Tokyo Sexwale, Gauteng premier, argues that the ANC must face up to the challenge of power
OPENING the inaugural meeting of the South African Native National Congress (later the ANC) in 1912, congressman Pixley ka Seme said: “We are gathered here today to discuss a thing which my colleagues and I have decided to place before you. We have discovered in the land of their birth, Africans are treated as hewers of wood and drawers of water. The white people of this country have formed what is known as the Union of South Africa — a union in which we have no voice in the making of laws and no part in their administration … We have called you therefore before this conference, so that we can together devise ways and means of forming our national union, for the purpose of creating national unity and defending our rights and privileges.”
This weekend, 82 years later, ANC men and women once more assemble in the city of Bloemfontein with a different sense of purpose and objective: this time as a celebration of the victory of their new-born liberty, the glory of a new non- racial South Africa — a united South Africa that negates the disunity that led to the launch of the congress in 1912.
Our conference this year dare not overlook the critical objective that emanated from the 1912 conference: to struggle for national unity and for the defence of fundamental rights and privileges of the people.
We are proceeding to Bloemfontein to renew that mandate and to report to the people on the progress made in the process of transfer of power from the white minority to all South Africans.
The significance of going back to Bloemfontein is to touch base with the geographical and political birthplace of the ANC. It was also in Bloemfontein that the mandate was given to do away with the demon of tribalism and statutory racism. The ANC conference this weekend shall be expected to address whether or not we have achieved this mission as set out in 1912.
Our progress in this is represented in the Preamble to the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, which states: “There is a need to create a new order in which all South Africans will be entitled to a common South African citizenship in a sovereign and democratic constitutional state in which there is equality between men and women and people of all races so that all citizens shall be able to enjoy and exercise their fundamental rights and freedoms …” Furthermore, the constitution has devoted an entire chapter to fundamental human rights, which formed one of the cornerstones of the 1912 demands.
Of critical importance in seeking a fresh mandate is to ensure that the strategies and tactics which shall emanate from this year’s conference should not be a repeat of old phrases under new circumstances or new phrases that do not apply under new conditions. We need strategies that will accord with the new and changed conditions.
The new conditions imply understanding that we are no longer just a resistance movement struggling to get into government but that we are now in power. Of importance is the fact that while almost everyone has accepted the reality of the government of national unity, it is not the GNU which is being subjected to severe criticism but rather the ANC which is facing judgment. It is not the GNU that is expected to deliver, but the ANC. Our strategy and tactics must address this stark reality.
Conference shall therefore have to remind all of us that we are in power and that the offices we hold epitomise and symbolise that power, both in the executive and legislative echelons. What the 1912 conference set out to reject, we now have the power to begin to redress.
We are in power, and conference must enable us to safeguard against a situation where the office as a symbol of power separates us from the people. What is important is not the act of being in power, but rather the wisdom of understanding the limits of such power and identifying the priorities within such limits.
We contend that our current strategic and urgent task is to assert the power we have and to consolidate it in the hands of the people.
Asserting power is no longer a theoretical question. If it is left to chance, or to individuals in office, we will not succeed. We need to look at the different levels of government to see how such power should be asserted. We require specific strategies and tactics for the national and provincial governments, and for the various legislatures, also with an eye focused on the forthcoming local government elections.
Bloemfontein must tell us how best to handle our power in order to translate our policies from theory to practice, to enable us to deliver things to the people to improve the quality of their lives.
For that reason, it will be important for conference to reflect upon people’s demands as embodied in the Freedom Charter and to ask ourselves if we still perceive those demands as relative today. We contend that they still are, though we hear little of the Freedom Charter these days.
A concern has developed within our ranks about whether our practice on the RDP is still related to the demands of the Freedom Charter.
We have to understand the vast social polarisation of wealth. No government can make headway without tackling this issue head on. We can’t be diplomatic about that. Time is ticking away and the people are looking upon us with great expectations.
There is nothing amiss with such expectations. There’s something wrong if we are seen not to be demonstrating serious evidence that we are giving attention to these demands. However, President Nelson Mandela is correct in urging the people to give the government a chance.
On the other hand, we note certain forces that benefitted from apartheid are keeping their fingers crossed with the hope that things will stay “business as usual”. They’re hoping the ghetto remains a ghetto — and that there’s no change in the nature of wealth ownership in the country, no change in the stock exchange. This cannot be so.
Our tactics and strategies must address the question of wealth redistribution. Not in a haphazard or emotional manner, but in a fundamentally constructive way without destabilising the economy.
Bloemfontein must also define the role of the people in the use of power. We knew the role of the peole in the quest for power — but now that the people are in power, we need to look at their role. If we don’t, power will remain in the hands of those who are in office. How do we bring the people in? How do we affirm them? How do we decide the best way through which they can assert themselves over us, over government?
Bloemfontein must help close the slight gap that had begun to develop since the elections between our grassroots structures and ourselves. People had expected the government alone to perform. On the contrary, it is the people’s government, together with the people, that must perform and deliver.
These are all difficult questions. But they are all vital to the rest of the country as we move forward in governance.
Or, in a Shakespearean sense, our conference may be full of sound and fury but signifying nothing. We can’t afford to make that mistake.