Winds of change

IT APPEARS the winds of change are blowing for the ANC in the Western Cape. Yesterday the party announced that its former provincial chairperson, Ebrahim Rasool, would lead its election campaign in a bid to win back control of the province.

This may be the plan of the ANC to go back to its roots in the Cape and woo the coloured vote.

New life and renewed hope followed Cyril Ramaphosa’s election as president of the ANC and the country. Interestingly, the question must be asked whether Rasool, a former Western Cape premier, can create that same hope among voters in the province.

It’s clear the DA has its problems, and the ANC would do well to capitalise on the showdown between the DA and Cape Town mayor Patrica de Lille.

Capetonians, more particularly DA loyalists, have raised concerns about how the City is being run, given the Day Zero saga, proposed tariff hikes and ever increasing rates bills.

The ANC can learn from the past after it lost power more than a decade ago, and not lose the people’s trust.

At the press briefing yesterday, Rasool said it was crucial to win the trust of the electorate in the Western Cape. “The moment of the ANC renewal has coincided with DA implosion; it is only the ANC in our City that has kept the dignity and stability of council intact, even if it was by one vote, to save the unity from (DA-style) infighting. This is a journey for me of unfinished business; non-racialism in the province has gone to sleep.

“Since the ANC last ruled, we have seen (the return of ) words like ‘colonialism’ and ‘immigrants’.

“This is unacceptable as we need to be united,” he said. He is right. Rasool, who also served as South Africa’s ambassador to the US, may very well need to focus his campaign on unifying the people. It will definitely not be an easy ride for the ANC in the Cape, but it’s time the party put its money where its mouth is.