South Africa On The Zimbabwe Road?
The South African Communist Party has scored a double victory.
Their ally Jacob Zuma is new president of the African National Congress and almost certainly the next South African president.
the SACP's National chairman, Gwede Mantashe has secured the powerful post of ANC General Secretary.
The SACP now controls all the major political structures in the "new" South Africa.
From the SACP website
19 December 2007
The SACP congratulates the newly elected national officials of the ANC, led by President Zuma. We also wish to congratulate our National Chairperson, Cde Gwede Mantashe, for his election to the important position of Secretary General of the ANC. In this he follows in the footsteps of other outstanding Communist stalwarts of the past, like comrades Moses Kotane, JB Marks and Dan Tloome, who have served concurrently as officials of both the Party and ANC.
ANC delegates to this historic 52nd National Conference have voted in large numbers for change and renewal within the leading formation of our tripartite alliance. Delegates have affirmed their conviction that the ANC belongs to its membership. We congratulate these thousands of delegates for refusing to be swayed by all manner of blandishments foreign to the culture of our movement.
The SACP believes that the electoral renewal of ANC leadership provides a platform on which to rebuild our alliance around a shared programme of action. For too long, intra-alliance relationships have been marked by recriminations and stand-offs. We warmly welcome the ANC Conference commitment to holding an Alliance Summit within three months.
ANC delegates have sent a clear message, but the electoral outcome of this conference does not mean that the underlying challenges of our society have gone away – poverty, unemployment, deepening inequality. As an alliance leadership, we will be failing the hopes and aspirations of the thousands of ANC branch delegates if we do not use the new reality as a platform to address with an even greater sense of urgency and determination these realities that impact upon millions of South Africans.
The resolutions that the ANC is taking at this conference, following on the June National Policy Conference, are, therefore, as important as the leadership elections. In particular, the SACP warmly welcomes emerging policy perspectives on industrial policy, a strong developmental state, an accelerated land and agrarian reform programme, and measures to address unemployment. What is needed now is much greater determination to drive forward these transformational, progressive policy perspectives, using the state and popular organization, participation and mobilization.
The slow Zimbabweanisation of South Africa is about to accelerate.
Their ally Jacob Zuma is new president of the African National Congress and almost certainly the next South African president.
the SACP's National chairman, Gwede Mantashe has secured the powerful post of ANC General Secretary.
The SACP now controls all the major political structures in the "new" South Africa.
From the SACP website
19 December 2007
The SACP congratulates the newly elected national officials of the ANC, led by President Zuma. We also wish to congratulate our National Chairperson, Cde Gwede Mantashe, for his election to the important position of Secretary General of the ANC. In this he follows in the footsteps of other outstanding Communist stalwarts of the past, like comrades Moses Kotane, JB Marks and Dan Tloome, who have served concurrently as officials of both the Party and ANC.
ANC delegates to this historic 52nd National Conference have voted in large numbers for change and renewal within the leading formation of our tripartite alliance. Delegates have affirmed their conviction that the ANC belongs to its membership. We congratulate these thousands of delegates for refusing to be swayed by all manner of blandishments foreign to the culture of our movement.
The SACP believes that the electoral renewal of ANC leadership provides a platform on which to rebuild our alliance around a shared programme of action. For too long, intra-alliance relationships have been marked by recriminations and stand-offs. We warmly welcome the ANC Conference commitment to holding an Alliance Summit within three months.
ANC delegates have sent a clear message, but the electoral outcome of this conference does not mean that the underlying challenges of our society have gone away – poverty, unemployment, deepening inequality. As an alliance leadership, we will be failing the hopes and aspirations of the thousands of ANC branch delegates if we do not use the new reality as a platform to address with an even greater sense of urgency and determination these realities that impact upon millions of South Africans.
The resolutions that the ANC is taking at this conference, following on the June National Policy Conference, are, therefore, as important as the leadership elections. In particular, the SACP warmly welcomes emerging policy perspectives on industrial policy, a strong developmental state, an accelerated land and agrarian reform programme, and measures to address unemployment. What is needed now is much greater determination to drive forward these transformational, progressive policy perspectives, using the state and popular organization, participation and mobilization.
The slow Zimbabweanisation of South Africa is about to accelerate.
posted by Trevor Loudon at
12/20/2007 11:00:00 PM
1 Comments:
News flash: Minto has woken up!
Activist rejects top SA award
28/01/2008 09:12 - (SA)
Wellington - A veteran New Zealand anti-apartheid campaigner has rejected a nomination for a prestigious South African award for foreigners, saying he is dismayed over conditions in the country, local media reported on Monday.
John Minto, nominated for a Companion of OR Tambo Award by a South African government official, asked for the nomination to be withdrawn, the Christchurch Press newspaper said.
"(South Africa) was the democratic country with so much hope and I think for so many people it's been the deepest of disappointments, and certainly it has been for me," Minto said.
"I'm just deeply dismayed at what's happened," he told the newspaper.
The Tambo award is the highest honour granted non-South Africans in recognition of friendship, co-operation and support.
Previous recipients include Mahatma Gandhi, Kofi Annan, Salvador Allende and Martin Luther King jnr.
A union organiser, Minto was national coordinator of the Halt All Racist Tours movement during the controversial 1981 Springbok rugby tour of New Zealand - when an all-white rugby team representing South Africa was strongly opposed by many New Zealanders.
Black South Africans worse off
In an open letter to South African President Thabo Mbeki, Minto blasted the African National Congress government which, he said, had left black South Africans "worse off than they were under (white) minority rule".
"When we protested and marched into police batons and barbed wire here in the struggle against apartheid, we were not fighting for a small black elite to become millionaires," Minto wrote.
"We were fighting for a better South Africa for all its citizens. The faces at the top have changed from white to black but the substance of change is an illusion," he noted.
Source:News24
http://www.news24.com/News24/South_Africa/News/0,,2-7-1442_2259759,00.html
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