Veliswa Mvenya, Eastern Cape leader of the African Transformation Movement (ATM), admits the party did not perform as well as it expected in the provincial polls.
However, the party intends to use the opportunity to build itself from the ground up and prepare for the 2021 local government elections.
In an interview with the Daily Dispatch, Mvenya, who was the new party’s premier candidate, said they were now strengthening their systems and putting measures in place to track membership.
“Our constituency’s voice will be represented well at the legislature. We are grateful to our voters. We know and we accept that it is not what we expected, but for a very new party we are grateful because this means that we have a footprint in the Eastern Cape,” Mvenya said.
She said now that the elections had passed, her party would be hitting the ground running, going from ward to ward, building from a foundation she claimed was already in place.
“We regard this as a solid foundation, because in each and every area we have votes. There’s no area we did not receive votes. This means that we will start from somewhere. It is also a good thing that we start from here.
“We are a faith-based organisation and we believe God is saying ‘Yes I agree, ATM, but let’s start from here’,” she said.
Mvenya is heading back to the provincial legislature as the ATM’s solitary MPL.
She resigned as a DA MPL last year, allegedly amid squabbles between her and party leader Athol Trollip.
She had also recently lost a provincial leadership race to now-DA provincial leader Nqaba Bhanga, who was the DA’s premier candidate.
Commenting on the fact that the party’s voters voted for the ATM in the province, but gave their national vote to other parties, Mvenya said the trend showed that voters in the province were tired of the Oscar Mabuyane-led ANC.“It tells you that ANC and other party members wanted us here more, rather than in the national assembly.“They recognise that there is a lack of service delivery in the province and that the leading party needs to be punished and taught a lesson in the Eastern Cape,” Mvenya said.Eastern Cape voters gave ATM 30,082 provincial votes and 27,935 national votes. It will be sending two MPs to the national assembly after receiving 0.44% of the total votes.siphem@dispatch.co.za..