Three Cabinet ministers and two deputies were nominated for the central committee of the South African Communist Party (SACP) at the party’s 12th national congress on Saturday.
Intelligence Minister Ronnie Kasrils, currently a member of the committee; Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula, who declined nomination for re-election as national chairperson; and Transport Minister Jeff Radebe will be among more than 60 people vying for the 25 seats on the committee.
Also nominated were Deputy Minister of Trade and Industry Minister Rob Davies and his health counterpart, Nozizwe Madlala-Routledge.
The only person to withdraw his nomination was Congress of South African Trade Unions president Willie Madisha — an announcement greeted by cheers from the 2 000 delegates at the congress. Madisha is seen as being close to African National Congress (ANC) president and state leader Thabo Mbeki.
The results of the elections will be announced on Sunday.
Earlier, a former general secretary of the National Union of Mineworkers, Gwede Mantashe, was elected unopposed as national chairperson. Mantashe is currently chairperson of the technical working group of the government’s Joint Initiative for Priority Skills Acquisition.
SACP general secretary Blade Nzimande was also re-elected unopposed, as was his deputy, Jeremy Cronin.
Former Eastern Cape social development minister Ncumisa Kondlo, now an ANC MP, was elected deputy national chairperson and another former Eastern Cape minister, Phumulo Masualle, was elected national treasurer. Both were unopposed.
Challenges to the revolution
On Saturday, ANC deputy president Jacob Zuma told the congress that the ”revolution is going through a test” and needs leaders who can withstand the challenge. He said these leaders should be able to ”take the organisation through these troubled waters”.
In a very low-key speech, Zuma — who appeared far more comfortable leading the singing after he had spoken — said the tripartite alliance is going through ”challenging times and what we are made of will be seen as we go through them”.
He said challenges arose after the second decade of liberation, adding that the critical issue is how to ensure that ”you get the fundamentals right in the first decade so that they can be sustained”.
The SACP, he said, needs to examine ways in which it can contribute to strengthening the ANC in an effective manner.
Zuma said there is also a need to learn from the recent public-sector strike, adding that there is a need to look at ”how to handle this matter slightly differently”.
The ANC deputy president noted that the SACP congress is taking place in one of the ”most important years in the history of the national democratic revolution”, which has already seen the ANC’s policy conference where there was a ”deep debate on policy issues”.
In December, he said, the ANC will hold its national conference in Limpopo, which will be important because it will be the last one before the general election in 2009 ”and, therefore it would have to take decisions to ensure that it increases its majority”.
Zuma said that the ANC would not have been what it is today ”without its deep association with the party [SACP]”, adding that the party needs to answer several questions regarding the role it plans to play. One of these, he said, is what the SACP’s contribution to nation building will be and what kind of nation it wants to see.
Another is the issue of unity within the alliance and how the SACP plans to address this. Also, there is the struggle against poverty and what role the SACP will play ”in uniting all progressive forces”, he said. — Sapa