Mbeki Rubbishes Talks Of The ANC Voting For Zuma Over Him Because He Was Not Friendly

Former President Thabo Mbeki addresses reports that the ANC leadership voted for Zuma over him because he was “aloof. Aloof meaning, not friendly or forthcoming. Mbeki lost to President Jacob Zuma in a bitter and controversial power struggle in 2008. He has since regularly launched thinly veiled attacks on his former rival and other leaders of the ANC and its alliance partners.Thabo Mvuyelwa Mbeki served nine years as the second post-apartheid President of South Africa from 14 June 1999 to 24 September 2008.

In his latest letter – Dare you ponder the obvious: of course Mbeki is aloof – posted on his leadership institute’s Facebook page, Mbeki wrote that, during his days as president and leading up to the fateful Polokwane conference in 2007, “the charge of being ‘aloof’ rested on the assertion that whether, intentionally or not, my very style of leadership meant that I deliberately chose to be ‘not in touch with the people’, (and the membership of the ANC), having ‘arrogated to myself the status of being the source of all wisdom’.”

Mbeki rubbished talk that he was aloof during his presidency, saying he engaged stakeholders including ordinary citizens and attended ANC and government meetings, “never standing aloof from the ANC leadership”.