African National Congress (ANC) president and head of state Thabo Mbeki says he will stand for a third term as head of the organisation if asked to do so by its leadership.
”If the leadership generally said, ‘Look, we believe the interests of the ANC and the country would be best served if we have somebody else,’ that is fine.
”If they said, ‘No, you better stay for whatever good reason,’ that would be fine; [I] couldn’t act in a way that disrespected such a view,” he told the South African Broadcasting Corporation on Saturday.
Mbeki said that the decision for him or any other person to stand for the position would be discussed among the leadership of the organisation. It would not be based on personal ambition, but on what would be best for the ANC and the country.
The ANC policy conference that ended on Saturday in Midrand, Gauteng, produced a compromise resolution, leaving the way open for either Mbeki or Jacob Zuma to stand for the party presidency at the end of the year.
Mbeki declared the event ”highly successful” after the leadership succession issue and others, ranging from floor-crossing to a single sporting emblem for South Africa, had been thrashed out. He said those who predicted the event would be marked by ”deep divisions and bitter conflicts” had been proved wrong.
Earlier this week, however, his deputy, Zuma, told unionists that there had been ”very serious debate” among delegates on the organisational design of the party.
Issues discussed
A key consensus among delegates to the four-day meeting was the need for South Africa to advance as a developmental state, with increased state intervention to drive growth and create employment.
Conference issues — which also include land, free education, the future of provinces, exploitation of mineral resources and the party’s stance on Zimbabwe — will all come up for rubber-stamping at the national conference in December.
There will be further discussion on floor-crossing before the December conference, the party’s policy chief, Jeff Radebe, told a post-conference media briefing in Midrand. ”There were two views, but at the end there was consensus that the status quo must remain while further work is done,” he said.
One of these views had been that the ANC should not accept any floor-crossers in the September crossing window.
There was no consensus on lowering the voting age, so the status quo will remain.
On the issue of rationalising the number of provinces, he said there was a call for the continuation of the process led by the Department of Provincial and Local Government to work on the issue that will involve drawing up a White Paper. ”By next year we shall be ready for discussion,” Radebe said, adding that a special summit on the issue should be held before 2009.
The conference also heard calls for a special meeting on education before the December conference. There were debates on the viability of the state to declare free education as opposed to expanding the current no-fee-schools policy.
Sports emblem
On sport, Radebe said that while delegates recommended a single sports emblem, specifics about its design and aesthetics will be up to artists at a later stage. South Africa’s globally recognised Springbok rugby emblem is in the firing line. Also at risk are the Protea emblem of the national cricket team and the insignia of the Bafana Bafana national soccer squad.
Party spokesperson Smuts Ngonyama said the move is a necessary part of efforts to unite the citizens of a country in which sport remains a divisive racial issue 13 years after the fall of apartheid.
Despite efforts to transform the face of South African sports teams, there are regular complaints that especially the rugby and cricket teams comprise mostly white players in a country with an 80% black population.
”In most countries, there is harmonisation of emblems,” Ngonyama said. ”Within the context of … nation-building, the creation of a non-racial, non-sexist South Africa, it is important that we rally around single emblems and symbols. It is within the context of transforming our society.”
The party’s deputy secretary general, Sankie Mthembi-Mahanyele, said there was a proposal for a development fund for women to give them a ”broader entry point” into opportunities. Though this was being tabled as a proposal, it could be adopted at the national conference, she said. There was also a call for a women’s ministry.
On the peace and stability front, the conference recommended that metro police and the Scorpions be incorporated with the South African Police Service into a single police force that is in line with the national Constitution. However, the incorporation of the Scorpions would also involve ”legal issues”, Radebe said.
On land, the call was for regulation, though not prohibition of ownership by foreigners. ”There is a need to make sure that we review the willing-seller, willing-buyer [approach], while taking into account forecasts to attract further investment.”
The conference also discussed Zimbabwe. ”There was support for the process led by [President Thabo] Mbeki, as asked by the Southern African Development Community to mediate,” said Radebe.
Ngonyama added: ”The primary responsibility [to resolve the crisis] is of the Zimbabweans themselves.”
On mineral resources, the party came up with the view that while the state, and therefore the people, owns mineral rights, more should be done about adding value to mining products, turning them into manufactured products.
Courts
The ANC is pushing ahead with its plan for the Constitutional Court to become the so-called apex court in South Africa, Radebe said. Delegates recommended that the Constitutional Court should be the court of last resort for all matters both constitutional and non-constitutional.
The Supreme Court of Appeal, housed in Bloemfontein, has the status of intermediate court with a right of final appeal to the Constitutional Court. Questioned on concerns about the ability of Constitutional Court judges to deal with complex commercial matters, Radebe said he was ”not empowered to express an opinion on the competency of judges”.
Radebe said the conference also agreed on the need for a single high court division for each province, and the elimination of apartheid-era names for divisions, such as Transvaal and Bophuthatswana. Delegates recommended that the transition in the judiciary be accelerated. There is no need for the ANC to discuss these issues, and the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development will go ahead with them, he said.
The full set of final resolutions will be made available once committees have had the opportunity to incorporate amendments from the plenary sessions, the party said.
There had been speculation ahead of the four-day meeting that the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) in particular would use the event to push ANC policies towards the left. Analysts said, however, that it seemed the ANC and its tripartite allies were very much ”singing from the same page”.
Cosatu president Willie Madisha expressed his satisfaction with the conference. ”It achieved everything that we think is positive; we go to the national conference with all these good things,” he said. — Sapa