South Africa
Free State judgment: Zuma, Magashule in emergency talks with legal team
President Jacob Zuma, Free State Premier Ace Magashule and ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe were in emergency talks on Friday night with a team of lawyers to discuss the judgment of the Constitutional Court invalidating the party’s Free State provincial conference. By RANJENI MUNUSAMY for NEWSFIRE.
Sources say the high level meeting in Bloemfontein between Zuma, Mantashe and Magashule was to discuss the implications of the judgment on the ANC’s 53rd conference starting in Mangaung on Sunday. There is no clarity in the ANC as to what the judgment means for the conference and whether Free State delegates will be able to participate and vote.
“The provincial elective conference of Free State province of the African National Congress held at Parys on 21 to 23 June 2012 and its decisions and resolutions are declared unlawful and invalid,” the court said earlier on Friday in an order read by Deputy Chief Justice Dikgang Moseneke.
The application was brought by a group of six ANC Free State members led by prominent Umkhonto we Sizwe military veteran Mpho Ramakatsa. DM
Photo by Reuters.