The party that can’t decide — but could hand KZN to Zuma

The average Joe doesn’t care much about the National Freedom Party (NFP), except for the fact that the party is KwaZulu-Natal’s kingmaker that can hand provincial power to Jacob Zuma.

Last week, the NFP announced that it had sacked its sole representative in the KZN legislature, Mbali Shinga, the woman who has stood in the way of Zuma’s uMkhonto Wesizwe (MK) party taking over the province.

On 15 December , Shinga, the KZN executive council member for social development, played a pivotal role in preventing the MK party from seizing control of the legislature by casting a crucial vote against a motion of no confidence in Premier Thami Ntuli.

Shinga defied the NFP’s fractious leadership to stand with the government of provincial unity (GPU), a coalition that includes the Ntuli’s Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP), the African National Congress (ANC) and the Democratic Alliance (DA).

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It is a tenuous balance of power.

The IFP leads the GPU, which includes the ANC, the DA and the NFP, the latter represented by Shinga. Of the legislature’s 80 seats, the coalition collectively has 41. MK has 37, and the Economic Freedom Front has two.

The NFP announced last Sunday, 19 April, that it had finally expelled Shinga for defying the leadership and refusing to vote against Ntuli, which would have seen his government dissolved.

Shinga immediately appealed against her expulsion.

While Shinga is keeping mum, her lawyer, Sthembiso Mbhele, said she had raised an internal appeal. “If that is unsuccessful, we will challenge her expulsion in court.”

Asked if that meant the end of the GPU, Mbhele said: “The MEC serves at the prerogative of the premier. There are contingency plans in place. I don’t see an imminent threat to the GPU or that it would collapse if Ms Shinga’s internal appeal is unsuccessful.”

Mbhele’s view was supported by KZN DA leader Francois Rodgers, who said: “We have an excellent working relationship with Mbali Shinga. We will continue to work with her to find workable solutions to ensure the government of provincial unity stays in place because the alternative is too ghastly to contemplate.

“To our knowledge, there is no immediate threat to the government. We are in contact with Mbali and other NFP leaders. When we last had a bilateral with the NFP in February, they gave no indication of wanting to leave the GPU,” he said.

The ruling IFP isn’t being drawn on the topic, and neither is the NFP.

NFP president Ivan Barnes said the party would issue a formal statement once all internal remedies had been exhausted in Shinga’s case. He would not say where the NFP’s loyalties lay in the legislature, although he has been courted by the MK party and is said to be close to the MK’s Willies Mchunu.

There is open animosity between Barnes and Shinga.

Their tiff is representative of the NFP’s deep divisions.

In addition to Shinga’s dismissal, last week the party was in the Durban High Court to defend a leadership challenge by the NFP’s Thuba Thwala.

Thwala, a member of the party’s national working committee (NWC) who heads the party’s deployment committee, failed to secure an urgent interdict preventing the NWC from meeting.

Thwala wanted to oppose the expulsion of an NFP councillor and amendments to the party’s deployments, which he said were illegal.

Thwala’s namesake, the former secretary-general of the NFP, Teddy Thwala, described the party as “in tatters”.

“There is a leadership crisis. You can’t deny that, look at the number of court cases there are against the party.”

Teddy Thwala has an axe to grind: he has been sacked by the NFP three times and is part of a growing number of party members involved in litigation against the party’s leadership.

Barnes and Sunset Xaba, the acting secretary-general of the NFP, wouldn’t comment on the number of interdicts against the party, but one insider said NFP councillors in 60% of KZN towns had interdicts against the party.

NFP councillors in different towns are in a host of different coalitions, some with the IFP, others the ANC, and one cohort rules a municipality with the Economic Freedom Front (EFF).

For Teddy Thwala, the matter will only be settled through a policy conference to secure a real mandate from members on which way the party must go.

A previous attempt by Thwala to draw the Independent Electoral Commission into the NFP’s leadership squabbles failed when the IEC ruled that Barnes was the bona fide leader.

Thwala has been associated with the party for 10 years and was an NFP parliamentary adviser.

“The NFP can’t be blowing in the wind, where our support is determined by emotion. There has to be a solid principle that determines our stand on coalitions.”

The NFP is a splinter of the IFP, but its former leader, Zanele Magwaza-Msibi, later had a working agreement with the ANC.

Thwala said: “The critical issue here is we don’t know what we stand for other than power. The MK has a far-left ideology. The NFP is a social democratic party. We need a policy conference to determine our direction on coalitions.”

‘Chappies bubble gum’ party

The NFP’s political opponents are having a field day with its woes.

A senior opposition party in the legislature said: “The problem with the NFP’s constitution is that it was written on the back of a Chappies bubble gum wrapper.”

NFP insiders say the constitution needs to be amended to address disciplinary issues effectively. At the moment, members can only be disciplined by their local NFP branch.

Meanwhile, the MK party believes it is only a matter of time until an MK/EFF/NFP coalition takes control of KZN.

Spokesman Nhlamulo Ndhlela said: “We are relentless about governing in KZN. We are the majority party in the province. The government should reflect that. We will use every tool and legal tactic to ensure that happens. We have a rogue Speaker in the legislature who is a law unto herself. She will say that, pending the outcome of the court case, she can’t remove Shinga. […] Let’s see what happens.” DM