ANC under threat but still deaf to reason
The past week was tough for the governing party, with leaders in its ranks starting to come face to face with reality. First in line was former president Kgalema Motlanthe, who reckons the ANC is so hard of hearing that it may well need to lose the 2019 election to be able to hear the voice of its own people again.
Motlanthe argues — and I couldn’t agree with him more — that patronage has so overwhelmed the party that it will have to lose state power to shed the leeches so that those party members whose motives are pure can be left in peace to rebuild it. For this sentiment to be expressed by a former president and former secretary-general of the ANC is a terrible indictment of what was a glorious movement.
In the same week, the High Court in Pietermaritzburg laid bare what many have been talking about anecdotally and Motlanthe himself highlighted in his organisational report a decade ago in Polokwane as the party’s dirty linen — the election of office-bearers in KwaZulu-Natal, the biggest ANC region, was declared illegal. This is the province that has the most influence over who will become the next president of the ANC, given the sheer number of delegates it can send to conference. To have such a region fall foul of the law is a serious indictment.
The ANC’s national executive committee now sits with a dilemma: should it resolve the problem politically, which would rise to political compromises that could dilute the governing party’s power ahead of the elective congress, or should it seek to contest the judgment to try to legitimise a fraudulent conference?
The instability that has followed in the government in KwaZulu-Natal, and the subsequent strife over patronage, has resulted in ugly political violence and assassinations, as the Moerane Commission has heard.
This proves the point that Motlanthe is making about the extent to which fighting over resources, and in this case, state power, even at the local government level is drowning the ANC. KwaZulu-Natal is in danger of reverting to its status as a killing field, which was last seen in the pre-1994 period, when the ANC and Inkatha Freedom Party were at each other’s throats.
On top of it all, Makhosi Khoza, widely hailed as a model MP who should be emulated by other public representatives, has quit the ANC. Many people leave parties without it being seen as a sign of the times, but in the current climate, Khoza’s departure has serious ramifications, proving the point that the ANC is deaf to reason.
Despite its poor recent performance at the polls, the ANC remains complacent and refuses to listen to the voice of its people. In the midst of the loss of electoral support, it would rather protect the kind of patronage and corruption that is represented by the continued presidency of Jacob Zuma.
Finally, instead of nurturing relationships with people who could restore a semblance of dignity amid all the scandals, the governing party would rather protect individual leaders in its ranks who repeatedly show contempt for the rule of law and constitution.
All of this is happening in the shadow of 55% of the population living under the breadline. The question is, will anyone get around to tackling the triple problem of inequality, poverty and unemployment when they are done with playing internal politics? Or, as Motlanthe reckons, will the penny drop only when the ANC loses power in 2019?