MK willing to Negotiate

 Elections 2024: MK says it will only negotiate with parties willing to give Zuma a presidential pardon

Former president, Jacob Zuma’s MK party, which is poised to become the third largest political party in the country has vowed not to negotiate with the “ANC of Ramaphosa” and would only form a coalition with like minded movements that would be willing to change the Constitution.

Nhlamulo Ndhlela, MK party spokesperson, speaking to media at the IEC’s National Results Operations Centre in Midrand said that any party wanting to negotiate with them must be prepared to change the Constitution to repeal apartheid legislation such as the Irrigation Act which currently forces government to buy water from private dam owners.

“We want to form a united front, and there's no doubt about that, right? And we will find ourselves in that position at some point, naturally. But here's the criteria (for a coalition) a are you patriotic?

“Are you progressive? Do we share the same ideologies? Are we aligned in terms of policy? Those are going to be the deciding factors in terms of how we work,” Ndhlela said.

In addition, he said that any negotiation to form a government must be pegged on giving Zuma a presidential pardon so that he can take a seat in the National Assembly and be eligible for the presidency.

Ndhlela said that he was basing this on their projections of becoming the official opposition in South Africa - despite independent projections putting the party’s national vote at around 12%.

“We will make a determination who becomes president, and whoever becomes president, he'll be told that you're going to give President Zuma a political pardon, presidential pardon, and when he gives a presidential pardon, we'll bring President Zuma back as president, so simple and we will do that even before we change the Constitution.

Despite projections that no party will win KwaZulu-Natal with an outright majority, Ndhlela said they were expecting to win the province by at least 60%.

With around 40% of the vote outstanding at 6pm on Friday, the MK party had captured 44.96% of the vote, the ANC, 18.93% and the IFP, 16.45%.

Ndhlela said brushed off speculation that if the MK party did not get over 50% of the vote, the ANC could form a coalition with the DA and IFP to run the province, saying that was hypothetical. He said MK would get 60% of the vote.