Chairman blasts factions in ANC
Masualle calls for a united front
Daily Dispatch
@Dispatch_DD
OUTGOING Eastern Cape ANC chairman Phumulo Masualle has decried the tendency of some party members to “cling” to factions after new leaders have been elected.
Masualle was delivering his political report to the party’s 7th provincial elective conference in Port Elizabeth this week. He labelled it the worst form of factionalism.
The conference was opened with a prayer for former president Nelson Mandela yesterday. Posters of Madiba hung on the walls. Candles were lit to bring “light in the midst of darkness”.
“When we come to conferences, we have preferences and that is normal. It is abnormal to cling to preferences held prior to the conference when conference has long passed,” said Masualle. “This has caused us a lot of harm in the past, we have to work against it going forward. It is anti-progress and therefore counterrevolutionary.”
His speech focused on discipline, unity and restoring “vibrancy” in the party’s two leagues.
“The PEC [provincial executive council], having appreciated the necessity of unity as a condition to prosperity, has campaigned vigorously for all of us to undermine and castigate divisive tendencies wherever they raise their ugly heads.
“We have wasted a lot of time and this had grave consequences for our provinces. With one solid and loud voice we should say no to gatekeeping. Our membership is said to be in decline but the truth is some comrades work hard to disenfranchise and exclude other comrades from membership. This is corruption at its best; it is counter revolutionary.”
The recent ANC audit showed how the party’s membership had dropped over the past few months. In January 2012, the province had 225 597 members. By June 2012 that figure dropped by 38 597 to 187 000. Last month the province reportedly had only 159 259 registered members.
He also raised concern about the decline of discipline in the ANC Youth League (ANCYL) admitting that the leadership “may have dropped the ball completely when it comes to the organisation and mobilisation of young people into the ANC”.
“At the height of the collapse of discipline in the leadership of the youth league,” he said, “I harboured the view that they were not entirely to blame as we, the leadership, are equally to blame, if not more.
“The ANCYL is the preparatory school of the ANC, where young, upand-coming activists are introduced to what the ANC is about.”
He said the party had “paid dearly” for failing to focus on the youth league. “It is my contention that drastic steps need to be taken to salvage the future of the movement by paying attention to the organisation of young people in the ANC.”