ANC aiming for 2.5 million members

The ANC wants to increase its membership to over 5 percent of the population to keep opposition parties at bay.

This is revealed in the organisational report ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe delivered to the more than 4 500 delegates attending the ANC elective conference in Mangaung on Sunday.

Currently, the ANC has over 1.2 million members and wants to increase that number to about 2.5 million.

Mantashe’s report says despite the party’s good performance in the elections there are signs that the party’s support has declined in some of the traditional support areas, in favour of opposition parties, especially the DA.

“Those early signs of tight competition must be a reminder that there will be a need for a bigger machinery and visible presence in all wards.

“Growing membership is a necessary step in building the necessary capacity for taking on any competition in future. A 2-million member ANC that is only 4 percent of the population has a chance of knitting together a bigger and better machinery into the future. A good party must have a membership equal to 5 percent of the population,” says the report.

Mantashe told the conference that about 14 percent of branches did not qualify to attend the conference as they were not in good standing, and most of them were from the Eastern Cape, North West and the Western Cape.

He lamented gate-keeping in the process of recruiting members, and the tendency of members who have their own members by buying membership in bulk.

Mantashe also lamented ill-discipline in the party, and suggested that the party should consider amending its constitution to bar lawyers from representing members when the party charges them for flouting its rules.

There’s also a proposal that party leaders should not be allowed to represent members when they face internal disciplinary charges “to avoid any real or perceived conflict of interest”

The decision by ANC treasurer general Mathews Phosa to represent axed ANC Youth League leader Julius Malema when he faced charges of bringing the party into disrepute in 2010 did not sit well with some leaders in the organisation. – City Press