2005-10-31,+OR+invoked+in+battle+for+ANC,+Msomi,+City+Press

City Press, Johannesburg, 29/10/2005 18:33 - (SA)

OR invoked in battle for ANC
S’Thembiso Msomi

IF YOU walked up towards the Sanlam auditorium unaware of what was about to happen on Wednesday afternoon, you would have been convinced that the country's president was on campus.

Police vehicles were stationed at strategic points around the University of Johannesburg's main campus in Auckland Park.

As you reached the main entrance to the auditorium, you were met by a queue of people - young and old, poor students and well-heeled black businessmen - all waiting to go through the metal detectors.

Manning the security machines were a group of black bodyguards in ties and jackets and three white men in blue overalls that had inscribed in gold the words "presidential protection tech support"on their backs.

Inside the massive and yet overcrowded lecture hall, students sang an ancient traditional song that has recently been given a new lease by the immensely talented music performer, Thandiswa Mazwai.

But if you cared to listen carefully, you would have realised that the lyrics have been given a new political twist:

//"Yindaba kabani uma sifun'uZuma?"// - whose concern is it if we want Zuma, the students sang.

Jacob Zuma, the ANC deputy president and the man some of the students called "the president-in-waiting", was on campus as a keynote speaker at the Oliver Tambo Memorial Lecture.

Tambo, who would have celebrated his 88th birthday on Thursday, was the longest-serving president of the ANC and is credited with keeping the movement united throughtout its most difficult period as a banned organisation operating in exile.

He was also one of the founding fathers of the ANC Youth League, the organisation that had organised Wednesday's memorial lecture.

When Zuma entered the stage - - accompanied by Youth League president Fikile "Mbaks" Mbalula, bodyguards and other youth activists - the singing broke into deafening cheers of joy, the kind that is usually reserved for soccer stars at an Orlando Pirates vs Kaizer Chiefs derby match. A lone vuvuzela, blown by an enegetic student, gave the affair that FNB stadium feel.

Only a huge green banner, with black and white mug shots of President Thabo Mbeki, served as a reminder of who was still in charge of both the party and state.

When Mbaks took the floor and chanted "Viva comrade President Thabo Mbeki, Viva!", the crowd answered back with "Viva!" more out of respect for the office than passionate support for the man.

But when the Youth League president followed that chant with "Hands-off Jacob Zuma, hands-off!", the entire auditorium roared "Hands-off!"

Only Zuma, Tambo's celebrated biographer Luli Callinicos, journalists and a few guests remained silent.

Callinicos, who had sat so far from Zuma at the front table as if to avoid being associated with the "JZ camp", later seemed to have been unsettled by the crowd as she rose to speak about Tambo.

Greeting guests at the start of the speech, she made a Freudian slip and referred to Zuma as "our honourable president of the ANC".

Mbeki might have been absent from the function but his presence was felt by the crowd throughout the proceedings.

After all, the event was as much about commemorating "Comrade OR", as Tambo was affectionately known in the ANC, as it was about the ongoing fallout in the party over whether Zuma, who is currently facing charges of corruption, should succeed Mbeki as president.

With the political turmoil reaching new heights in recent weeks, threatening the smooth running of both the ANC and government, both sides have now turned to the late Tambo for support.

Mbeki fired the first salvo last Friday at the wreath-laying ceremony at Tambo's grave in Benoni, east of Johannesburg.

While Zuma was not mentioned by name, but Mbeki spoke at length about corruption within government and ANC structures and said Tambo would not have tolerated such behaviour within the party ranks.

Mbeki has taken much flak from the ANC's rank-and-file for his decision to fire Zuma from government after Judge Hilary Squires ruled that there was a "generally corrupt relationship" between Zuma and his former financial adviser Schabir Shaik.

There seems to be concern within the Mbeki camp "that the organisation is in danger of falling into the hands of corrupt individuals". But to the Zuma's supporters, this renewed "anti-corruption drive" is but a smokescreen to stop the charismatic leader from becoming president.

On Wednesday, it was Zuma's turn to claim Tambo for his own cause. He was businesslike in approach, never straying from his prepared speech to tell one of his famous jokes or to lead the crowd in his beloved "mshini wami" song.

Like Mbeki had done six days before, there were no references to the ongoing crisis in the ANC. Instead it was all about Tambo, the beloved ANC leader whom Zuma referred to as the "quintessential father" of the movement in exile who was also "a glue" that kept the alliance consisting of the ANC, SA Communist Party and the SA Congres of Trade Unions united.

But the crowd could read between the lines. When he spoke of Tambo's emphasis on collective leadership, consultation and "instilling the culture of debate" at all levels of the ANC and its allied organisations, they understood very well that he was criticising Mbeki for doing none of these things.

The crowd must have drawn similarities between Zuma and the late party leader when he told them of how "accessible and approachable" Tambo was to the rank and file of the party in exile. Zuma himself has a reputation of a "people's leader" who is never too busy for "ordinary" people.

Yet it was the following remark that drew the loudest applause from the crowd: "Another important issue in relation to this is the fact that Tambo always understood that leadership was not a lifetime issue.

"He was leading the ANC for as long as the ANC membership required him to lead.

"When it was time for him to pass the baton to others to lead, he would have no problem in doing so. He was prepared to serve the ANC under whichever capacity the organisation asked him to serve."

Mbeki's close relationship with the late Tambo is well-documented.

But Zuma too can claim to be one of Tambo's children.

He too did work closely with the ANC leader and, along with Mbeki, he was chosen by Tambo to initiate secret talks with the apartheid regime in the mid-1980s.

In Callinicos' book on Tambo's life - //Beyond the Engeli Mountains// - Zuma tells of how, after Tambo had adressed a Natal ANC conference in 1959, the then party president Chief Albert Luthuli stood up and said even if his own generation were to die they will be "happy in the knowledge" they would be leaving the ANC in Tambo's hands.

"I believed in Luthuli, I loved him . . . For him to say so about this other leader was an important thing to me," Zuma says in the book.

Tambo, who was Luthuli's deputy at the time, went on to become ANC president.

Although Nelson Mandela succeeded Tambo as ANC president in 1991, many in the party say it was "OR" who "annointed" Mbeki as the future president.

Zuma now expects Mbeki, the man he has worked with for over 30-years, to pass on the baton to him.

"What would OR have done?" is the question that has become fashionable even within the most liberal of commentators.

But is it a right question to ask? Tambo might have been regarded as a statesmen around the world, but he never ran a country.

The answer lies with the living.

From: http://www.news24.com/City_Press/Features/0,,186-1696_1825788,00.html