EFF’s Vena loses chair bid

There was drama at the oneday Economic Freedom Fighters elective assembly in East London at the weekend when supporters of EFF Nelson Mandela Bay councillor Zilindile Vena walked out disgruntled.

This was after EFF provincial legislature member Yazini Tetyana emerged as the new EFF provincial chair, edging Vena by more than 160 votes.

The top five officials include former EFF co-ordinator Simcelile Rubela as treasurer, Zoleka Qotoyi as deputy secretary and Thembelani Apleni as the deputy chair.

The long-awaited provincial people’s assembly, which was meant to have convened two weeks ago, had been postponed on numerous occasions, due to an unpaid transport bill for the party’s 5th celebrations held in Mdantsane in July.

The highly contested assembly disintegrated into disarray after the announcement of the new leadership, when the losing side left the plenary proceedings.

Delivering his closing remarks, Tetyana made a veiled reference to Vena and his supporters, warning them against trying to hold the party to ransom.

“I am very unhappy with the comrades that decided to leave,” he said.

“I am not leading a faction here; we are leading a political party. We will not be held at ransom by people who want to create parallel structures. We are aware of deployees in municipalities that wanted to defy and sabotage the conference.

“They did not want to attend meetings called by the [regional command team],” Tetyana said.

National chair Dali Mpofu, who chaired most of the proceedings, said the new leadership had a huge task of garnering 150,000 to 200,000 members for the party before the national elections.

“We are saying to [new leadership] the immediate task is winning the next election.”

The lack of resources and financial constraints faced by the party were not an excuse to not achieve the targets set for the new provincial command team, he said.