OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Friday 3.30pm.
THE Mail & Guardian has endorsed the African National Congress for the June 2 elections, just three weeks after promising that it would not be endorsing any specific party.
Editor Philip van Niekerk explained the choice of the ANC, saying the party “has made a contribution second to none in creating and safeguarding the political peace”.
The ANC’s balanced economic policy and “moral generosity and maturity” were also complimented, while the failure to deal effectively with crime was noted as a major problem.
The paper also noted voting against the ANC “for the reason that a good government need a strong opposition” as a “respectable position”, but dismissed all major parties besides the Democratic Party as “unlikely champions” of the weak and vulnerable. The DP, it said, has positioned itself for opposition, and not for government.
Explaining the about-turn on the endorsement issue, van Niekerk wrote that the choice followed partly from admiration of Financial Mail editor Peter Bruce who went out on a limb two weeks ago to endorse the United Democratic Movement, stirring a major controversy.
While acknowledging that many M&G supporters who voted for the ANC in 1994 may feel betrayed by the party’s failures, he also cited a virtually unanimous feeling amongst the paper’s staff that the ANC is the party to support.