How belligerent elephants can be brought to heel
Western Cape ANC will mobilise around issues that affect the masses at grass-roots level
WHEN two elephants fight, we know all too well what suffers. The grass.
If we were to then extend this metaphor to the ANC, we would appreciate the idea that unless all members of the ANC heed the call of President Cyril Ramaphosa that we unite “through a cohesive programme of action that places the needs and interests of the people above all other interests”, it will only be our people on the ground who will suffer.
The January 8 statement read out by Ramaphosa reminded us that it is the ANC that remains South Africa’s most effective force for social change.
The national executive committee of the ANC insisted that our branches must be rebuilt in order to serve as centres for community development.
At the same time, integral to the mechanism to serve as an effective force for social change, is the roll-out of a mass political education campaign so as to develop our members.
At grass-roots level, local government remains at the coalface of service delivery.
It is for this reason that the ANC committed itself to ensuring that local government is strengthened particularly through the selection of candidates and the deployment of cadres.
Again, as if to highlight people at grass roots, the statement declared that there would be an intensive engagement with communities on their needs and concerns.
As the ANC in the Western Cape prepares for its own 108th celebrations, the call for unity must continue to echo throughout every corner of our province. This is mainly for two reasons.
First, the ANC in the Western Cape must fulfil its historical and constitutional mandate to serve as an effective opposition in this province.
The people voted that the ANC, at this juncture, would serve better as opposition than as a provincial government.
As an organisation with a 108 years of democratic practice, we accepted the democratic mandate of the people of the Western Cape.
Yet the message sent to the ANC from voters, particularly in the Western Cape, as in cities such as Nelson Mandela Bay, Johannesburg and Tshwane, where the ANC did not win outright majorities, was that the ANC in these places and in the Western Cape must get their house in order.
In order to win the confidence of voters again, the ANC must listen to those at grass-roots level.
Secondly, the call for unity, especially in the Western Cape, must be heeded if we desire a non-racist, non-sexist and prosperous Western Cape where all its inhabitants enjoy its prosperity.
Unless we build a united front with all progressive forces around the ideals and aspirations of the Freedom Charter, whose 65th anniversary we celebrate this year, our ideological opponents will always win the battle of hegemony in this province.
What this means to people at grassroots level is that they, too, enjoy the beaches, not only on Family Day, as our compatriots in Camps Bay and Herold’s Bay do every day of the year.
The vision of the ANC for the Western Cape remains one where the farmworker is afforded the same respect as the farm owner.
We must be able to see an end to arbitrary evictions, whether from farms or because developers are moving in, and insist on an emphasis on service delivery rather than clean audits.
Our real opponents remain those who believe that colonialism was somehow good or that life was better under apartheid.
Our real opponents remain those who continue to drive a wedge through our communities, pitting the people of Cloetesville against those of Khayamandi, or those of Thembalethu in George against those from Pacaltsdorp, also in George.
Our opponents are those who deprive the people of Mitchells Plain and Khayelitsha from participating fully in the economy of Cape Town by denying them the service of MyCiti buses, which is now in its seventh month of suspension.
Indeed, we too must question whether our opponents are in the Passenger Rail Agency of SA, given the non-functionality of the central railway line in the metro. We therefore welcome the entity being placed under administration.
The ANC will unite around the issues of our people. The challenges faced by those at grass-roots level will direct us to ensure that together we embark on this cohesive programme of action, as pointed out in the January 8 statement.
The elephants will stop fighting. We will work together to build a strong ANC, a responsive ANC and an ANC that will ensure that we give our people the better life we promised in our manifesto.
These elephants, strong and patient as they are, defeated the horrendous systems of colonialism and apartheid. Together we can and will defeat any challenge that we face today as a country and as a province. Yet we can only do so together.