Senior clergyman Professor Caesar Nongqunga is taking over as the new president of the African Transformation Movement (ATM) without being elected to the position because the party believes that electing its leaders instead of appointing them would harm it.
Nongqunga, the leader of the Twelve Apostles’ Church in Christ, which has over 4.5 million followers in South Africa and with footprints across the continent, is taking over the ATM presidency from Vuyolwethu Zungula, who will now only focus on parliamentary duties.
Zungula was appointed as the ATM president when it was formed and registered in 2018.
The ATM has already held several congresses, but not to elect its leaders.
“The ATM has used the system of appointment since its inception in 2018 because the system of elections, when the party is in its infancy, kills the political party,” said its spokesperson, Zama Ntshona.
He said the ATM had learnt that there would be people who would masquerade as members of the party but whose actual interest is to divide it after being elected.
“When we are going to an elective congress, they can use underhanded tactics and even hand over the party to the capitalists that fund the rise and fall of regimes.
“Therefore, we wanted to protect ourselves from those people by choosing the system of appointment,” he said.
The party, which in the 2019 and 2024 general elections obtained two seats in the national Parliament, announced on Monday that Zungula would now only be focused on parliamentary matters, while Nongqunga focused on building the party brick by brick.
Ntshona on Tuesday said that the decision to restructure party leadership was because it has not grown fast enough.
“We don’t have time anymore, time is against us,” said Ntshona.
He said that after last year’s May 29 general elections, the party went through the process of self-evaluation.
He said during this process, the party concluded that “Zungula was truly untouchable” as an exemplary parliamentarian despite having taken over the party leadership with no political background, having been a former “church boy”.
“He was able to hold a seventh-year presidency in Parliament, and he did this with distinction,” he said.
Ntshona said Zungula would now have to focus his energy on holding the government accountable for its failure to deal with social ills that are ravaging the country.
“From 2023, there were 4,500 people who were abducted for ransom in South Africa, close to 80 murders a day, and 20 million people who are subject to abject poverty, with close to 70% of the youth unemployed, and the economy is not growing.
“We have moved in the last seven years, but we have not moved significantly enough to stop all the issues that we keep raising in Parliament,” he said.
Ntshona said the party then decided to decentralise its political functions “so that we can be more effective”.
“We have fewer seats while there are more portfolios in Parliament, and we have the president (Zungula) having to bear the burden of also having to monitor the functionality and the growth of the party of which we felt like it is a bit too much.
“We said let us introduce this approach of Vuyo Zungula to continue doing that as the party leader in Parliament, while Professor Nongqunga, who is the visionary as the one who started the ATM, stops working behind the scenes,” said Ntshona.
He said everything that the party had been doing since its inception was in collaboration with Nongqunga, who, while not seen being active in the party’s affairs, worked behind the scenes from strategy to advocacy, including building houses and starting agricultural schemes for the poor.
“We are saying (Nongqunga) come out of the shadows and be on the right-hand side so that our plane can fly without any challenges because we are looking for faster growth, and the faster growth can come when we decentralise the office of the president,” said Ntshona.
With Nongqunga being a spiritual leader of millions of followers of his church coming out of the political closet, Ntshona said that would boost the party’s support base.
“We are preaching to the converted, and we are going to work hard to win them over, as it is not a guarantee that they will automatically come to us, as some of them belong to other political parties.
“As any other church members and any other individuals who do not belong to a church, if you are a South African, we are looking for you,” said Ntshona.
