LETTER TO THE DELEGATES OF THE 53RD NATIONAL CONFERENCE OF THE ANC Dear comrades delegates,
As we all know the year 2012 has been one of the most important years in the ANC. It is very important because, during this year the ANC celebrates its 100years since its formation. The ANC was formed in 8 January 1912 to unite all Africans in the fight against colonialism and minority dominance. Since then the role of the ANC has evolved to include fighting for a united, non-racial, non-sexist, democratic and prosperous South Africa. However, this never was and still not is a smooth process. In any struggle or revolution, you are bound to have set backs and the ANC is not an organization of Saints. Our victory against apartheid in 1994 has opened space for those who want to capture the movement for their narrow-selfish interest. Chairman Mao warned us that “After all enemies with guns have been wiped out, there will still be enemies without guns; they are bound to struggle desperately against us, and we must never regard these enemies lightly. If do nor now raise and understand the problem in this way, we shall commit the gravest”. Chairman Mao’s words should vividly resonate in everyone’s ears as you delegates are task with in-storing the integrity of our movement in Mangaung. Let me remind you that we are facing “enemies without guns”, enemies who are hell-bent to see our movement going down. Some of these enemies are found within our movement, they have penetrated our movement. They continuously shout our revolutionary slogans while they go drink expensive whiskies and eat sushi with our class enemies at night. They are more concern about who must lead more than the progressive policies that will benefit masses on the ground. The movement has been turned into the games of mathematics; the ANC has been reduced to a numbers game. We can’t allow this to define us comrades. Not in our name, not in our watch and certainly not in our movement. Cde we spoke at length about factionalism, “Through the eye of the Needle” and other important documents, but these documents are applied when it suit a particular faction. Those with ulterior motives and those who are genuine will quote from “Through the eye of the needle” when they want to purge others. Leaders of the ANC are decided in restaurants and are reduced to slates. Those who have capacity and skills needed in the movement are marginalized because their names don’t appear in a particular slates. This deprive our movement of leaders who are best suited to lead the movement in the manner in which is in line with what we stand for as the movement. Our comrades must do away with politics of “Emerging”. Cde Joel Netshitenzhe warned us about the dangers of Factionalism in his article “Of Cats Factions and a Revolution”, he outlined how the President of the Queensland Cat Protection Society, Kathleen Marshall was brutally stabbed to death by one of his own because he belong to a particular faction. We are not immune to these comrades, going to the 53rd National Conference we have heard of similar allegations in some branches where members are being beaten, stabbed and even killed because they don’t agree with certain individuals. One wonders what would the generation of Tambo, Slovo, Sisulu, Ngoyi First, Hani Kotane, Mhlaba, Maxeke and many others say about the state of affairs in our movement. Do we really have to stoop so low to be in power comrades? We know that some see positions in the ANC as the stepping ladder to their self-enrichment and this cannot continue comrades. Eighteen years into democracy the ANC government has achieve a lot, but we still have a long way to go. The triple challenges of poverty, unemployment and inequality continues to confront us everyday. Young people still continues to suffer the most under these circumstances we found ourselves in. These challenges need a very sober ANC and other MDM structures to work together to ensure that our people primarily benefit from our programmes. Government alone cannot succeed; we therefore need every one to play his/her part in making sure that we build a better South Africa. Our programmes of Action as structures need to speak and confront these challenges. At the helm of these contradictions is the neo-liberal offensive through the DA, Judiciary, Afriforum, Section 27, the media in particular and other counter-revolutionary and reactionary institutions that seeks to undermine our movement and our government. Our political discourse is, in the main, being shaped by the media and unfortunately in the wrong direction. Our people and our comrades cant see politics beyond what they read and watch in the media, our comrades don’t understand that the media is part of the neo-liberal agenda that will never stop these negative reporting until they see the DA in power. It is therefore counter-revolutionary for members of the ANC who are not mandated to deal with the media to divulge organizational matters to the media. It is equally wrong for those who don’t agree with certain process in the ANC to take the ANC to court, the ANC was never formed in court. We cannot allow courts and the media to run our organization. Karl Marx once said “the ideas of society are in every epoch the ideas of the ruling class”, it very unfortunate in South Africa the ruling class is also in charge of the media. We have seen recently how the media report on certain issues relating to the president of South Africa and of the ANC, President Jacob Zuma. The President has been called all sorts of names, he has been found guilty at some point by the media without even going to court. The recent story (which is yet to be tasted as true) has been used to depict the person of president Zuma as a lootist who used R248 to upgrade his home. This is a lie that has been spoken with conviction by many (even within our movement) as a truth without evidence. Unfortunately this is used by many to de-campaign him running to Mangaung. This is the victory to the media; they got us where they wanted and we have fallen trap into this agenda. Comrades must understand that, if there is anything dangerous to our movement, something that will kill our movement, it is comrades who are lacking class consciousness. It does not matter how many years does one has in the congress movement but if that person lacks class consciousness, that person is more dangerous than the DA and other reactionary institutions. I am not surprised to see some within our ranks leaking confidential organizational matters to the media because they don’t like certain leadership, people who use media to discredit leaders of the ANC are a cancer to slowly eats our organisation. I am equally not surprised to see our own comrades agreeing with a motion of no confidence in one of the municipalities in the North West Province. They are failing to understand one thing that, this is a class struggle and giving a vote to your class enemy is a class suicide. One asks why do we even invite media in our BGMs? At whose class interest is this media going to report the outcome of that BGM? What makes us sure that they wont even distort (like they always do) what they see so that they will sell their papers? Why are we not using our Media& Publicity Sub Committees to popularize our views and decision? Do we really need to report our programmes and resolutions to Sowetan, City Press, Mail & Guardian, The Star etc.? Comrades delegates, our masses are putting trust in you as you will deliberate on matters that affect them directly. They don’t care who wins, they don’t care about ASIJIKI or ZUMANTASHE, what matters to them is that you represent them with distinction, that your decisions should not be clouded by patronage and expensive whiskies. You should forget about “Peace Sign and Change Sign”, they don’t matter to them, they don’t matter to us. Unity and cohesion is of paramount importance to the life of our movement. I trust that you will represent the correct mandate of your branches, and that you will not sell out because some body promise you job and bought you alcohol. We can’t reduce our movement to these petty things comrades. AMANDLA!!! Cde Tom -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. 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