ANC treasurer-general Zweli Mkhize believes that the party will survive its December elective conference unscathed‚ despite factional battles over who should take over as party president.
“Insofar as there are concerns about ensuring that we correct the wrongs and weaknesses of the organisation and also to ensure that we rebuild the trust and confidence of our people‚ I agree with that.
But to say the ANC is at the edge of the cliff‚ we disagree with that. We will fix the ANC‚” said Mkhize.
“When we emerge at the end of December‚ we will emerge with a strong and united African National Congress that will be worth reinvigorating the trust and energy of all our people and we will be able to move forward.
“Whatever challenges that we are going through now‚ we all understand them but we are also working on the solutions to make sure that the African National Congress is part and parcel of this alliance with a stronger leadership of society‚” said Mkhize.
Mkhize was speaking on the sidelines on day two of the SACP’s national congress.
However‚ during the delivery of his political report earlier‚ SACP leader Blade Nzimande said the ruling party had no appetite to rescue itself from its current state as divisions kept getting deeper and deeper.
“What state capture is doing is corrupting our organisations money-based factionalism because there is mutual dependence between these parasites (Guptas) and factions in our movement who want to capture our organisations and deliver them to these parasites so that they accumulate and bring back money to drive factionalism in our democratic revolution‚” said Nzimande.
“The internal crisis facing the ANC has begun to impact on its electoral performance with a very steep decline in support‚ much of it due to a voter stay-away…If the current trajectory is not reversed‚ the ANC is unlikely to pass the 50% mark in the elections in 2019. You know when some of our comrades say let the rand fall so that we will rise up with the economy‚ you just despair‚” said Nzimande.
Turning to the 2007 ANC Polokwane conference at which President Jacob Zuma emerged victorious‚ Nzimande‚ who has sat in Zuma’s cabinet since 2009‚ said he personally felt betrayed by what had transpired in the organisation.
“We note that there has been some advances during the first Zuma administration‚ but post-2014 the picture is changing…state capture is on steroids‚ as bourgeoisie democratic networks degenerate into parasitism. That is the immediate threat we are facing.”
“We want to say as the SACP‚ including myself personally…we feel betrayed in terms of the understanding we had in Polokwane. That has been betrayed…our trust has been broken‚ and we must learn a lesson as the SACP that unless we root ourselves within our people‚ we cannot just freely give out trust which‚ when broken‚ leaves things to go haywire…that is how I feel personally as Nzimande.”
However‚ Mkhize said these challenges would be dealt with when new leadership is elected in the December conference.
“The only way of resolving our own challenges is to go back to discussion and have robust engagements amongst us; I think it’s possible and once the party has gone through its own discussions‚ we need to ensure that these meetings take place so that we can face all of those issues which are difficult.”
The SACP was the first member of the ANC-led tripartite alliance to call for a judicial commission of inquiry into state capture.
The SACP will use its six-day conference to discuss the divided state of the ANC-led tripartite alliance and how it can be reconfigured. — TMG