadline for parties to submit candidates for the election is Monday.
The ConCourt has yet to make a judgement on whether the elections should be postponed or held on 27 October, as announced previously.
Nhlakanipho Ntombela, the ANC spokesperson in KZN, said he wasn’t aware of any drama around the election of ward candidates.
