President Thabo Mbeki is expected to face a storm of dissent today at a meeting of ANC, Cosatu and SACP leaders in Cape Town where he is expected to announce the axing of his deputy, Jacob Zuma.

Any move against Zuma was bound to be met by strong resistance from many who have publicly spoken out against Zuma being forced out of the Cabinet.

The mood in the party and its alliance partners was tense overnight as news of Mbeki's impending announcement filtered down.

Members braced for Mbeki's announcement after more than a week of rampant speculation.

The ANC, meanwhile, tried to contain the expected fallout, denying reports of deep divisions within the party and the alliance over Zuma's fate.

Well-informed sources, who did not want to be identified because of the risk of speaking publicly on the most contentious issue to face the ANC in its modern history, said yesterday that Mbeki would encounter significant opposition during the ANC National Working Committee meeting in Cape Town, which was due to start at 11am.

However, the president is understood to be resolute.

According to senior government officials, Zuma received his marching orders at yesterday's meeting of the ANC's top six leaders in Johannesburg, after he refused to go quietly.

ANC secretary-general Kgalema Motlanthe called the meeting yesterday as Mbeki and Zuma met face to face for the first time in a week during which the deputy president toured the country in an apparent bid to show his support base and marshal backing.

A senior ANC source said the deputy president's campaigning was "problematic" because it had prompted speculation that the ANC was divided between Zuma and Mbeki supporters.

It had also created the impression that Zuma was defiantly undermining Mbeki's authority by attempting to influence the announcement he had promised to make.

But Zuma's supporters made it clear that Mbeki was in for "a huge fight", because of the perception that Zuma was the victim of a campaign to take him out of the race to succeed Mbeki.

Another senior ANC insider said it would be "most undesirable" for Mbeki to fire Zuma, but it seemed the president had little choice, since Zuma had refused to accept Mbeki's call for him to choose a dignified exit.

"It is a very serious situation - the firing of a deputy president is bound to send the wrong signal that things are not going well in the party," the source said.

Although the ANC had "very funny ways" of resolving contentious issues, this was one of the most - if not the most - serious challenges in the ANC's history.

Senior ANC insiders said Mbeki had little choice but to act firmly following the damning judgment in the trial of Schabir Shaik, Zuma's financial adviser.

Yet another senior leader said it would be preferable for Zuma to stand trial as soon as possible, so he could either be found guilty or clear his name ahead of the ANC's national conference in 2007, when Mbeki's successor is due to be elected.

It is expected that Zuma will be replaced by ANC national chairman Mosiuoa Lekota, although Foreign Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma has also been mentioned.

Jacob Zuma's axing may involve a Cabinet shuffle.

"Nothing short of charging him will do - we know what the judge said about Comrade JZ (Zuma) during the Shaik trial, but he must be given the opportunity to tell his side of the story," said the senior leader.

Lower-ranking ANC members had refused to believe Mbeki would fire Zuma, because "that's not the president's style".

Zuma was scheduled to answer questions in parliament's second chamber, the National Council of Provinces, at 2pm today.

Instead, Mbeki has asked the secretary to parliament, Zingile Dingani, to call a special joint sitting of both houses, where is expected to make the formal announcement that he has fired Zuma. Meanwhile, Mbeki spokesman Bheki Khumalo said the president would travel to Qatar as scheduled tonight.

Asked whether leaving the country in the middle of a crisis would not send the wrong message, he said: "No, it doesn't. The president is only going for a day to make a statement at Doha.

"Contrary to what the opposition would like to peddle, domestic policy is paramount for the president."

This is not the first time since the onset of democracy that the president has moved against members of his executive, but Zuma is the most senior member of government to go.

In 1995, then president Nelson Mandela fired his estranged wife, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, as deputy arts and culture minister, and a year later Bantu Holomisa lost his job as deputy environment minister in a "cabinet reshuffle".

This was followed by an ANC disciplinary process in which Holomisa was accused of bringing the ANC into disrepute after alleging that a cabinet colleague, Stella Sigcau, was guilty of corruption while she was a homeland leader.

Immediately after yesterday's meeting at Luthuli House, ANC spokesman Smuts Ngonyama issued a lengthy attack on the media and "a handful of voices within the ANC and its alliance partners".

He said they had mischievously fed journalists with reports that the party and the alliance were faltering in the wake of the Shaik judgment.

Ngonyama said: "The ANC is not - and cannot be - divided over the outcome of the Schabir Shaik trial."

With acknowledgements to Cape Argus.