A political analyst from the North West University said the ruling ANC is using the Presidential Imbizo to campaign ahead of the 2024 elections.

President Cyril Ramaphosa will be heading back to North West, this time in Potchefstroom, after a visit to Mahikeng in 2022. He will address residents' service delivery issues. Ramaphosa will be flanked by the Acting Premier Nono Maloyi, who has been vocal about securing investments to grow the economy.

Professor Kedibone Phango said politicians will use every opportunity now to campaign for next year's election. He called on political leaders to not only interact with communities on the basis of political expediency.

"I think they need to understand that communities are facing real problems and to really use these problems for political campaigning and political expediency should not be what we experience as a society. Issues of road infrastructure, many potholes that we see on a day-to-day basis, problems of water access for many of our communities, there is a whole range of basic problems that should not actually be problems and we know the reason that we are experiencing these problems – it's that very same political leader who has participated in squandering money and getting themselves involved in corruption. This has compromised service delivery and they really don't care," Phango slammed.

He said initiatives such as Operation Thuntsha Lerole should be commended as they really help communities. He, however, said that a bigger, sustainable provincial strategy is needed to deal with multiple challenges, not a packaged operation such as Thuntsha Lerole.

"We need to be talking a lot about local economic development initiatives that are impactful, meaningful, sustainable and can change the lives of North West people by creating employment by making economic activities viable. That should be our main focus – not just a once-off ad-hoc arrangement which we don't know when it's starting and when it's ending."

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