The African National Congress is targeting white, coloured and Indian voters in Gauteng and the Western Cape to break what the party sees as the opposition’s stranglehold on minorities.
Support of minorities for the ANC in the past two elections has been negligible, prompting the new strategy. According to ANC spokesperson Steyn Speed, activities in the two provinces are part of a national campaign to make inroads into minority communities.
The campaign has already begun in Gauteng, where a task team has been appointed to run house meetings and organise supermarket campaigning and ward meetings in minority areas.
In the Western Cape, ANC provincial leader Ebrahim Rasool remained upbeat this week about the province’s racial atmosphere, saying there are ”encouraging signs of goodwill”. Feedback from white communities indicated a break with ”the divisive politics of the past”, even if they decided to ”skip this election”.
”We [the ANC] are not leaving any area uncontested, even the white communities. [They] are in need of a new dispensation, new politics. We will never be accused of not taking our message there,” he said.
However, the Western Cape ANC makes no bones about the fact that its primary constituency is the coloured and African working class. And in the demographic make-up of the province — dramatically different from other provinces, due to apartheid-era coloured preferential policies — more than half the province’s 4,5-million residents are coloured, with 28% African and around 15% white.
In Gauteng, the ANC has in the past few months established branches in traditionally conservative areas such as Pretoria, Krugersdorp, Sandton and Randburg.
Gauteng minister of safety Nomvula Mokonyane, who heads the provincial organising and mobilisation unit, said the ANC had failed in the past to communicate directly with these voters; as a result, the Democratic Alliance had given them a distorted view of the party.
”Our focus on this campaign is to explain to them why they should vote ANC; why the ANC is their home. All ward councillors have to present report-backs on what the ANC has done for the past 10 years. We do not want the DA to be our spokesperson,” Mokonyane said.
The ANC said the biggest misconception it found during interaction with these communities was a view that the ANC was a black organisation that cared for blacks only.
”Some also felt that the ANC was there to lower their standard of life and expose them to situations like violent crime.
”But we also found many who wanted to identify with change, who joined in big numbers. Many business people came forward and said they supported the government’s economic policies.
”We will only be satisfied if we have a branch in every ward and we have reached most individuals … I am confident that we will not receive less than 40% in all of these minority areas.”
The ANC has relied heavily on former members of white parties — such as former education minister Sam de Beer and National Party stalwart Jogie Boers, who are members of the provincial legislature.
”We have succeeded in our campaign because we had credible and prominent people. We also have old comrades such as Ismail Vadi, who have made sure we’ve got a branch in each and every Indian area in the province,” said Mokonyane.
”We have not used discredited people like the DA has done, where it went into townships and used discredited people to target blacks.”
At the Gauteng ANC manifesto launch, a smattering of white faces were seen, including Jakobus ”Ogies” van der Berg, who joined the party in September last year.
”I joined the ANC because it is the only organisation that looks after all people … I trust the ANC,” Van der Berg said.
The ANC claimed this campaign has caused jitters in the opposition, but the DA said the ANC was unlikely to make any headway.
Said DA provincial leader Ian Davidson: ”According to our own research, this ANC campaign has very little prospect of success. Their support among whites is very low and among Indians and coloureds, it is on the wane. They are welcome to join us and compete for votes. But we will be focusing on the non-traditional bases.
”Research has indicated that we might get around 10% support from black people, which is very encouraging. In the last election we only had about 2% from the townships. But the ANC must not forget its own backyard in the townships.”