The Western Cape branch of the ANC denied reports on Tuesday that its leaders turned on party secretary general Gwede Mantashe at a weekend postmortem of its election defeat in the province.

"Recent reports in the media that a Provincial Executive Committee lekgotla held over the weekend attacked the secretary general of the ANC are devoid of truth and without foundation," it said.

Embattled provincial party chairperson Mcebisi Skwatsha dismissed a report in the Cape Times as propaganda aimed at dividing the party.

"The people responsible for leaking misinformation to the media are attempting to divide the ANC and are its enemies," he said.

"There was robust engagement at the lekgotla in which the secretary general Gwede Mantashe not only participated but enriched the discussion with an inspiring address."

He said the meeting weighed the weaknesses and strengths of the ANC's election campaign and discussed ways of trying to win the province back from the Democratic Alliance.

The DA won an outright majority in the province in the April elections and the ANC netted only 31 percent of the vote.

It is the only province the ruling party lost to the opposition and has prompted considerable soul-searching and a sustained campaign to put the DA and Western Cape premier Helen Zille under pressure.

The Cape Times report said Mantashe blamed the election result on poor party leadership in the province and warned the provincial executive that it risked being dissolved.

It added that Mantashe rejected the province's call for the task team deployed to manage the ANCs' election campaign in the province to be disbanded.

Some members of the party's national executive were said to feel that Skwatsha should instead have offered to resign.

The local leadership reportedly responded by accusing the national structures of "factionalism" for failing to listen to its demands.