JOHANNESBURG: South Africa president, Thabo Mbeki, has purged rebellious members of the African National Congress who were accused of plotting a leftwing challenge to his leadership and turning Eastern Cape into a “political disaster area”.

The ANC’s national executive annulled the results of provincial party elections in Eastern Cape amid reports that corruption and mismanagement were pushing one of the country’s poorest provinces to the brink of collapse.

The crackdown has thrown the spotlight on long-running personal rivalries and ideological tensions bedevilling the party’s effort to deliver improved services to poor South Africans eight years after it took over from the apartheid regime.

As an ANC stronghold which spawned Mr Mbeki, Nelson Mandela and Oliver Tambo, Eastern Cape is turning into a scar on its record in office, with tales of incompetence and graft emerging weekly.

A delegation from the ANC’s national executive travelled to the province last weekend to enforce the annulment of the results of the party’s Eastern Cape election on the grounds of irregularities in the vote. Until fresh elections are held next year the province will be ruled by what had been the outgoing ANC administration.

The national leadership was known to be impatient with the provincial premier, Makhenkesi Stofile, for failing to sack officials accused of milking their jobs for personal gain or not doing their jobs at all.

In a survey by the public service accountability monitor, almost half of Eastern Cape government officials said it was “not wrong” or “wrong but understandable” for them to accept gifts from the public in return for services.

Mr Mbeki’s crackdown has been portrayed as an attempt to crush the movement’s left wing, which is suspected of planning to challenge several of his allies at next month’s ANC conference.

Eastern Cape is a stronghold of the Communist party and trade unions - alliance partners of the ANC — and will send the largest delegation to the conference.—Dawn/The Guardian News Service.