- The uMkhonto weSizwe Party is facing a two-fold existential threat.
- The ANC approached the Electoral Court and KZN High Court to stop the MK Party from contesting the elections in colours mirroring its history and logo.
- MK Party advocates Dali Mpofu and Muzi Sikhakhane enlisted former NPA boss Nomgcobo Jiba to take on the ANC’s application.
The newly formed uMkhonto weSizwe Party is relying on two senior counsels and a former top National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) official in one of its parallel legal fights against the ANC.
They are all known for doing former president Jacob Zuma’s legal heavy lifting.
ANC secretary-general Fikile Mbalula suggested on Thursday that there was a sinister motive behind the formation of the MK Party.
“And I will explain as time goes. The truth about the MK Party is not what former president Zuma is saying, and he knows it’s not about Cyril and all of that. It’s not that and he knows what it is; he knows the truth,” he said.
The MK Party is facing an existential threat posed by the ANC’s twin court applications: one, in the Electoral Court sitting in Bloemfontein, in which the ANC wants the Zuma-endorsed political party’s registration with the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) declared null and void due to the theft of its history as it pertains to uMkhonto weSizwe.
And, two, the ANC initiated another application in the KwaZulu-Natal High Court in Durban regarding a logo dispute.
The ANC argued that the MK Party could not use the likeness of the brand of its former armed wing, uMkhonto weSizwe.
The MK Party argued in court papers that the ANC’s efforts to block its participation in the elections should be rejected by both courts.
In the Electoral Court case set for 19 March, advocates Dali Mpofu and Muzi Sikhakhane will lead the MK Party’s pushback against the ANC’s claim that its registration as a political party – approved by the IEC – was unlawful.
Mpofu and Sikhakhane will be bringing in from the cold the former deputy national director of public prosecutions, Nomgcobo Jiba.
All three lawyers gained notoriety for their proximity to Zuma, with both Mpofu and Sikhakhane playing significant roles in the former ANC president’s “Stalingrad” legal defence to corruption charges.
Jiba, dismissed by President Cyril Ramaphosa as NPA boss, returned to the courtroom as a pupil advocate in 2019.
Ramaphosa had overturned a controversial decision by Zuma to not institute an inquiry into the fitness to hold office of Jiba.
Previously slated for her close proximity to Zuma, she has largely kept out of the news since her dismissal by Ramaphosa.
In 2019, the Mokgoro Inquiry, chaired by retired Constitutional Court Judge Yvonne Mokgoro, found Jiba and the head of the Specialised Commercial Crimes Unit, advocate Lawrence Mrwebi, unfit to hold office.
Fast-forward to 2024, the pro-Zuma legal triumvirate is now preparing to come to his aid as the party he leads, the MK Party, is doing battle with the ANC.
The ANC has asked the Electoral Court to declare the IEC’s registration of the MK Party unlawful.
If the ANC succeeds, this will bar the MK Party from contesting the elections.
Mpofu, Sikhakhane, Jiba and a lawyer referred to only as P May are the legal representatives of the MK Party, whose founder, Jabulani Khumalo, filed the answering affidavit against the ANC’s application.
In court documents, Khumalo, through the four lawyers, said: “The ANC seeks to split hairs by suggesting that the letter of the deputy chief electoral officer did not include a requirement for the supplementation of the existing application. This is an untenable argument and flies in the face of the facts, logic, and the correct legal and constitutional context.”
The ANC’s application belabours the point that the IEC had sent the MK Party a rejection letter in response to its application because of an issue with the signatures required for a political party to be eligible to contest the elections, but the MK Party argued the letter sought to correct its application.
In the heads of argument, the four representatives set out Khumalo’s argument and label the ANC’s application as “misconceived, unmeritorious and should be dismissed with costs” for two counsels, preferably on a punitive scale, to indicate the court’s “displeasure” at the ANC’s “misconduct” and to discourage “similar frivolous” applications.
The MK Party said the ANC was trying to “remedy its own negligence” – for failing to object to the MK Party’s registration within the prescribed timelines – by seeking an order to set aside the IEC’s approval of the MK Party’s application to register as a political party.
“The right to form a political party is a right enshrined in Section 19 [1] of the Constitution and it is part of the broad family of political rights.
“The ANC’s misconceived and narrow interpretation does the opposite of its contention as it seeks to frustrate this very right to form a political party,” the MK Party’s lawyers said in court documents.
The Electoral Court will hear the case on 19 March.
The clash between the two parties amped up when Zuma took the role as the face of the MK Party.
The ANC first sought to downplay concern about the threat of the MK Party eroding its support, particularly in KwaZulu-Natal.
It had, however, painted a different picture in court, expressing concerns that the MK Party might confuse ANC voters.
“Will it weaken the ANC? We don’t know. Does it have influence? We don’t know.
“We do what we can, but we didn’t think in our wildest dreams we would be in KwaZulu-Natal and everywhere in the country talking about Zuma as opposed to us.
“We thought we would be the same force and in the same direction. Now, he has strengthened the hand of our opponents. He has, and he doesn’t think like that. He doesn’t see it,” said Mbalula.
The MK Party told the court it was formed last year to rescue the ANC and to be a political home for those disgruntled with the current state of the ruling party.
Mbalula said anyone who wanted to “rescue” the ANC should do so from within.
“It doesn’t work like that because you are collaborating with the enemy; you are collaborating with the opponents of the ANC.
“You can only rescue the ANC from within, if you believe that something is wrong ideologically, and has gone wrong in the ANC.
“If the ANC fails, Zuma will account for that. He would have contributed to its failure … because there are people who believe in him, and there are opportunists also who are with him, who stand to benefit with positions, patronage, and all of that.
“The era of patronage they benefitted from is over, and they think they can get it through the MK Party.
“And that is where they go in their numbers, look at them and look at their names, and that’s why there is a manifesto every weekend because there’s nobody in charge there because it is a party that was formed for a particular mission,” he said.