NEC must resign: Decoding the Gigaba and Lungisa Urgent Call for Action

When two former ANCYL presidents, with a combined experience of over 60 person-years as national leaders, call for the NEC, of which they are members, to resign, it is a seismic event. This signifies a monumental shift within the NEC, which we might see the full extent of at the mooted December 2025 National General Council of the ANC. These eruptions open the muted leadership debate within the ANC, raising questions about the calibre, breed, or character of individuals needed to ensure the organisation’s survival in the current times. 

The new era, a post-Ramaphosa reality, will undoubtedly be shaped by increased multipartyism and a more diffuse state executive authority. Voters’ power will determine who is suitable to lead South Africa. The reputations of leaders or individuals within political parties will be weaponised to move voters away from established political brands. This necessitates a fresh leadership approach, one that is responsive to the changing political landscape. 

For over a century, the ANC, as a political brand, held moral high ground because of its championed cause. But after it became the governing party, it became dangerously entangled with the sins of incumbency, shifting its focus to defending the interests of its leaders and members more than the people’s. This erosion of support saw its approval drop to 40% in 2024, and polls are already projecting less than 30% overall in 2029. 

Given the integrity-impairing reports from formal commissions of enquiry, Chapter 9 institutions, and evidence-based media reports, the ANC’s leadership supply side requires a complete overhaul. Career politicians, such as Malusi Gigaba and Andile Lungisa, are finding it hard to advance their careers in a party where leadership conflicts with societal ethical expectations. ‘Innocent until proven guilty’ has become a euphemism for tolerating and defending misconduct without considering the reputational damage done to the party. 

The courage to challenge the criminal justice system, once seen as a virtue of leadership when apartheid criminalised the freedom struggle, has now been weaponised to defend post-apartheid unlawfulness. A breed of impunity has emerged that elevates the worst elements of society to the status of celebrities and leaders. 

The call from Gigaba and Lungisa urges the ANC to transform itself into an institution that rejects the worst and wrong elements of society in its leadership or aspirations. Though they may, for some reason, be unqualified to lead the charge, their conscience remains human enough to push them to pursue what is right. Their call highlights their willingness to tell uncomfortable truths, risk their careers for the right cause, take responsibility for the organisation’s mistakes, and confront themselves—including those in power. It exposes how policy dishonesty has become so persistent that it now conflicts with their core instinct of being intolerant of injustice, which is increasingly becoming an asset for a better ANC. The silence of many within their ranks will be short-lived. 

The renewal of the ANC will not occur if its members do not lead it. If none among those in leadership discuss the organisation’s challenges, it would be a sign of a movement or house without mirrors. Malusi and Andile are standing in front of the proverbial mirror. What they see in the mirror has led them to conclude that the entire NEC must resign. It is a radical proposition, which might be influenced by what they see. 

In an interview on the NEC, Gigaba laments the decline in the quality of discourse within the ANC, especially in its highest decision-making body, the National Conference. He observes that conferences have ceased to be gatherings of ideas. They are no longer platforms for establishing policy directions. He argues that they have taken on the character of leadership confirmation events and are losing the essence of the ANC’s policy hub. 

He argues that this exemplifies organisational decay and has made it unable to respond to challenges it previously could address. The centre, which, along with Andile, they agree must resign, has long ceased functioning. The spirit of truth-telling underpinning the call for the NEC to resign is already influencing leadership. 

According to him, the coalition arrangements with the DA are one of the significant political sins committed by the ANC. As it stands, the DA is positioning itself as the rescuer of an otherwise vote-shedding ANC. The challenge of selecting candidates for the upcoming municipal elections is one area where discontent signals the last chance to either rectify or press the proverbial self-destruction knob.

Discontent about the current NEC is no longer a hushed-up matter. ANC Stalwarts have been raising it, and disturbing news is that the discontent has reached senior levels of the security cluster. This context might have led to speculations of a coup by the Minister in the Presidency. 

Malusi Gigaba is a product of a profoundly nurturing ANC NEC. He lived through a Mbeki Presidency. He experienced the so-called nine wasted years and the current Ramaphosa period, which has yet to be clearly defined. He literally knows what the successive ANC NECs, including the Ramaphosa-led one, failed to do for the country to reach its current state. Andile was part of the ANCYL, whose call for renewal of the ANC, before it became fashionable, was met with disbandment and the subsequent rise of the EFF.

Both of them have the credentials to sound a call to action as drastic as the one they have made. As former ANCYL leaders, they have pointed out the ANC’s broken compass on one occasion or several times and demonstrated that it might have ignored the organisation’s actual liabilities. Their warnings might have either been fudged or outrightly concealed to let the then incumbent generation prevail.

The multiparty reconfiguration of political power has forced the RSA’s democratic and political order to enter a dramatic and unprecedented period of change. What worked when South Africa was a multi-party one-dominant-party state can no longer work. The majority of leaders still in the system would require a unique way of responding to the reality of a coalition.

Since the older generation cannot be interchangeable and easily replaced, coalitions present an opportunity to insource capability unencumbered by the traditional ANC way of doing things. This makes the call for resignation an essential mechanism for a fresher look at what is at stake. The enemy might suddenly become a critical leverage to continue influencing state power.