South African President Zuma Says Power Struggle Undermines the Ruling ANC

South African President Jacob Zuma said that members of the ruling African National Congress who were already debating his succession in public were undermining the party.

Former Zuma backers are unlikely to support him for a second term, several newspapers have in recent weeks reported. The drop in support comes before the ANC’s National General Council policy conference, which takes place in the eastern port city of Durban from Sept. 20 to Sept. 24. The next meeting where members elect their leaders takes place in 2012.

“What has happened now, which is unfortunate, is that such utterances have come too early and it is not characteristic of the ANC,” Zuma said in an interview published in the Johannesburg-based Sunday Times newspaper today. “The ANC doesn’t do so, because if you do that too early you are in fact undermining the functioning of the ANC. It could be an indication of some weaknesses we may be having.”

Some members of the ANC, its youth wing and the Congress of South African Trade Unions, all of which helped Zuma oust former president Thabo Mbeki from the party leadership in 2007, won’t support him for a second term, the Johannesburg-based Mail & Guardian newspaper reported on Sept. 3. With the ANC winning roughly two-thirds of the vote in Africa’s largest economy, the head of the party has in the past also led to the presidency.

Criticism

Zuma’s leadership during a three-week public-sector wage strike, which has shut thousands of schools and disrupted hospitals, and perceived corruption among the political elite are some of the biggest gripes amongst leaders of the ruling alliance, the Johannesburg-based newspaper reported.

Both Cosatu and the ANC Youth League have criticized the award of a 21.4 percent right in the Sishen iron ore mine of Kumba Iron Ore Ltd., a unit of Anglo American Plc, to Imperial Crown Trading, which is in business with Zuma’s son Duduzane.

“We see children of those who are in power and friends of those who are in power accumulating more money and our people not emerging,” ANC Youth League President Julius Malema said, according to the Johannesburg-based Times newspaper on Aug. 29.

Cosatu would seek to overturn the “outrageous” deal, South African Press Association reported on Aug. 26, citing General Secretary Zwelinzima Vavi.

Zuma’s nephew, Khulubuse Zuma, has this year also won oil contracts in the Democratic Republic of Congo, amongst others.

Criticism of his family’s success in business is “unfair”, Zuma said. “They have been in business long before, more than a decade,” he said. “Why should you not do business when you are closer” to political power.

To contact the reporter on this story: Franz Wild in Johannesburg at fwild@bloomberg.net.

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