ANC bails out troubled child ANCYL over debts 'in the region of millions'

The ANC head office has bailed out its beleaguered child, the ANCYL, over millions of rand in debt.

The bail-out has enabled the league to convene its national elective conference, which will take place by March next year.

The admission was made by Thandi Mahambehlala, convener of the ANC national youth task team (NYTT), and its coordinator, Sibongile Besani, who briefed the media at Luthuli House on Monday.

Mahambehlala and Besani confirmed that the ANCYL, because of its failure to honour financial obligations, was placed under liquidation to the extent that the mother body has had to come in to bail them out. The parent body, they said, had since settled ANCYL debts "in the region of millions" and await a court decision on rescinding the liquidation.

The duo flatly refused to be specific about exactly how much the liquidated ANCYL owed.

However, they did confirm that the NYTT was fully bankrolled by the ANC because ANCYL funds were "frozen" owing to the liquidation.

Mahambehlala said: "Yes, we are financially capable [to organise the youth league conference]. The moment the court says [the liquidation is] rescinded, we will defrost because currently we are frozen. We will defrost and we will run smoothly."

Besani added: "Liquidation can only be rescinded by making payments, so already we have obliged to our liabilities and our lawyers are handling everything. We are confident that by the time we get to March 2020, the matter would have been resolved."

For now, the ANC coffers would finance youth league responsibilities until it regained a sound financial position.

The Collen Maine-led ANCYL national executive committee was disbanded in July by the ANC's national executive committee for failing to convene a conference for more than a year after their term of office came to an end.

This led to the formation of the NYTT, which dumped the term "ANCYL" because of the lingering liquidation.

Besani said they were confident the ANCYL would rise from the ashes once the liquidation has been rescinded.

After the NYTT met at the weekend, it took several resolutions, including a road map to the March 2020 conference.

At the meeting the NYTT decided to "correct the anomaly" of the gender imbalance in the original structure established three months ago. To this end, more women were co-opted into the structure in line with the ANC's 50/50 quota.

The co-opted lot are Gauteng MECs Mbali Hlophe and Tasneem Motara, Precious Banda, Joy Maimela, Sizophila Mkhize, Loyiso Masuku, Tlangi Mogale and Gumani Mukwevho.

Besani said the NYTT had also set the ANCYL to migrate to a new digital membership system, as is the case with the parent body. The system goes live on October 27.

The NYTT has also set itself the task to convene regional assemblies in all provinces by the end of this month.