The African National Congress (ANC) chairperson in KwaZulu-Natal Sihle Zikalala has condemned the recent killing of eight people in Richmond and Inanda.
Eight people were shot and killed at Esigcakini township in Richmond on Friday night.
In an unrelated and separate incident, six people were shot and killed at Amaoti, near Inanda, north of Durban.
Zikalala says drug-related killings need urgent intervention from the government.
“We instruct the government to confiscate firearms and deal with undocumented nationals. We must eliminate the spread of illegal firearms. We must end drugs and abuse of people rape and the dominance of the undocumented persons in the country.”
Eight people killed at a township in Richmond:
‘In-fighting’
Earlier the ANC’s provincial spokesperson Nhlakanipho Ntombela said in-fighting among its members in the Moses Mabhida Region – especially at Umngeni – is the main reason why the ANC lost the municipality to the DA during last year’s municipal elections.
Ntombela says they want to give hope to party members who may feel disillusioned.
“We had to come back and assure our members to not lose hope to them it might be a shocker now to accept that they are under DA municipality but they would have observed the processes from 2014 general elections, 2016, 2019 the signs were there that if you don’t turn the corner you might lose this municipality. So we had to come here and assure our members that the ANC is still their home.”
By-elections in KZN
Meanwhile, registration for special votes for the upcoming municipal by-elections in KwaZulu-Natal opens on Monday. The by-elections will be held in four wards in three municipalities in the province.
The posts became vacant after councillors in eThewkini and kwaNongoma were murdered just before the local government elections last year.
The IEC’s Acting electoral officer in KwaZulu-Natal, Ntombifuthi Masinga says, “The by-elections will take place in 4 wards across three municipalities in the province including eThewkini, Ukhahlamba in Bergville and kwaNongoma municipalities. All these councillors except in Bergville were actually murdered before they could even assume their seats as councillors in their municipalities. So as a result that caused a vacancy in their municipality and the municipal managers have since declared those vacancies.”
ANC Provincial chairperson Sihle Zikalala says 2021 was a challenging year for KwaZulu-Natal:
