The lawyer representing the African National Congress (ANC) branches in the OR Tambo region, Mpendulo Stoyile, has defended his clients' decision not to participate in the ANC provincial elective conference in the Eastern Cape. Stoyile says a number of branches in the region have filed papers in the High Court Mthatha challenging the integrity of the regional leadership. The branches want the provincial leadership to disband the regional leadership on the grounds that some of the members and branches that elected it were bogus. Stoyile says the legitimacy of the executive is questionable.