Sanco says call for Mbeki 3rd term ‘to retain brains’

JOHANNESBURG – Amending the constitution to allow the South African president a third term would enable the country to keep good people in that office, and was not intended to benefit President Thabo Mbeki, Sanco said on Monday.

“It is important to underline that we are talking about an institution, not an individual,” said SA National Civic Organisation president Mlungisi Hlongwane. “We may require the expertise of a president and we may want his term extended.”It is co-incidental that we proposed these constitutional amendments to be discussed while Thabo Mbeki is president.We value the contribution he has made and it is within our school of thought that we feel our Constitution is likely to deny us one of the best brains we have.”The proposal was contained in a Sanco submission to the African Peer Review Mechanism and was being presented to the organisation’s 6,3 million members during roadshows, he said.Mbeki is currently serving his last term, expected to end in 2009.However, according to sabcnews.com, Hlongwane does not have the support of the body’s national executive committee as claimed.Dumisani Mthalane, the Sanco president in KwaZulu-Natal, said that a member simply made a comment at the organisation’s meeting in December last year that Mbeki should stand for a third term, the public broadcaster said.Hlongwane denied this and told Sapa that Mthalane had not been present at the meeting on December 16 and 17 where the resolution was taken and that he only arrived on the 18th.He said the resolution had nothing to do with the Jacob Zuma controversy, in which Sanco’s alliance partners the African National Congress, the SA Communist Party and the Congress of SA Trade Unions distance themselves from theories that Zuma is the victim of a conspiracy to prevent him from succeeding Mbeki.- Nampa-Sapa”We may require the expertise of a president and we may want his term extended.”It is co-incidental that we proposed these constitutional amendments to be discussed while Thabo Mbeki is president.We value the contribution he has made and it is within our school of thought that we feel our Constitution is likely to deny us one of the best brains we have.”The proposal was contained in a Sanco submission to the African Peer Review Mechanism and was being presented to the organisation’s 6,3 million members during roadshows, he said.Mbeki is currently serving his last term, expected to end in 2009.However, according to sabcnews.com, Hlongwane does not have the support of the body’s national executive committee as claimed.Dumisani Mthalane, the Sanco president in KwaZulu-Natal, said that a member simply made a comment at the organisation’s meeting in December last year that Mbeki should stand for a third term, the public broadcaster said.Hlongwane denied this and told Sapa that Mthalane had not been present at the meeting on December 16 and 17 where the resolution was taken and that he only arrived on the 18th.He said the resolution had nothing to do with the Jacob Zuma controversy, in which Sanco’s alliance partners the African National Congress, the SA Communist Party and the Congress of SA Trade Unions distance themselves from theories that Zuma is the victim of a conspiracy to prevent him from succeeding Mbeki. – Nampa-Sapa