Behind the smiles: state of the ANC

This weekend is likely to see a blockbuster show of unity from the ruling African National Congress as the party celebrates its 95th birthday. Yet, behind the scenes, senior members worry that the very future of the party is threatened.

President Thabo Mbeki and the ANC deputy president, Jacob Zuma, cut a cake and sang ‘Happy birthday”, the beginning of the party’s tactic of showing unity in what is likely to be the start of a fractious and risky year. At its heart is the fight for the party’s presidency; the incumbent is likely to be the country’s president too.

Will the drive for unity work? It must work, according to the influential national executive committee member, Joel Netshitenzhe, who has warned warring members that they risk the party’s future. Netshitenzhe is the first NEC member who has presented a no-holds barred assessment of the state of the ANC and it is not pretty.

‘…are we approaching a state of paralysis, stagnation and degeneration, where none of us can open our mouths, express a view on any matter, and critically raise an issue for debate, without our foreheads being branded with the label of pro-this or anti-the-other,” he asks in the latest edition of the party journal, Umrabulo. ‘We may not be fully there yet, but the fact that elements of this have started to manifest themselves in our ranks signals a crisis in the making.”

Factionalism has become ingrained in the national consciousness, says Netshitenzhe, who searched the terms ‘pro-Mbeki”, ‘anti-Mbeki”, ‘pro-Zuma” and ‘anti-Zuma” and found 5 000 results. ‘Now we can blame this on the media [and] shoot the messenger, so to speak. But in this instance, the most that we honestly can do in criticising the media is to argue more about embellishments rather than essence.”

Said party spokesperson Smuts Ngonyama: ‘2007 is a year for a critical assessment of the ANC, its programme and its policies. It is time for the ANC to — focus on building an ANC capable of meeting the challenges of the second century of its existence.”

This year, the party will face three struggles: around ideology, incumbency and the impact of the succession strife on government and delivery.

Incumbency

Netshitenzhe says the power of office, or what he terms ‘incumbency”, for the past 12 years has raised new challenges for the ruling party. The vices of greed and patronage are impelling factionalism and eroding unity. He quotes an assessment of the Spanish Socialist Party, which found that ‘conflict … is far more concerned with ‘power, careers, spoils and rewards’ than with ‘strategy, policy or ideology’.”

Writing of intra-Alliance politics, Netshitenzhe asks: ‘Don’t some of us, faced with inviting possibilities or uncertainties about future careers, or with the spectre of being investigated for one misdemeanour or another, or with doubts about our competence, conveniently nail our colours to an imaginary mast, claiming allegiance to individuals who may not even know of our existence and who may not agree with the things we do.”

The ability to dispense patronage will play a significant role in the run-up to the ANC’s December conference. Patronage can be about the promise of political positions like premierships and mayoralties or senior civil service jobs. Patronage also refers to the state’s huge spending power in the form of tenders. With revenue collection consistently beating targets, government is on a spending binge with most of it allocated through tenders to established and new black businesses.

Ideology

The ANC and its alliance partners, the South African Communist Party and Congress of South African Trade Unions, have, in the past, been glued together by a shared vision — that of a two-stage national democratic revolution, which would first ensure democracy and later socialism.

Mbeki’s term since 1999 has moved the party away from socialism to black-led capitalism and it is this that underpins the tensions the ANC is now dealing with.

Last year, Mbeki and SACP general secretary Blade Nzimande engaged in a public spat over the character and soul of the ANC. Mbeki said the ANC had never been a socialist party in response to Nzimande’s claim that the ruling party was betraying a working-class agenda.

An ANC provincial chairperson and NEC member known to support Mbeki said: ‘This ideological difference is at the heart of the battle for the soul of the ANC. The noise over who succeeds President Mbeki is just a smoke screen for a more fierce ideological battle.

‘People are rallying behind certain candidates because they believe such candidates would be more sympathetic to their idea of which direction the ANC-led tripartite alliance should take.”

Adam Habib, the Human Sciences Research Council analyst, agrees: ‘The crisis manifests itself as a succession crisis, but at its core is the direction of the ANC and the direction of development. The same struggle is finding different ways of expressing itself.

‘It [the ANC] is going to put on a brave face and pretend that it is united during the January 8 statement, but that is not going to solve the crisis.”

Impact on government

The infightings and divisions within structures of the ANC are impacting on all spheres of government, stalling major government projects and paralysing service delivery, notably in municipalities. Within the state, senior civil servants speak of the risks of administrative drift.

At local level, political infighting is increasingly linked to the control of access to government resources. Provinces have been convulsed by struggles fought under the guise of the succession race.

In a Cabinet reshuffle in KwaZulu-Natal last year, premier S’bu Ndebele used the opportunity to consolidate his power base by appointing Mbeki loyalists to the positions vacated by Inkatha Freedom Party members. Ndebele is a known Mbeki loyalist.

In the Eastern Cape premier Nosimo Balindlela, who owes her position to Mbeki, purged left-leaning members of her Cabinet and replaced them with loyalists last year.

Additional reporting by Ferial Haffajee