Clear as mud — Inside the NFP’s high-stakes game in KwaZulu-Natal

Leaders of the lesser-known National Freedom Party (NFP) held a two-hour press conference in Durban on Friday, 9 January, but it is unclear exactly what the KwaZulu-Natal kingmakers want.

Most likely, they are horse-trading.

“We will remain in opposition until we are re-engaged by parties that want to govern KZN. We will not sell our souls this time around,” party president Ivan Barnes said.

Earlier, he told journalists: “There is no agreement between the NFP, MK party [uMkhonto Wesizwe party] and the Economic Freedom Fighters with regard to governing KZN.”

Barnes appears to have consolidated control of his fractured party, which sided with the EFF and MK in a failed bid to wrest control of the provincial legislature on 15 December.

Mbali Shinga, the NFP’s sole MPL, was the only obstacle to those three parties’ securing a majority over Government of Provincial Unity (GPU) members, led by the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) and including the African National Congress (ANC) and the Democratic Alliance (DA).

Read more: The woman who stopped the MK party’s power takeover bid in KZN

Barnes and NFP party leaders, who initially agreed to join the GPU, say Shinga has gone rogue.

They have suspended her membership for three months pending the outcome of a three-day disciplinary hearing next week.

She defied Barnes and others in her party when they ordered her to turn her back on the GPU she serves to support the MK party’s takeover bid.

‘A mighty organisation’

Flanked by NFP leaders, including acting secretary-general Sunset Xaba and deputy KZN secretary Zethembe Ngobese, Barnes denied the party had a leadership crisis.

He promised Shinga will receive a fair disciplinary hearing.

He also defended the NFP’s bid to secure positions in GPU-related deals, shedding some light on why his party wanted to leave the GPU.

The relationship soured with the ANC and IFP, particularly the latter, which he said was poaching municipal NFP councillors in Zululand municipalities.

“Our GPU partners were shaking our hands in Pietermaritzburg [in the legislature] and stabbing us in our backs in Zululand councils […] and we gave these people the premiership.”

In apparent reference to the NFP’s bid to help the MK party win control of KZN, Ngobese said: “The whole of South Africa was shaking because of our 1% [electoral support …] but they ignored us.”

Read more: Chaos in legislature as MK loses bid to control KZN

The party actually secured 0.12% of the national poll, but a fiery Ngobese said the NFP wasn’t a “puppy” prepared to run after the big dogs. “We are a mighty organisation.”

NFP leaders attributed their party’s withdrawal from the GPU to the poaching of its councillors, snubbing of its leadership and the party’s disapproval of crookery in some provincial departments.

And because the GPU was a stooge of white monopoly capital, Xaba said in a speech full of revolutionary fervour delivered ahead of media questions.

Xulu’s speech offered no details on what the party would pursue if it gained access to state power.

He said GPU was “a dictatorship with a smile” that was a cover for political elites who are cosying up to extractive mining capitalists.

Xulu was unable to name the extractive miners.

“The voices of the electorate, especially those of South African natives, the historically condemned and dispossessed, have been systematically strangled. In this province, natives vote but do not rule.”

He accused the DA of roguery and the IFP and ANC of hypocrisy.

Barnes later said the NFP intends to meet the ANC once their diaries aligned.

The NFP was willing to meet with anyone to create a government, he added.

Read more: Kingmakers, knives and numbers: The vote that could hand KZN to Zuma’s MK party

‘They’re horse-trading’

Earlier this week, the ANC’s KZN task team co-ordinator, Mike Mabuyakhulu, said he noted the NFP’s instruction to Shinga to resign from the provincial executive council.

She is MEC for social development in the GPU.

“The ANC respects the fact that the NFP has a right to make decisions about its allegiances. However, the ANC will seek bilateral engagement with the NFP […] on the wider implications of its decision, beyond the GPU,” Mabuyakhulu said.

Francois Rogers, the KZN MEC for finance and the DA leader in the legislature, said: “Barnes is horse-trading. He is waiting for an offer. That is why he isn’t saying outright that he won’t work with the GPU.

“Why suspend Mbali for three months when her disciplinary will be over in days? He’s buying himself time.

“Barnes has always been about position. When we started the GPU negotiation in June last year, Barnes arrived 1.5 hours late because he was meeting [MK party leader] Jacob Zuma before he came to us.

“Someone sent us a picture. When he arrived, he said he wanted to be the district mayor of Zululand. Everybody was taken aback and said that wasn’t on the table. The NFP claims to be about service delivery, but a political stalemate in KZN will paralyse service delivery.”

The IFP didn’t respond to a request for comment.

A GPU cabinet member who asked not to be named said: “This needs to be taken seriously. I cannot see GPU partners allowing MK to take over KZN ahead of the elections. The NFP is a small party in turmoil, but it is making the most of this crisis to fly its flag.”

In response, Barnes said: “The NFP has been labelled as many things […] including a party after positions. […] The DA joined the GPU for positions so that’s neither here nor there. All parties joined for positions."

Shinga will attend her disciplinary hearing, but doesn’t expect a fair trial.

She refuses to leave the GPU.

“I am not leaving the legislature. I was voted for by the people in KZN,” she told Daily Maverick on Friday. DM