Gangster State

Magashule and his supporters needed the gathering to proceed in order
to formalise the province’s support for the Dlamini-Zuma slate. They
must have suspected that the court would rule against them, because
they concocted another plan to ensure that their slate got some form of
official backing from the province before Nasrec. Two days before the
judgment, the party sent out a notice that there would be a Provincial
General Council meeting in Parys the following day, Tuesday 28
November.^17 The PGC had the power to rubber-stamp the disputed
branch decisions to support Dlamini-Zuma and Magashule. According
to a former Magashule backer and erstwhile MEC in the province, this
move was vintage Ace. ‘Whenever he felt that his leadership or power
was being threatened, he convened meetings or conferences in his
hometown,’ this person told me. ‘He felt that he had more control over
things in his own backyard.’
His detractors cried foul, saying that the announcement of the PGC
had caught them off guard, and that it was a desperate attempt by
Magashule to have the Free State back the Dlamini-Zuma slate amid
the unresolved disputes. ‘This is the chair’s only path to a national
career in the ANC,’ a former provincial leader told News 24.^18
Naturally, many of the party members who supported the Ramaphosa
slate decided to boycott the PGC. Few observers were therefore
surprised when the PGC delegates overwhelmingly voted in favour of
the Dlamini-Zuma slate. Magashule received 216 votes against 36 cast
in favour of former KwaZulu-Natal premier Senzo Mchunu, the
Ramaphosa bloc’s choice for secretary-general.^19
Later developments suggest that Magashule did not view this
questionable victory as enough of a guarantee to ensure his political
future. In an apparent attempt to secure a fall-back position in case he