These are Cope’s premier candidates for the elections

Cope spokesperson Dennis Bloem said Kganare would visit the IEC offices and submit the names at 4pm. The IEC yesterday said political parties had until 5pm to submit their lists for both parliament and the provincial legislatures. They would also have to pay their electoral deposits or be excluded from contesting the polls.

The IEC spokesperson said parties that had not met the deadline to submit their candidates’ lists and pay the required deposit  would not be allowed to contest the May 8 election. All parties will have to come up with R605,000 if they want to contest for parliament and all nine provincial legislatures.

Cope’s media officer, Glacier Nkhwashu, confirmed that Cope had paid the full amount and the party was contesting the election at all levels.

Meanwhile, Cope president Mosiuoa Lekota on Monday announced the party’s premier candidates for the nine provinces.

He said a large number of South Africans had responded to Cope’s invitation to avail themselves to serve as its leaders. The selection of candidates was undertaken by Cope’s electoral college, which scrutinised the applications by looking at potential candidates’ experiences, qualifications and capacity to serve the nation and feedback during the process was gathered by an independent team of professionals.

Bloem was selected as premier candidate for Gauteng; former party national chairperson Pakes Dikgetsi for the Northern Cape; academic and Limpopo Cope MPL Dr Mankwana Rampedi for Limpopo; and current Cope national chairperson Teboho Loate for the Free State. Cope’s KwaZulu-Natal’s provincial secretary and women’s rights activist, Jessica Panday, is candidate for the province’s premier; Matsholo Lekgalanyane is for North West; Anthony Hall for the Western Cape; and Eastern Cape provincial chairperson Reverend Lievie Sharpley (MPL) also gets the premier nod while Ouma Mathebula will contest for the premiership of Mpumalanga.

At the weekend, Lekota unveiled Cope’s election manifesto in East London. The party is opposed to land expropriation without compensation, the amendment of section 25 of the Constitution, black economic empowerment, affirmative action and the child support grant.

But Cope promises to improve standards and access in basic services, housing, healthcare, safety, transport, childcare, sport and recreation.

They want to promote buying South African goods and introducing the Buy South African Bill in Parliament as a way to create employment.

“By promoting our services and goods we will both preserve and create jobs,” Lekota said.

“We will do our utmost as a political party to attack inequality in innovative and constructive ways so that people can have more equitable access to resources of all kinds,” Lekota added.

Through “fit-for-purpose education, mentoring, skills development and incentive schemes, where necessary, Cope would ensure that South Africans have skill sets necessary in the Fourth Industrial Revolution to find work or alternatively be self-employed.

“We will seek to enhance the curriculum, capacity, functionality and pass marks for key subjects at all our schools to ensure relevance and adequacy of the education they get. Where necessary, through public-private partnership schemes, we will offer financial support to individual learners as well as educators to excel in areas of great need in our society. We will also actively facilitate cooperation between our schools and encourage the sharing of resources and facilities between them,” Lekota said.

– ericn@citizen.co.za

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