South Africa's ruling African National Congress (ANC) opened a conference yesterday to elect its new party leader, who is likely to succeed President Thabo Mbeki when he leaves office in 2009.
Mbeki, seeking his third term as leader of the ANC, faces stiff competition from ANC Deputy President Jacob Zuma in a race that has split the party, which has ruled South Africa since the end of apartheid in 1994.
Some delegates at the five-day conference booed Mbeki's ministers and aides and cheered Zuma supporters as they arrived.
The ANC said it would release the result of the vote for party leader today, with voting started yesterday.
Mbeki, who took over the party from Nelson Mandela in 1997 and then the country two years later, defended his record and criticized some party members who he said used dishonesty and lies to achieve their goals.
"This is the practice that again is entirely foreign to our movement, the practice of using untruths, of resorting to dishonest means and deceit to achieve particular goals," he said.
Mbeki is barred from a third term as state president but can be re-elected ANC president, which would give him a big say over who becomes the presidential candidate in 2009.
If Zuma wins the leadership race, he is almost certain to become South African president in 2009.
A populist who was fired by Mbeki after being linked to a corruption scandal, Zuma is going into the leadership vote with a significant lead, having secured nearly double Mbeki's party branch nominations in the lead-up to the conference.
A rape trial in which he was acquitted in 2006 has often overshadowed his status as a hero in the ANC's anti-apartheid struggle, which included 10 years at Robben Island prison with Mandela.
And Zuma, 65, may be recharged for bribery and fraud in connection with a multi-billion dollar arms deal. But many poor South Africans regard him as a man of the people who can ease hardships in townships, which are glaring reminders of white minority rule.
He has been endorsed by the powerful Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), which is a formal governing alliance with the ANC.
Members of the South African Communist Party, also in the governing coalition, have thrown their support behind Zuma, with many saying he would tilt the country to the left.
Source:China Daily/Agencies
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