Kgalema Motlanthe is the new South African President; he was declared winner with 269 votes after a parliamentary poll to elect the new commander in chief, the result was announced this afternoon by Chief Justice Pius Langa in Cape Town.
Motlante will be president on interim basis until next year’s election.
The ANC deputy chief was deployed to Parliament to serve in the Mbeki cabinet to act as a bridge between the outgoing government and the one coming in. He was given the job of minister in the presidency, and took over from deputy president Phumzile Mlambo Ngcuka in the task of leading the government’s Parliamentary business.
Although he nailed his colours to the star of Jacob Zuma, he has been described as an independent thinker who is not afraid to speak his mind.
He is a man of compromise, so when Ebrahim Rasool was fired by the new ANC, he spotted a possible danger to the party in the Western Cape, and moved to neutralise it by appointing Rasool to his staff.
This did not go down well with the firebrands in the Zuma camp, and he has since been accused again of grooming himself to take over the presidency.
Born in 1949, the youngest of 13 children, Motlanthe was early on influenced by the revolutionary ideologies of the Black Consciousness Movement of Steve Biko. He was detained by the apartheid government in 1977 at the age of 28, the year after the Soweto uprising.
In 1967 he had been detained for 11 months for pursuing the aims of the liberation movement African National Congress. He was later sentenced to 10 years imprisonment on Robben Island.
Shortly after his release he followed Cyril Ramaphosa as secretary- general of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM). Ramaphosa became secretary-general of the ANC but in 1997, disappointed by the succession of Thabo Mbeki, Ramaphosa retired from politics. Kgalema was elected in his place.
In last year’s bitter ANC succession battle, Motlanthe featured on the lists of both Mbeki and Zuma supporters for a position in the top six to be elected at the party’s conference in Polokwane.
His political style is ponderous, and he is not a charismatic speaker, although he has a gently humorous turn of phrase, but is also known for his lengthy speeches.
He has high regard for process and consultation, and his ten years as secretary-general has given him unrivalled knowledge of the ANC way of doing things and a useful idea of where many bodies are buried.
He also earned a reputation as a grassroots worker who visited the various branches and kept in contact with ordinary rank and file members. But in his report to the conference in Polokwane, he had to frankly admit that the organisation he administered was not in a healthy state, and would need much work before being ready to face the electorate.
