Can the Congress of the People convince a significant number of South Africans to put their cross next to party president Mosiuoa Lekota’s picture on April 22? A whistle-stop tour of Free State townships by Cope leaders suggests they may have left it too late.
Last week Cope’s Free State leaders were dispatched to areas around the province to revive the party’s campaign. The response community meetings two weekends ago ranged from poor to average.
In the three-day tour of Lekota’s home province, Cope’s presidential candidate, Mvume Dandala, visited Virginia, Bochabela, Thaba Nchu and Botshabelo, while Lekota himself went to the Thabo Mofutsanyana district municipality.
They used a chartered branded bus dubbed ”The Express of Hope” which will tour several provinces before April 22. In Phase 6 of Bochabela, outside Bloemfontein, and at the Welkom taxi rank, residents were either unaware that Cope was in town or just did not buy into the party’s campaign.
Provincial leaders blamed poor planning and poor communication for the turnout. Provincial party spokesperson Mahlomola Ralebese said Phase 6 — where fewer than 20 people pitched up — was the most worrying. ”It was too early, people were still in church. The people who were already at the venue left when they realised that Dr Dandala was delayed in church,” said Ralebese.
He justified the poor turnout during the taxi rank walkabout by saying there was no plan to address taxi drivers and that it was a low-key encounter with the few Cope supporters who waited for Dandala at the taxi rank entrance.
The turnout in Botshabelo and Virginia was better — about 400 and 300 supporters respectively.
Here the man Cope has given the task of challenging Jacob Zuma was visibly fired up, accusing the ANC of a ”betrayal of the people’s vision”.
”How can you be happy when you don’t have water?” Dandala asked a resident of Phase 6 in Bochabela, Matau Sello, during an impromptu door-to-door campaign that replaced the failed community meeting. The township had been without water for three days. He accused the ANC-led government of not spending some of the money allocated for service delivery because the public service lacked the skills and capacity to use it. ”There are skilled white South Africans who are sitting back and saying ‘we don’t know whether we are needed or not in this country’.
”The instrument you have to change this country is your vote,” he told the crowd in Virginia’s Meloding township.
Dandala faced the tough task of explaining the difference between his party and the ANC. ”The policies are the same,” he conceded.
”But the difference is that they [ANC] have had those policies for the past 10 to 15 years. Their people in government did not implement those policies.”
Some residents told Dandala they would give Cope a chance, but attached an ultimatum. ”We’ll only give you five years to fix things, no more than that,” said Abraham Khotle in Bochabela.
Khotle accused the ANC of lying about the number of households still using the bucket system for sanitation, saying there are more than 7 000 in Bochabela alone.
Pinky Mbuli complained about the small government-built house she lives in and her poverty. ”People fight for children’s social grants. When you’re getting a grant for the child a family member would kill you to earn that grant,” said Mbuli.
”Rêrig, hulle maak so by ons [Really, they do it to us],” she said when a shocked Dandala asked her to repeat this.
Dandala explained that Cope resorted to holding community meetings instead of rallies because the party believed small meetings were ”more intimate” and wanted to avoid the cost of holding big events.
”It actually gives people a chance to ask us questions,” he said. This was part of reaching out to poor people and giving voters a chance to raise their grievances with party leaders.
”People feel they would have been happier if we had started earlier [with the campaign]. You get people asking ‘where have you been all along? Why have you been reluctant to start this campaign?”’
Dandala said some Cope supporters had expressed concern about the difficulty of selling the party with just days to go before polling.