Supporters of ANC veteran Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma say she will remain an National Executive Committee (NEC) member until her term ends and will then decide on her future, after she announced that she will not seek a seventh term in the country’s Parliament.
The minister wrote to her party, saying she will not be returning to Parliament after the 2024 general elections.
Dlamini Zuma’s supporters were responding to speculation linking her to the newly formed MK party, which has been galvanised with the backing of former president Jacob Zuma, her ex-husband, but they said if this was her intention she would have been forthright about it.
The MK party has been linked with ANC members, some of them senior party officials, who are said to be disillusioned with the governing party’s policies related to transformation of the economy and society.
“She is very forthright, especially in public, and if she was joining a new formation she would have said so. For now she is going into a normal retirement and she will continue to serve on the NEC until that term ends.
“She is thinking about her future and how best she can use her significant experience to serve, but she does not have to be in Parliament to do that,” a source said.
Dlamini Zuma was nominated for the ANC’s 2024 national list but wrote to the party’s electoral committee head, Kgalema Motlanthe, thanking him for the interview opportunity but indicating that she would not be participating in their upcoming interviews.
She thanked the party for the number of opportunities she had been given throughout her career.
The Minister in the Presidency responsible for women, youth and persons with disabilities remains one of the few politicians who served in Parliament under former president Nelson Mandela’s Cabinet in 1994 – the country’s first democratic administration.
Dlamini Zuma has been appointed to the Cabinets of all of the country’s five democratically elected presidents.
Between 2012 and 2017 she served as the first woman chairperson of the AU.
Her supporters said she was committed to making way for “new blood” to have an opportunity to represent the party in Parliament.
“She feels she has done all she could in Parliament and will explore other ways to put her considerable expertise to use.”
Political analyst Professor Bheki Mngomezulu said Dlamini Zuma’s decision to retire from Parliament was a wise and historical decision, saying other party members who had been there since 1994 had no intention of vacating the office.
“A number of ANC leaders are crossing to the MK party and if ultimately she joins the MK party, then there is nothing wrong with that.”
The Mercury