JOHANNESBURG, FEBRUARY 5 (ANA) - President Jacob Zuma has stubbornly refused to quit as head of state and has instead dared his African Nation Congress colleagues to remove him "if they have the power to do so" media reports said on Monday.
The ruling party's top brass met Zuma on Sunday night in Pretoria, where reports say new ANC President and SA deputy president, Cyril Ramaphosa, asked the President to resign and he flatly refused to do so.
Ramaphosa took over the reigns of the ANC last month after defeating former African Union Commission Chair Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma in a closely contested election. Dlamini-Zuma is the beleaguered SA president's former wife.
Zuma's term ends in about 13 months, but pressure has been mounting for him resign amid a plethora of legal and other problems.
On 22 February Zuma, if he is still president of SA, faces a no-confidence motion in Parliament. He also faces the possibility that decade-old corruption and racketeering charges could be reinstated by the National Prosecution Authority by the end of the month.
The ANC is yet to make an official announcement on the matter, but it has called for an urgent meeting with its National Working Committee to further deal with the matter.
Meanwhile, threats of marches in support of Zuma to Luthuli House, the ANC headquarters in Johannesburg, were yet to materialise.
- African News Agency (ANA), Editing by Moses Mudzwiti
