Mbeki vs Zuma in 2012?

According to informed sources former president Thabo Mbeki will be running for the post of African National Congress president at the ANC’s policy and elective conferences in 2012.

Mbeki, who was replaced by current President Jacob Zuma as ANC president in December 2007 and national president in 2009, is of the view that at age 67 he still has a lot to offer both the party and the country.

The decision was prompted by certain disaffected members of the ruling party who feel that — as a committed and loyal member of the ANC for the past 54 years — Mbeki will offer the membership a clear choice between disciplined and cohesive leadership as opposed to the anything-goes approach that has been a feature of his successor’s presidency.

A prominent regional investor lamenting failure of ongoing leadership has agreed to underwrite Mbeki’s return saying that it is in the interests of the country that the experience of someone like Mbeki be brought in before the economy collapses.

“As we have Mbeki we need not concern ourselves with looking beyond him,” he said

The investor, well-known in ANC circles, has asked that his name be withheld.

In addition to Mbeki’s experience, party insiders are suggesting that his presence would ensure the return of Cope members en masse. Many of them are believed to have been upset with the manner in which Mbeki was recalled, their treatment at Polokwane and the after-effects of the 2007 elective conference.

One Cope insider advised us that they would be back in time for tea the minute they heard that Mbeki was back at the helm of the party.

Though Mbeki might be entitled to run for ANC president his success may well reopen the constitutional issue of a third term as national president. This was the cause of much of the bitterness and resentment in the past.

That, however, does not form part of his medium-term strategy, which relates only to leading the party.