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The ANC national executive committee (NEC) was unlikely to disband its Western Cape provincial executive committee (PEC), highly placed sources told Business Day.
The sources, who asked not to be named, are privy to the deliberations on the crisis in the province.
The governing party’s national working committee leaders visited the Western Cape at the weekend for the second time in as many weeks in an attempt to find a solution to deep divisions that threaten to tear apart Western Cape structures ahead of the ANC’s crucial December conference.
This week, ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe said a decision on whether to disband the Western Cape provincial executive had been made but would be revealed only after it was ratified by the party’s NEC on Thursday.
"We have clear views on what we want to do. But we don’t want to make pronouncements prematurely.... The focus is how do we get the power back by 2019.... We must go deep and come up with fundamental changes on a number of areas," said Mantashe.
An insider said the NEC, the majority of which is believed to be firmly behind Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa to take over as president, was against disbanding the Western Cape provincial executive.
"It is highly unlikely that they will disband the PEC … the PEC has made it clear that it wants Ramaphosa to take over… and it wants [President Jacob] Zuma to go," the insider said.
Another source said the national leaders had indicated that it would not be prudent to disband the PEC at this stage, particularly because of the growing crisis in other areas.
Disbanding the Western Cape PEC would create more chaos, the source said, amid growing infighting in other provinces, particularly in KwaZulu-Natal, an influential province within the ANC.
The infighting in the Western Cape is seen as a proxy battle in the race for the ANC presidency between the main contenders, Ramaphosa and Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma.
At the heart of the feud is the controversial decision by the provincial leaders to disband the Dullah Omar region. It is the biggest region and includes the Cape Town metro. The region is said to back Dlamini-Zuma for the presidency.
A team has since been tasked with leading the party in Cape Town until a regional executive congress is held later in 2017.
Five of the six regions in the province have called for the provincial executive to be disbanded, accusing it of imposing decisions.
Provincial secretary Faiez Jacobs declined to comment.
In June Jacobs said that the region had been disbanded because of insubordination.
The provincial executive has been accused of wanting to dictate which delegates from the Western Cape will be sent to the ANC’s elective conference in December.
The Western Cape, with 350 ANC branches, will have the second-smallest delegation after the Northern Cape.
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