We don’t accept personality cults in politics’ - Manamela Lebogang Tsele 11 March 2009 ------------------------------
Buti Manamela, national secretary of the Young Communist League People assume particular lifestyles and then in the process have to compromise their principles in order to finance those lifestyles I personally never supported Jacob Zuma in order for me to have one form of benefit or another Young people do not ask you who’s Kgalema Motlanthe’s girlfriend Will I get a job, will I have access to education, will my friend who has HIV get anti-retroviral drugs? Related Content *ON CAMERA: *Young Communist League leader Buti Manamela defends the ANC’s Jacob Zuma <http://www.sowetan.co.za/multimedia/video/yclbuti.wmv> "I really think we need to bring back that factor of politics being mainly about service to the people, rather than service to an individual politician," says Buti Manamela, national secretary of the Young Communist League. Speaking in a one-on-one interview with Sowetan Online at the organisation’s offices in downtown Johannesburg, Manamela spoke about the League’s outspoken support for ANC President Jacob Zuma and the April 22 general elections. Manamela contends that a lot of people mistrust politicians, saying: "They think that politicians basically do politics in order to enrich themselves, and in some instances you can’t really blame them precisely because there are incidents which show that a lot of politicians have just gone into politics as a career instead of as a passion for service to the people". He criticised the rampant display of materialism exhibited by some politicians saying this behaviour has contributed to the perceptions that people have of politicians and also contributed to crony-ism. He said: "People assume particular lifestyles and then in the process have to compromise their principles in order to finance those lifestyles, and all of a sudden you can’t criticise anybody because you’re expecting them to give you a position or to give you money and I think that we really need to deal with that kind of problem in society". "I personally never supported Jacob Zuma in order for me to have one form of benefit or another and in fact I’ve got no expectation from him as an individual or from anybody - precisely because once there is that kind of expectation, what you basically do is you put pressure on him in order to continue with all the wrong things that have been happening." Manamela said rallying for Jacob Zuma to become ANC president was not to entrench a personality cult. He said: "I know that there is that particular fear, and we as communists will be the first ones to be opposed openly to personality cults precisely because we know what the consequences of those are and we wouldn’t want to encourage that". Explaining the league’s support for Zuma over ex-president Thabo Mbeki, Manamela said: "The consequence of having that kind of popular support (within the tripartite alliance) for Jacob Zuma has led to a situation where a lot of people have had their real views ‘unbanned’. "Today there’s no such thing as - ‘you can’t be critical of the president of the ANC’ because you’ll be scared that patronage will be discontinued," Manamela said, and added: "There also isn’t this form of an intellectual deity on the part of the president who hardly listens to anybody and his word goes". "If you look at the developments in Parliament, people (within the ANC) directly challenge the president of the republic (Kgalema Motlanthe, the deputy ANC leader) and say ‘ this is what we want’– that never happened before." Manamela believes the youth should stand up and be a part of the making of history. He says: "No doubt the next president will be determined by the youth vote. We’re entering a very interesting generation of youth politics and part of the influencing factors is that we’ve got more and more young black South Africans who’ve got access to tertiary education, more and more young South Africans who’ve got easy access to information and they are able to dissect issues and make decisions. "You also have the social imbalances, which in themselves play as a mobilizing factor. "Young people do not ask you who’s Kgalema Motlanthe’s girlfriend, they will ask - ‘will I get a job, will I have access to education, will my friend who has HIV get anti-retroviral drugs’," he said. Manamela hopes that Government will focus on helping poor South Africans and says: "We (as communists) have participated in the election manifesto of the ANC and made quite an impact, more than ever before - pillars of the manifesto are about what people need and what people aspire for". Sowetan Online --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. 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