Politics.za

Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu has urged Jacob Zuma to give up his pursuit of the presidency, stating:

I for one would not be able to hold my head high if a person with such supporters were to become my president…

This isn’t the first time Tutu has commented on the internal affairs of the ANC. In November 2004 Tutu and the ANC got into a war of words after he called them “unthinking, uncritical, kowtowing” yes men. At the time COSATU/SACP came out in support of Tutu’s statements.

Now that Tutu is criticising their man their response is a bit more muted. The SACP has stated that Tutu has “a right to air his views”. Even the ANCYL were suprisingly restrained with KZN leader Nhlakanipho Ntimbela saying that he was suprised but Tutu can “raise his opnions”. COSATU even used the opportunity to give themselves an out by claiming to never have actually endorsed Zuma in the first place.

This is all a bit strange I was expecting a full on attack mode response from COSATU/SACP/ANYL. Perhaps Zuma isn’t worth the effort to argue anymore?

The latest SACP central committee meeting seems to have indicated that there is a move to get rid of any SACP leaders who do not wish to throw their support in with the Zuma camp. Current SACP chairman Chales Nqakula, Ronnie Kasrils and Jeremy Cronin seem to be the ones targeted as they have all publicly stated some doubt, Cronin especially, about why the SACP must back Zuma. Expect the months leading up to the SACP national congress to be full of stories like this.

Meanwhile SACP secretary general Zwenlinzima Vavi has beefed up his bodyguard count because he believes there is a plot to assassinate him. The supposed plot against him is hilarious though:

The plot against him is three-fold. First to spread rumours that he has an affair with a married woman; secondly, to plant a woman who would later claim that she had been raped like they tried to do with (ANC deputy president Jacob) Zuma; and ultimately to assassinate him and play it out as if it was a love-triangle killing.

You really can’t make this up.

• There are still calls by some in the SACP for them to contest elections on their own ticket. Every time this comes up Jeremy Cronin gets another gray hair.
• President Mbeki has stated that the Department of Home Affairs will try to make life easier for immigrants with scarce skills. No word yet on whether resident South Africans with scarce skills will be afforded the same courtesy.
• Had an accident at work? Thanks to the example set by our own Minister of Public Enterprises Alec Erwin you can just plant that ‘Sabotage!’ seed of doubt. Who needs personal responsibility?

Jeremy Cronin has always been one of the more pragmatic members of the SACP, which is why even he admits the electoral chances of the SACP, should they split, are slim.

I don’t think [the SACP] will do particularly well out of contesting elections on its own, and I think that South Africa will be damaged seriously if our political system splinters and fragments.

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.

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.

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 on from the SACP, who were making it clear they may be splitting from the tri partite alliance, COSATU have decided to do the same thing. In a discusstion paper released yesterday in preparation for their national conference in September COSATU lists the following options:

1. Walking out of the alliance and calling on the third partner, the South African Communist Party (SACP), to contest political power or launch a working-class party. In this scenario, Cosatu would work with others to challenge the ANC in power.
2. The alliance disintegrating in the absence of a clear direction, with the ANC pushing a business agenda and Cosatu and the SACP splitting “along ideological lines and loyalty to personalities in the ANC”.
3. Continuing the tripartite alliance and Cosatu members being used as election campaigners for the ruling party.
4. Signing an enforceable pact within the alliance partners on how the alliance should operate. As in north European examples, workers would be shown the ANC’s manifesto and if the ruling party did not deliver on election promises, they would support another party.
5. Cosatu members work to influence the ANC from within the alliance and redirect it as a ruling party sympathetic to workers.

Options 1 and 2 are pretty much non-starters unless COSATU doesn’t mind being part of a two seat minority party in government. Option 4 a potential outcome with the ANC doing so to get COSATU to keep quiet, except that almost immediately after signing the ANC will once again ignore COSATU leading basically to option 3 anyway. Option 5 is what probably will be chosen despite the fact it’s been a losing strategy for COSATU since 1994.

The SACP are once again floating the idea that they might decide to go it alone in the next national elections. They will only make a firm decision at their 12th Congress in July 2007 leaving us waiting for a year to make up their minds.

At this point I would like to quote one of the 20th century’s most important philosophers:

No…try not. Do or do not. There is no try

You know I still don’t understand the SACP and their on again/maybe off again relationship with the ANC. For instance the SACP have just released a discussion report, which they claim they were working on for sex six months, dealing with the role of the state. And when the ANC dominated cabinet brushed off the report like you would a yapping maltese poodle the SACP is shocked, shocked, that the ANC does not take their views into consideration.

By know this kind of behaviour between the ANC and the SACP should not suprise anyone and it makes me wonder why the SACP even bother with the tripartite alliance. I guess they’re hoping that come 2009 the ANC will select a suitable left wing candidate as President who will take them more seriously than their current role as household pet communists, but I hope they’re not getting their hopes up.

That being said their differences with the ANC and their reluctance to go it alone is making them seem more and more like the NNP of the left when it comes to politics in that they are willing to tolerate massive ideological differences as long as they have some power.