Politics.za

I’m heading off on a short holiday tomorrow. Posting will resume on the the 3rd of July.

Black people in SA are still poor

The ANC is reportedly about to embark on a ‘charm offensive’ program in order to regain goodwill from members and officials who are not happy with the recent infighting between the members of the tripartite alliance. Here is how the program is described:

The national executive committee (NEC) has charged ANC provincial leaders with convening “compulsory political schools” that will be held monthly for branch executives and quarterly for members of the provincial legislatures, provincial ministers and members of the ANC provincial executive committees. National ANC leaders will be deployed to the provinces to lead the debates.

“We want to re-educate members about the principles, tradition and ethos of the ANC to stop them from following individuals,” said Supra Mahumapelo, the North West ANC secretary. “When leaders go off the track, we must speak to the principle, not the individual.”

Compulsory political schools? Re-educate members? That sounds less like a charm offensive and more like the current ANC leadership doing some squashing of dissent in the ranks and weeding out of undesirables from position of power. When you consider this response the SACP received from the ANC after the SACP published their State Power from ANC high up and Mbeki ally Joel Netshitenzhe:

The [SACP] document posits an outdated proposition that South Africa could have had or should have a ‘socialist orientated’ or ‘non-capitalist’ path to socialism … this error is a consequence of a subjectivism that informs most of the treatise: great revolutionary things could have happened had it not been for the cadres who betrayed the revolution!

I wouldn’t be suprised if the ANC orients themselves even further away from the socialist bent of their (former?)tripartite allies.

I wonder if anyone in government is feeling a little bit embarassed that they had to kindly ask China to stop kicking our behind in the textile industry. China has now promised to limit it’s textile exports to South Africa.

To me this is a stop gap measure that probably won’t do much to help our industry. While this agreement limits imports into South Africa it does not help local textile producers who wish to export to other countries and who will have to compete against China in foreign markets. Industry and unions say this provides a chance for SA to upgrade it’s textile factories and provide better training for it’s workers, except that China is probably doing the exact same thing.

Following the cancellation of the broadcast of a documentary about Thabo Mbeki, reports have surfaced about further self censorship within the SABC. Business Day reports that a number of it’s columnists are no longer welcome to give their opinion on SABC current affairs and news shows according to a list drawn up by SABC News Head Snuki Zikalala. William Mervin-Gumede, author of ‘Thabo Mbeki and the Battle for the Soul of the ANC’ – a book which any SA political aficianado should read, is supposedly also persona non grata at the SABC.

Update: John Perlman, a presenter on SAFM (SABC current affairs radio station) confirmed live on air that this blacklist is in effect.

According to this report the ANC has challenged the SACP to split from the tripartite alliance and fend for itself in the SA political landscape. The ANC is asking why the SACP feels it is marginalised when senior SACP leaders are in high up positions in the cabinet and government. In it’s attack on the SACP authored paper, ‘State Power’, the ANC even question the the political chops of it’s authors:

Besides the possibility of conceitedness, this patently subjective treatment of history does pose another question about the character of the authors of the discussion document… For how long have they been in SACP ranks?

I’m calling it. 20th June 2006 – the end of the tripartite alliance. It may still persist publicly but within the SACP/ANC/COSATU group it might as well be over, there is seemingly so much bad blood and I don’t see it getting better any time soon.

Did anyone else nearly spit out their sunday morning coffee when they saw that full page ad in the Sunday Times wishing Thabo Mbeki a happy birthday? It was paid for by a group of 29 black professionals and it opened:

Mr President, in those quiet moments when the burdens of statehood threaten just for a moment to overwhelm you, we would like you to remember that you have our support and that of the overwhelming majority of our people…

After reading that I can almost picture The Chief at 2am in his Union Building office, pipe gently smoking in the ashtray, scotch on the rocks at his side with his head in his hands as the ‘burdens of statehood’ threaten to bring about another migraine. But nevertheless he will soldier on!

And did you notice this little dig at what I can only assume is the socialist wing of the tripartite alliance:

...we stand on the edge of a new society whilst the old refuses to die.

Months after the power outages at Koeberg nuclear power plant plunged the Cape into darkness no one has been found responsible for the mysterious bolt that found it’s way into the generator turbines. Until now. It seems it was…

THE FRENCH

Grab your pitchforks and torches! We can be in Paris for some ‘retribution’ by Monday evening!

The Business Day Weekender reports that the SACP has been going on a determined voter drive in order to increase their membership, perhaps before any potential split occurs. They are up to just over 40 000 members which means that if elections are held tomorrow and they manage to convince another 10 000 people to vote for them they might win a single seat in parliament. Not exactly the opposition to the ANC they would like to be?

Following their canning of the half hour documentary on Thabo Mbeki the various high ups at the SABC have been doing an absolute hilarious jig of dodging questions and producing idiotic quotes as they try and justify their decision and try to convince us that there was absolutely no political reason for it. This story in the Business Day is a veritable gold mine of idiotic quotes.

Here’s SABC CEO Dali Mpofu:

Where do you jump to the conclusion that it was political manipulation? Where do you get this notion?

Perhaps it’s from SABC3 Content Enteprises head Mvuso Mbebe:

According to sources within the broadcaster, content enterprises head Mvuso Mbebe told officials at SABC3 and in the content hub that it would be wrong to flight the film while Mbeki was still in office as the broadcaster needed to manage its relationship with the presidency.

Mpofu of course can only find the ominous ‘right-wing’ to blame for the controversy:

In SA, any student of politics will tell you that what is referred to as liberal is the political right wing.

I’m suprised he didn’t say right afterwards ”...war is peace and slavery is freedom”.

Nonsensical value-based and ideologically loaded right-wing vitriol should not be mistaken for legitimate public commentary.

Only nonsensical left wing vitriol is allowed! Not that Mpofu is a left winger or anything, he’s got some pretty sweet BEE deals going on but no doubt he’ll use it when it suits him.

Coming from a man who admitted on radio to not actually having seen the documentary before it was cancelled this quote by Mpofu is pretty idiotic:

There can be no excuse for jumping to conclusions and taking sides in a dispute without even pretending to hear the other side of that dispute.

Well I’d love to hear both sides of the dispute. Perhaps you would like to show me the documentary in question?

But the award for most idiotic quote goes to SABC Content GM Yvonne Kgame:

If you are going to be reckless and irresponsible, you might drop the Rand to nothing.

So next time you’ve got the urge to post something critical about Thabo Mbeki hold back because you might just ruin the economy.