POWER WITHOUT RESPONSIBILITY
Where else is there a party that will not contest elections yet sits in the cabinet while holding a gun to everyone else’s head?
We really need to talk about the SA Communist Party (SACP). No, not the fact that it is probably one of the last few communist parties left in the world — most of them closed shop after the fall of the Berlin Wall. Not the fact that the SACP probably has fewer supporters than Mzwanele “Gupta” Manyi’s new political party, the profitably named ATM (as in automated teller machine, geddit?).
We need to talk about the power — and responsibilities — of the SACP, you see. Over the past week I have watched as the SACP held forth on the unbundling of Eskom, its possible privatisation and possible job losses in the process.
And I wondered: what exactly gives you the right to hold the country ransom to your demands when you won’t even contest elections so we know your strength?
Last weekend SACP secretarygeneral Blade Nzimande bellowed: “We are going to mobilise workers in the country to ensure that the unbundling of Eskom does not lead to its privatisation.
We want government to commit that privatisation does not actually happen.”
Nzimande, for those who may have forgotten, served again and again as a minister in Jacob Zuma’s cabinets. Indeed, he led the campaign to have Zuma installed as president of the
ANC and of the country.
Which all led to the nine wasted years in which Eskom was looted and destroyed.
Now Nzimande is safely ensconced in Cyril Ramaphosa’s cabinet. He sat in the cabinet meetings that discussed Eskom and came up with the unbundling plan.
And now he has the luxury of stepping out of his ministerial garb for the weekend, donning his red socks and “Made in China” T-shirt and criticising the same decision he was party to making.
Must be nice.
Back in 2017, as the Zuma train was running out of steam, Nzimande told delegates at the party’s 14th congress in Ekurhuleni that SA has a parallel state run by a “parasitic patronage network” that was sucking the people dry.
“The question is, do we have a state? What is to be done?” he asked.
This is when delegates made themselves heard. “Contest elections!” they responded.
An election is now due on May 8. You will see the pathetic ATM, the miserable PAC, the priapic ANC, the whingeing DA, the clueless EFF, the hopeless Freedom Front (and its pluses and minuses), the envious Cope and all manner of other hopefuls on the ballot paper.
They will make promises on the election trail, they will beat their chests, they will kiss babies and they will give poor old people new party T-shirts with the faces of grinning party leaders on the front.
And the SACP? It won’t be there. Instead, a party that has not contested a single election, a party whose entire politburo enjoys cushy government positions courtesy of the ANC, will be whispering revolutionary talk in the ears of the ANC’S other partner, Cosatu, to wreck the plans of the president and cabinet they have sent off to do the right thing.
It is a quite extraordinary thing. I must get those brilliant young minds at the University of Cape Town, when they are not burning paintings, to find out for me if there is anywhere in the world where a party that will not contest elections actually has cabinet ministers, makes policy and implements decisions while holding a gun to everyone else’s head. Wow. Democracy, Sacpstyle, is quite wondrous.
When Ramaphosa and his comrades finish sending the Zuma crowd to prison (it’s a tough and time-consuming task, I know) they really must turn their minds to the SACP.
Even the Chinese communists have unbundled their electricity supply utility, but our communists here in SA, drunk from their government salaries, want to block attempts to save Eskom.
Before long we will have the public sector unions abandoning their desks and taking to the streets. Teachers affiliated to the SA Democratic Teachers’ Union will be leaving children alone at schools. And the SACP will bemoan our poor economic growth.
Ho hum. You reap what you sow.