Johannesburg - The ANC NEC is drafting a letter requesting that President Jacob Zuma resign immediately, a source said on Tuesday.
This after the ANC's highest decision-making body resolved in the early hours of Tuesday morning to recall Zuma if he refuses to resign.
It was earlier reported that ANC secretary-general Ace Magashule and his deputy Jesse Duarte had on Tuesday morning again visited Zuma to brief him about the ANC national executive committee’s decision to ask him to resign within 48 hours. But the letter will reportedly give him only a few hours to respond with the ANC to brief the media at 2pm on Tuesday.
ANC national spokesperson Pule Mabe said members of the media were advised that the post NEC media briefing scheduled for 12pm on Tuesday has been rescheduled to 2pm.
“This decision is occasioned by the need to ensure that all necessary communication protocols, including direct communication to ANC structures on the NEC decision, are complied with,” Mabe said.
All eyes were on whether Zuma would heed the call from his party to quit. It is understood that on Monday night Zuma told Magashule and Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa that he would not resign. Zuma’s refusal could plunge the ANC into a quagmire.
According to the source, the ANC NEC want to an ANC-led process to remove Zuma to take place in Parliament by Wednesday or Thursday.
Opposition parties were pushing that their motion be tabled first, which would force ANC MPs to vote Zuma out with and through the initiative of their opposition counterparts.
The opposition motion would also force the ANC to defend Zuma again even when he has been told by the party’s leadership to step down.