Lamola spells out plans for higher office
Ramaphosa detractors ‘malicious, grandstanding’
Ronald Lamola is certain that President Cyril Ramaphosa’s detractors are malicious and grandstanding when they say he has not implemented the party’s conference resolutions.
Lamola, who wants to be elected Ramaphosa’s deputy at the ANC’s conference in Nasrec next month, dismisses those who say Ramaphosa needs to go as being either wilfully ignorant or one-track minded.
“It is political opportunism and expediency so that they can sound more radical than the president whereas the president has implemented on the land issue as can be demonstrated and you can go to parliament and you will see it.
“The president has been at the forefront of implementing conference resolutions. Remember, there is a resolution on organisational renewal on corruption, the state capture commission of inquiry; that we must strengthen the NPA and the Hawks are all ANC resolutions.
“We have implemented all these resolutions, including the resolution to step aside. All these are conference resolutions which we are implanting. Maybe our sin was to implement all of them.
“Perhaps we [were] expected to only implement the one related to land and not those related to the integrity and state of the party,” said Lamola.
Lamola also insists that the current ANC leadership has gone further than even conference mandated it with regards to land expropriation.
“Nasrec said we must expropriate without compensation. It was not conference resolution that we must amend the constitution but this NEC went further and said we must amend the constitution to make this practically possible and make it explicit in the constitution.
“That could not succeed because we could not get the required two-thirds majority because the EFF did not agree with us and we did not agree with them.
“Our model for expropriation is certain identified land and not all land in the country because that will do away with the mixed form of ownership where the state owns some land, individuals have title deeds, there is freeholding and communal land.
“We have put in parliament the expropriation bill which identifies certain aspects of land that can be expropriated without compensation, which has gone through the National Assembly and it is now in the NCOP and hopefully will be concluded before the end of the year. “Secondly, we have a Land Court Bill which is also before parliament and the NCOP and will soon become law early next year. It is also part of the land resolution.
“Thirdly, the sixth administration has distributed 700,000 hectares of land countrywide, which is a commitment to the resolution on land. “We have done what conference said we must do. The conference will take stock and say where we have achieved and where we have not and what should be done.”
Even though he wants to oust current party and Republic deputy president David Mabuza, he is no hurry to replace him at the Union Buildings.
“I am prepared to wait to be appointed by the president. It is not like I will be elected in December.”
As for the conference itself, Lamola reckons it is about more than just ideas. It is about preparing to hand the baton to a generation of those who were too young to fight for freedom but have been its first beneficiaries.
This is the generation that crafted the slogan, economic freedom in our lifetime at the youth league conference in Midrand in 2011. “This is a succession conference. It is important that there is a transition from one generation to another. It is important that the younger generation must ascend and take responsibility for the future of the ANC and the future of the country.
“It is important that this generation knows that this thing will not be handed over to us. It is not like we have to wait like the king of England.
“The generation must stand up and play its role. We must gradually move from the generation that fought for freedom to a generation that became products of our democracy who are sitting in boardrooms, who are lawyers, doctors, engineers and journalists.”
He says the generation that has seen and lived the experience of this democracy can contribute to the economic reset of the country. Lamola believes the ANC can take a leaf from the Chinese Communist Party on how to groom future party leaders.
“The Chinese Communist Party identified young capable cadres and assigned them tasks to help them learn in the struggle. That will help the organisation to build a crop of capable cadres.
“When we speak of generational mix, we mean we need all generations but the dominant generation must be the younger ones. The older ones will still have a role to play in mentoring and guiding the younger cadres.”
Like the Chinese Communist Party, Lamola believes that the ANC should be discriminating about who can be allowed to be a member.
“The ANC cannot escape the reality that it has to scrutinise its membership and look into who can or cannot join the ANC. That is something the ANC will need to attend to.
“You find us having all sorts of characters, like gangsters and rapists. The ANC must be able to scrutinise. One of the resolutions for this conference is that the ANC must put systems of sifting through the applications.”
Nasrec will not only define where the ANC wants to go or look like, says Lamola. It will also determine whether the ANC has a fighting chance in the 2024 general elections.
“We all know that the integrity of the leadership plays a role in the elections. The membership should elect people who can pass through the eye of the needle.
“This means electing members who reflect the values of OR Tambo, who are selfless and contribute to the well-being of the organisation, someone who has integrity. It means someone who has put his or her skills to the disposal of the organisation.”
‘‘ We have done what the 2017 conference said we must do
‘‘ The ANC can’t escape reality that it has to scrutinise its membership