The African National Congress (ANC) has come up with a compromise that leaves the way open for either Thabo Mbeki or Jacob Zuma to stand for the party presidency at the end of the year.
”There is general agreement that the ANC president should preferably be the ANC candidate for the president of the republic,” secretary general Kgalema Motlanthe said on Friday afternoon at the organisation’s policy conference in Midrand.
But he added that there was also a ”strong view” that this should not be made a principle.
Motlanthe was reporting back to journalists on a plenary session earlier in the day, which in turn followed earlier debates in commissions on whether the ANC’s president should necessarily be the party’s candidate for president of the country.
This would have effectively ruled out a third party term for Mbeki.
The party presidency comes up for review at the ANC national conference in Limpopo in December.
Friday’s plenary followed months of campaigning by Zuma, who is currently deputy president of the party.
”The roof almost came down,” Motlanthe said of the debate.
Earlier it was reported that succession battle has loomed large over the conference despite a call by Mbeki for members to remain focused on policy.
At another media briefing earlier on Friday, Motlanthe had confirmed to reporters that the issue had been strongly on the agenda.
This comes after Zuma told a labour meeting in nearby Pretoria on Thursday evening that the conference’s commissions had engaged in ”serious debate” about the organisational design of the ruling party.
Motlanthe said at midday on Friday that delegates did not want to amend the ANC’s constitution for the sake of allowing a particular candidate an easier route to the party’s top job.
No swing to the left
Meanwhile, there has been no swing to the left at the policy conference, political analyst Professor Susan Booysen said on Friday.
She said it was clear from party spokesperson’s announcements on Thursday on the strategy and tactics policy document, which deals with the ANC’s broad socio-economic vision, that there was ”a large amount of status quo emerging”.
”One can argue that in terms of the developmental state, and state intervention in the economy, given that [these issues] are not articulated through this policy conference, it might have additional gravitas and impetus in getting the government to implement more and faster,” she said.
However, when one looked at the details of what was being proposed in issues such as state intervention, regulation and taxation, and given the fact that there was already a broad social security net in South Africa, it was not new.
”This has been state, government, policy practice for sometimes five years, two years in the case of Asgisa, sometimes even a decade.
”So in that context we do not see a surge to the left.”
Booysen said though it had been said Congress of South African Trade Unions delegates were going to come to the policy conference to argue strongly for more radical policies, they ”had not turned the movement around like I believe they had hoped to do”.
She said this had repercussions for the succession issue, as supporters of ANC Zuma had tried to pin his candidacy for party and national leadership on more left-oriented policies.
”What we have just seen is that the ANC is holding out, so far, a lifeline to a third-term ANC presidency for Thabo Mbeki, arguing that the constitution of the ANC should not be tampered with.
”Currently that constitution does not limit the number of terms that an ANC president can serve.”
She said it was clear from Thursday’s briefing, which was conducted by ANC NEC member Joel Netshitenzhe and South African Communist Party deputy general secretary Jeremy Cronin, that the tripartite alliance was seen as a long-term relationship.
It would not be determined by ”mood swings and arguments here and there”.
Netshitenzhe and Cronin were ”singing from the same sheet very strongly”, she said.
”It’s a mutually beneficial relationship, and I think they are going to continue it.” — Sapa