Mbalula and Dlamini-Zuma meet in Johannesburg High Court over vote-buying claims

SABC News reports that ANC Secretary-General Fikile Mbalula and ANC national executive committee member Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma are meeting in the High Court in Johannesburg on Tuesday over vote-buying allegations, and the original report can be read here.

The case turns on remarks Dlamini-Zuma made on a podcast in August. According to that reporting, she said Mbalula had used money to secure his position as secretary-general, and that he had helped ensure Cyril Ramaphosa’s re-election as party president at the ANC’s 55th National Conference.

Mbalula has called the claims defamatory and false. He asked Dlamini-Zuma to withdraw them and apologise. She declined, and he then took the matter to court. She has filed an opposing affidavit rather than a retraction.

The two are therefore before a judge on Tuesday, with the secretary-general of the governing party on one side of the courtroom and a former minister and party veteran on the other.

What is actually being decided

This is a defamation matter. The question before the court is narrow. It is whether the statements were made, whether they were false, and whether they were published in a way that harmed Mbalula. It is not a commission of inquiry into how the ANC elects its leaders, and no court has been asked to set aside any conference outcome.

That distinction matters for anyone following the story from outside Luthuli House. A finding for Mbalula would not undo the 55th National Conference. A finding for Dlamini-Zuma would not establish that the allegations are true. South African defamation law asks whether a statement was false and harmful, and whether the person who made it can show it was true and in the public interest. The court is being asked to weigh those questions, not to adjudicate an election.

Why it lands where it does

For ordinary South Africans, the practical question is what a public fight between two senior figures costs the institution they both serve. The ANC governs the country. Its internal disputes consume time, attention and legal fees, and they arrive in public at a moment when the party is managing coalitions, a budget and service delivery in the metros.

There is also a plainer consequence. Defamation litigation is expensive, and it is slow. Cases of this kind can run for years through the High Court and then through appeals. Whatever the outcome, both sides will carry the cost, and the party will carry the attention.

What the public record shows is that the ANC has a process for internal disputes, and that its own constitution and disciplinary structures exist precisely for complaints between members. Mbalula chose the courts instead. That is his right. Section 34 of the Constitution guarantees access to courts, and no party rule can take that away. It is also a choice that moves an internal argument onto a public docket.

What the state has done, and what happens next

The matter is before a sitting of the High Court in Johannesburg on Tuesday. Dlamini-Zuma has filed her opposing papers. The court will hear the parties and will decide how the case proceeds, whether that is argument on the merits, a timetable for further affidavits, or a ruling on any preliminary point raised.

Both are senior figures in the governing party. Mbalula holds the secretary-general position that is the subject of the claim. Dlamini-Zuma is a former minister and a member of the party’s national executive committee. Neither has stepped back from their public roles while the case runs.

The next dated step is the court’s own: the judge’s ruling on the matter before it, and any timetable set for the case to continue. Until that ruling, the allegations remain allegations, and the court has made no finding on them.