The South African Communist Party (SACP) is to investigate a number of ways of ”contesting state power in elections” and will convene a policy conference next year to look at the various avenues open to it.
A resolution on the ”SACP and state power” adopted on the final day of the party’s 12th national congress also addresses the issue of SACP members who are deployed as either as African National Congress (ANC) elected representatives or public servants. It states that they ”must continue to owe allegiance to the party”.
This means that they cannot ”conduct themselves in ways that are contrary to the fundamental policies and values of the SACP”. This, the resolution says, also applies to members deployed in community organisations and trade unions.
Regarding the possibility of contesting elections as a separate political entity, the resolution, the most contentious at the congress, reads that this should be done within a ”reconfigured alliance”.
It says the possibilities that should be investigated are:
- an electoral pact with the alliance partners, which could include agreement on deployments, possible quotas, accountability of elected representatives (including that of SACP members to the party), an election manifesto and ”importance of an independent face and role for the SACP and its cadres within legislatures”; and
- independent electoral lists on voters’ rolls ”with the possible objective of constituting a coalition alliance agreement after elections”.
The resolution states that the SACP must engage its alliance partners — the ANC and the Congress of South African Trade Unions — on the issue.
The decision to investigate possible avenues for electoral participation follows the growing anger within the SACP at the marginalisation of the party and problems with the way in which the alliance has functioned, ”particularly with regard to policymaking, the lack of joint programmes on the ground, deployments and electoral list processes”.
The SACP congress also wants to the tripartite alliance reconfigured so that there is respect for ”the independent role and strategic tasks of each of the alliance partners”.
Earlier, SACP general secretary Blade Nzimande ruled out the possibility of contesting the 2009 elections as a separate entity with his deputy, Jeremy Cronin, saying that the feeling of delegates generally was that this should not be a ”do or die” situation but that it should be ”kept on the agenda”.
He said that what the SACP wants to do is to ”shift the ANC towards a socialist agenda”, adding that it does not want to leave the tripartite alliance but feels the need to discuss its role in that body.
Organisational issues
Membership of the SACP increased to 51 874 this year from 19 385 in July 2002, when its previous national congress was held. The organisational report debated at the congress describes this as ”tremendous membership growth” for a communist party.
The reason for the significant growth is the ”campaigns and principles working-class leadership provided to society”, it notes.
KwaZulu-Natal has the highest number of members, with growth from 3 250 to 10 225 paid-up members at the start of the congress.
The report finds that the SACP’s biggest challenge is to harness the increase in membership into ”active socialist brigades”.
About 25% of members were women, an increase of 90% over the past two years.
The report further finds that while party structures in the nine provinces are fully functional, some of those in districts are still in an ”interim phase” and have collapsed or been weakened although ”they still continue with party work, albeit with difficulties”.
With regard to relations between the ANC and SACP, the report says ”cordial relations” at national level have been maintained, but that as with any kind of relations, ”contradictions are necessary to clarify key areas of government”.
”In this regard, these relations have themselves flared up from time to time and sometimes in an acrimonious way that could have been avoided.”
The report identifies as a main area of concern the ”poor relations between the two organisations at the lower levels starting with the provinces and stretching down to the branches”.
It describes relations between the SACP and Cosatu as ”excellent”.
Central committee
Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula was the only one of three Cabinet ministers to be elected to the central committee of the SACP on Sunday.
Nqakula had failed to gain re-election as SACP national chairperson as he did not receive sufficient backing from the provinces. Former National Union of Mineworkers general secretary Gwede Mantashe was then elected unopposed.
The other two ministers — Transport Minister Jeff Radebe and Intelligence Minister Ronnie Kasrils — were not elected.
However, deputy ministers Rob Davies, of trade and industry, and Nozizwe Madlala-Routledge, of health, were elected.
In an indication of the growing support for the Young Communist League, David Masondo, its president, polled the highest number of votes with 989 out of a possible 1 298. He was followed by National Assembly MP Ben Martins with 976.
It was also announced at the congress on Sunday that the SACP will hold a national policy conference next year. — Sapa