Mayor Masina never attempted to resign – ANC Ekurhuleni

Regional ANC spokesperson Sonnyboy Masinga has said there was no instance during a meeting of the regional executive council (REC) on Tuesday where their chairperson presented a resignation.

“We discussed the posts on Twitter, he never said here ‘I am resigning’. No, that never happened,” said Masinga.

This is despite some ANC Ekurhuleni members claiming Masina had attempted to step down, but that was rejected by the regional leadership.

Masina met with his REC after getting into hot water, once again, with Luthuli House over his tweets, leading to a public rebuke from the party’s headquarters.

On Monday evening, ANC spokesperson Pule Mabe released a statement chastising Masina after he agreed with EFF leader Julius Malema’s calls to allow the “white monopoly” to collapse.

After being rebuked, Masina dared the ANC to remove him as Ekurhuleni mayor, tweeting that he was ready to stand down or be isolated over the “radical policies” he promoted.

His Twitter account was disabled for a brief period and when it returned, the tweets daring the governing party to get rid of him had been deleted.

“We wanted to know which point he was coming from, he explained it, we listened and a lot of what he was saying made sense and where we differed with him, we told him,” said Masinga.

He said the REC differed with the “wholistic approach” adopted by Masina when calling for white companies to be dealt with but added it too felt the country’s economy needed transformation.

Masinga said the ANC regional chair apologised for “where he was wrong”, and was questioned about his overall approach to social media.

“But of course, we understand that some of the things are said or done in his personal capacity. It’s just when it touches on organisational positions on matters that it becomes an issue,” Masinga said.

The ANC in the province had said it is waiting to hear from the region and Masina before speaking on the matter.

This is not the first time the mayor has had a statement from ANC headquarters over some of his controversial views.

He also made headlines in 2017 when he threatened to resign if President Cyril Ramaphosa was to win the ANC’s Nasrec elective conference.

Ramaphosa is now president of both the country and the ANC, with Masina having since pledged his loyalty to him.

There had also been some confusion over the statements from the REC, with two circulating on WhatsApp groups on Tuesday evening, one slamming those who have criticised the region’s leader for attempting to elevate himself to  national discourse and claiming Masina’s views were an “afront” to the party’s own resolutions on the economy.

But Masinga denies this, saying the REC knows nothing about that statement. He says the ANC in Ekurhuleni will make a formal statement on that meeting later on Wednesday.

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