Tsipane’s campaign suffered a blow when Ntshalintshali took her key lobbyist head-on.
eHlanzeni ANC leader Ngrai Ngwenya or Lomdzala’s return to party structures is set to be a major boost for Premier Refilwe Mtshweni-Tsipane’s campaign for the party’s top job in December 2019.
The provincial first citizen’s campaign to take over control of the Mpumalanga ANC suffered a major blow when Lomdzala got suspended late July 2019 and was charged with acting secretary Lindiwe Ntshalintshali’s assault.
Both Tsipane and Ntshalintshali do not see eye to eye, and Ngwenya is Tsipane’s ally. The Premier’s backers in the PEC are determined that she should not report to Ntshalintshali as Ntshalintshali is an acting secretary and is also an MEC in Tsipane’s cabinet, instead Tsipane should report to acting chairman Mandla Ndlovu…
This week Wednesday Lomdzala told the 013NEWS reporter over the phone that he was “very, very happy” at being freed of all charges by the ANC’s national disciplinary committee (NDC) a week ago.
“I’m very, very happy Lomdzala,” he said, “and now I’m back in my duties,” Ngwenya said over the phone.
He added he believed his detractors were trying to bury him with the charges.
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“That’s all I can say,” he said when asked how he believed he was being targeted.
He said he will support Tsipane for the position of chairwoman.
The disciplinary committee was chaired by Mildred Oliphant and concluded the matter of the ANC vs Ngwenya and former regional treasurer Phindile Nkuna on 27 September 2019.
It found Nkuna guilty of her assault and ordered that she apologises to the ANC as well as to Ntshalintshali within 7 days.
Ngwenya told Oliphant that there was no way he could have assaulted Ntshalintshali because he was not able to reach to her during the scuffle at the Nutting House Lodge in Mbombela on the Wednesday evening of 17 July 2019.
He said there was a line of chairs in front of him on that day of the scuffle and he never picked up a single chair to hit Ntshalintshali.
Ngwenya and Nkuna had been charged by the ANC for the assault of Ntshalintshali and disrupting an ANC gathering or behaving in a manner that’s likely to cause disunity.
(edited by ZK)
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