The SACP used the march to Goodman Gallery to show its strength.
As the saga of “The Spear” hopefully came to an end this week, it was significant who was on the specially created stage outside the Goodman Gallery in Johannesburg to celebrate the “people’s victory” over the gallery and the media.
Four members of the South African Communist Party’s central committee addressed the 4000-strong crowd and crowed in victory.
SACP national chairperson Gwede Mantashe, general secretary Blade Nzimande, leader of the Young Communist League Buti Manamela and freshly elected National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) president Senzeni Zokwana took turns to savour their moment.
Of course, Mantashe wore his ANC secretary general hat and ANC spokesperson Jackson Mthembu also was there, beside himself with glee. But that did not make the SACP moment any less deserved. It was the SACP that had led the charge against City Press and the Goodman Gallery.
Although the party had recently been accused of being less visible in the streets to lead workers because its leaders were in Parliament and in Pretoria, it was there for this carefully chosen demonstration.
Hypocrisy
It was Nzimande who first called for the boycott of City Press, a call later endorsed by the ANC. It was also Nzimande who researched City Press editor Ferial Haffajee’s earlier attitude to freedom of expression. He found that she had said it was not absolute and it was now he who sought to “expose her hypocrisy”.
Mantashe was ticking from what he called “a score card” during their crowning moment.
The commies are here and they can feel the power.
It has been quite a journey for the SACP, which underwent gruelling internal battles when the party first said it would back Jacob Zuma during his troubled days in 2005.
“What difference will a Zuma presidency make?” asked then-SACP member Mazibuko Jara in 2007.
Jara and others questioned whether a Jacob Zuma presidency “would overcome the structural constraints imposed by the liberal democratic framework on economic and social transformation”.
Policy change
Strictly speaking, Jara could still be right about the lack of fundamental policy change, but the SACP argued, metaphorically, that it could not open the door and leave it open for someone else to walk through.
The party has been notching up some victories. The win for Zokwana and the general secretary of the NUM, Frans Baleni, at its conference in the face of fierce competition was one, the two are both central committee members.
Aside from what it calls “policy breakthroughs”, some noticeable scores have included helping to consign motormouth former ANC Youth League leader Julius Malema to the dustbin of history.
When the party initiated discourse about the evils of “tenderpreneurs”, it was precisely Malema and others close to him they had in mind. And it was greatly assisted in the process by Malema’s ill-prepared project to get rid of Zuma.
And so it is that the SACP basks in glory as Malema is not only on the margins, but also faces possible arrest over his financial affairs.
A socialist revolution
It is a long way from June 2007, when former president Thabo Mbeki humiliated Nzimande at the ANC’s policy conference.
Reminding him of his station in life, Mbeki said the ANC had never sought to prescribe to the SACP the policies it should adopt or the programme of action it should implement and the leaders it should elect.
On a cold morning in Midrand, Mbeki told delegates at Gallagher Estate that the ANC was not a socialist party pursuing a socialist revolution, so the SACP should not try to tell the ANC what to do.
Mbeki was in charge then and the thunderous applause that followed his words spoke of resonance among delegates.
A week later, Nzimande told a National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union congress that “the SACP is not and will never become a narrow electoralist formation. Our strategic objective in regard to state power is to secure not party-political but working-class hegemony over the state.”
Policy breakthroughs
It is the counterargument he still uses today to those who ask why the SACP exercises power under the ANC banner rather than on its own. The policy breakthroughs the SACP brags about include National Health Insurance, the new growth path, mooted proposals to abolish the willing seller-willing buyer proposition, the National Planning Commission and industrial policy creation.
Nzimande is still vulnerable to criticism that he and fellow SACP leaders have been uncritically supportive of every action of Zuma’s since they have served in his Cabinet. But the party has retorted that Nzimande is being singled out unfairly.
“People want Blade out of government so that they can do whatever it is they would like to,” SACP spokesperson Malesela Maleka said.
“It does not make sense to argue that Blade is capacity, that without Blade there is no capacity.”