For the African National Congress to remain a national movement it must ensure that both socialists and nationalists have a place in the party, President Thabo Mbeki said on Thursday.
He was speaking at the launch at the presidential guesthouse in Pretoria of the second of five volumes of The Road to Democracy in South Africa. The book tells the story of the liberation struggle from 1970-1980.
”Most interesting, certainly for me, is how important it is to know the history to understand what is happening today,” Mbeki said.
He told the audience about a meeting he had with an academic from the United States while in exile in Botswana in the 1970s who told him that the party’s strength lay in incorporating both nationalists and socialist tendencies in the movement.
”I hear some discussion within the country which essentially says that we need to redefine the ANC as a socialist movement … I wish I could bring her here today to talk with some of my comrades,” Mbeki said, referring to the academic.
He said the ANC was starting to be overruled by its socialist tendencies in the 1970s until some black consciousness leaders brought back the balance with their nationalists tendencies.
”To know that history and to absorb it I think tells us something about what we should do next,” he said.
The goal of The Road to Democracy in South Africa is to show a chronological analysis of history from the 1960s to the present day.
Volume two includes the growing influence of black consciousness ideology, the Soweto uprising of 1976, and the intensifying of the armed struggle. – Sapa