Business Day
*Don’t let disagreement become enmity, Mantashe warns*** /Cosatu ‘undermining’ ANC/*Setumo Stone, Karl Gernetzky, Natasha Marrian and Sam Mkokeli, Business Day, Johannesburg, 16 December 2012*
AFRICAN National Congress (ANC) secretary general Gwede Mantashe on Sunday defended the decision to recall former president Thabo Mbeki in 2008, saying the party had been at a tipping point.
Mr Mantashe told delegates at the party’s national elective conference in Mangaung that at the time, having two centres of power between the ANC and the government — following Mr Mbeki’s loss to President Jacob Zuma at the Polokwane national conference of 2007 — had paralysed the organisation.
Organisational decisions had to be negotiated with the government, which often took longer.
Supporters of Mr Mbeki — among them former ANC chairman Mosiuoa Lekota — broke away from the ruling party to form the Congress of the People following the president’s removal.
Delivering his organisation report on the state of the ANC, Mr Mantashe warned delegates not to elevate disagreement to enmity. “Talk and persuade each other,” he said.
Deputy President Kgalema Motlanthe is expected to challenge Mr Zuma for the ANC presidency in Mangaung. Supporters of both candidates adopted a deeply rival stance ahead of the national conference, involving incidents of violence and intimidation.
Mr Mantashe said factionalism seemed to have become institutionalised in the ANC and members had become bolder in their factional activies, leading to the collapse of discipline in some ANC structures.
He said the ANC’s inability to arrest factionalism threatened to bleed it to death because ill-discipline went unpunished in structures where factional interests placed some members above the party’s prescribed code of conduct.
Mr Mantashe also said that when national executive committee members were deployed to provinces to attend to problems, provincial leaders often “saw red immediately” and did all they could to resist the party’s efforts. Provinces had to recognise the authority of the higher structures of the ANC, he added.
The ANC could not have allowed factionalism to “become institutionalised in our provinces”, Mr Mantashe said, and action was taken that led, among other things, to the recall of Eastern Cape premier Nosimo Balindlela, who recently joined the Democratic Alliance.
Without naming the Congress of South African Trade Unions, Mr Mantashe bemoaned the effects of “public spats” after alliance partners assumed “postures” on issues rather than through joint deliberation.
The impact of “being attacked” by an alliance partner was greater than coming under fire from “all the opposition parties together”, he said.
The fallout over actions of the ANC Youth League, which ultimately led to former league president Julius Malema’s expulsion, had also cost “the movement heavily over time”, he said.
Mr Mantashe also said the ANC should play a lead role in the fight against corruption. “Engagements with various formations in society point to the growing belief that corruption is fast becoming systemic and embedded in government systems and in execution,” he said.
He said the emphasis was placed on public sector corruption, though there were instances of private sector corruption too.
“Only when government is seen to be leading the way will the movement succeed in dealing with corruption in the private sector,” he said.
*Cosatu ‘undermining’ ANC*Continuing with his organisational report, Mr Mantashe said the “ease” with which the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) called for strikes during talks with its ally, the ANC, undermined the party.
He said relations between the allies had been at a high after the ANC’s Polokwane conference in 2007 but cracks emerged soon after that gathering, when the federation became increasingly critical of the party.
The next five years, however, may usher in a new era for relations between the two bodies as senior Cosatu leaders are likely to take up posts among the ANC top brass on its national executive committee, including its president, Sdumo Dlamini, said Mr Mantashe.
Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi, however, has turned down nomination to the conference, as he believes it may compromise his independence.
Cosatu has been vocal about its opposition to a number of issues, including electronic tolling on Gauteng highways, labour brokering and the proposed youth wage subsidy.
“The other awkwardness is the ease with which the federation calls for strikes while there is engagement, making the engagement and any results that come (out of it) ... to be seen as succumbing to the political pressure,” Mr Mantashe said in his report.
“This may make Cosatu appear bold and strong in the short term but it weakens the governing party in the public eye and indirectly weakens Cosatu,” he said.
Differences on matters such as e-tolling and the Protection of Information Bill proved the alliance was “better off” when partners engaged each other directly instead of fighting in public, Mr Mantashe said. “Every time there was a fight, opposition forces would join in and suspicions among the alliance partners started translating into conspiracies.”
He said Cosatu tended to become “so angry” when there were disagreements that the federation became reckless with its comments.
“Cosatu is the only alliance partner that, from time to time, sees the democratic government as worse or the same as the apartheid regime. The ease with which Cosatu pronounces the possibility of (Democratic Alliance leader Helen) Zille taking over power also tends to foster acceptance of this possibility in the minds of our people.”
Mr Mantashe described the ANC’s relationship with Cosatu as “stable”, however.
On the internal functioning of the federation, he said the “attack” on the National Union of Mineworkers — the federation’s largest affiliate — and on the federation itself showed that “more in-depth analysis on the state of the trade union movement is necessary and urgent”.
“There are many signs that this wave of strikes can be an entry point for other forces seeking to dislodge the congress movement,” he said in the report.
Many Cosatu affiliates were embroiled in internal turmoil this year, with the South African Transport and Allied Workers’ Union and five other affiliates having faced a split. Workers’ anger reached boiling point in the mining sector, where union rivalry and clashes between workers and police led to the deaths of about 50 people.
Earlier on Sunday, ANC president Jacob Zuma had called for internal engagement among alliance partners to resolve differences instead of “shouting from podiums if one partner is unhappy with the other”.
* **From: http://www.bdlive.co.za/national/politics/2012/12/16/dont-let-disagreement-become-enmity-mantashe-warns*
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