By Michael Georgy
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South Africa's former defence minister has announced a breakaway party will be launched, splitting the ruling ANC and challenging its years of dominance.
"We are going to go and set up a party," Mosiuoa Lekota said in remarks broadcast on South Africa's SAfm radio. It would be set up at a national congress he has called for November 2, he said.
The move, which was widely expected, is likely to raise tensions in the biggest political shake-up in the 96-year history of the ANC which has ruled since the end of apartheid in 1994.
It will also raise questions about the political direction of Africa's biggest economy.
SAfm said Lekota made the announcement while addressing supporters at the Vista branch of the University of the Free State. The party will adopt its constitution at the convention, said the radio station.
Lekota, who was suspended from the ANC for threatening to form a new party, has made a wide appeal to South Africans to attend the national congress to discuss what he says are major flaws in the ANC leadership and plan future strategy.
"At the convention people must decide what they want to do with themselves. There has to be debate, what will you call it (the party)," said Lekota.
"Obviously there will be lots of names and so on. We say to the people 'you go back to your constituency and see which names, which colours, which emblems."
ANC CARDS TORN UP
Lekota, nicknamed "Terror" for his fearsome skills on the soccer pitch as a young man, was not reachable by telephone.
He resigned as defence minister after the ANC forced President Thabo Mbeki to step down following accusations of political meddling in ruling party leader Jacob Zuma's corruption case. Zuma is widely expected to become president after next year's general election.
Some analysts doubt Lekota can secure enough funding and voters to challenge the dominance of the ANC in South Africa.
Mbhazima Shilowa, the former premier of South Africa's richest province, Gauteng, resigned from the ANC and joined Lekota's campaign to change the political landscape.
Disgruntled ANC members gathered at a primary school near Cape Town on Sunday to announce they were leaving the party.
"We are here today for what we call a mass resignation. We are expecting not less than 1,000 members to be resigning from the ANC today. This is just a start," said Mbulelo Ncedana, a senior Western Cape ANC official who defected to Lekota's camp.
A Reuters correspondent at the school's packed hall saw dozens of ANC members tearing up their membership cards and tossing them into cardboard boxes. One of them was Dan Nokotywa, a member of the former liberation movement for 39 years.
Shilowa tried to stir up a crowd of about 1,200 people at the school, who were encouraged to sign membership forms for the "African National Congress of South Africa (ANCSA)."
"Those who think we are few, they are making a very serious mistake," he said.
Although the ANC still enjoys political mileage from its long fight against apartheid, some South Africans have become increasingly frustrated with party power struggles that have overshadowed crucial issues such as poverty and crime.
They may welcome a new political party, which could also comfort markets if it sticks to Mbeki's business-friendly policies as expected.
Mbeki was replaced by former trade unionist Kgalema Motlanthe, who along with Zuma, has tried to reassure investors that the economy will not veer left.
But South Africa's new political dynamics could make it difficult to read policy statements.
Investors worry that the COSATU labour federation and the Communist Party, part of the ruling alliance with the ANC, will push Zuma to switch tracks.
(Additional reporting by Wendell Roelf in Cape Town; Editing by Sami Aboudi)
