‘Radical new’ Zuma raises temperatures
Mngxitama irks Vavi, Ndletyana at ‘land’ seminar
A claim that President Jacob Zuma was now a radical, socialist-leaning leader determined to return land to blacks raised tempers at a seminar in Tshwane yesterday.
“Zuma has made a serious left turn,” Andile Mngxitama, leader of the fledgling Black First Land First (BLF) party, said at the discussion.
“What? My God!” trade unionist Zwelinzima Vavi, a fellow panellist, exclaimed at Mngxitama’s assertion.
But Mngxitama stuck to his guns, arguing fiercely that the “most important evidence” that Zuma was now radical on land was that he, in his State of the Nation Address in February, called for land expropriation without compensation.
“This is the first time ever that a president of this country says … land was stolen from black people and land must be restored to black people without paying a cent. This is the most radical statement you can ever have,” said Mngxitama.
But Vavi and Mcebisi Ndletyana, another panellist and professor at the University of Johannesburg, strongly disagreed with Mngxitama. “If there was a left-wing turn, I [and the workers] would have known about it from the ANC processes.
“We’ve read the January 8 statement, which is a statement of the national executive committee of the ANC. There’s no left wing turn there,” said Vavi.
He said there were no ideological differences between Zuma and the sacked finance minister, Pravin Gordhan.
“They’ve been driving that pro-business agenda together. That’s why we’re refusing to take sides. They are the same, the only difference is that Zuma represents crony capitalism,” Vavi said.
Ndletyana said “for anyone to say Zuma is radical is self-delusional”.
He said Zuma has betrayed black people in favour of the Guptas, who he called expatriates. The Gupta family arrived in South Africa from India in 1993.
“I even doubt the nationalist credentials of Zuma today. What he has done is a betrayal of African nationalism.
“One of the commitments [of] nationalism is to address dispossession and return the land and wealth to the indigenous people,” said Ndletyana.
‘‘ No ideological differences between Zuma and Gordhan