It+is+not+about+individuals,+Zamikhaya+Maseti,+The+Star



=It's not about the individuals=


 * Zamikhaya Maseti, The Star, 11 December 2007**

As the ANC's conference in Polokwane gets nearer, Zamikhaya Maseti urges its members to follow in the footsteps of previous leaders such as OR Tambo by putting the interests of the organisation and the country before those of personal politicking

Not since the 1969 Morogoro Conference of the ANC (held in exile in Tanzania) has the organisation faced such a traumatic national gathering as it does in Polokwane this month.

Like Morogoro, Polokwane promises to be a watershed conference. For students of history seeking to understand the present, it is very interesting to look at the dynamics of Morogoro and discern the similarities and differences from the current situation.

In 1969, ANC president Oliver Tambo's leadership and the entire ANC leadership collectively was threatened and challenged by the Africanists who were referred to as the "Group of Eight". This group was ultimately expelled from the ANC in December 1975. The Group of Eight, as First Lady Zanele Mbeki succinctly put it, "questioned ANC decisions on membership". It was during this internal crisis that OR Tambo demonstrated his ability to calm the waters.

The proceedings at the Morogoro Conference were marred by a generally tense atmosphere. A group of Umkhonto We Sizwe (MK) commanders and commissars presented a strongly worded memorandum criticising the ANC leadership in what was later referred to as the Chris Hani Memorandum.

Historian Vladimir Shubin sketches the episode: "The strongly worded document expressed a lack of trust in the leadership and spoke in very dramatic terms of frightening depth reached by the rot in the ANC and disintegration of MK accompanying this rot.

"The main complaints were that the leadership had created machinery which was an end unto itself and completely divorced from the situation in South Africa. It spoke of the careerism of the ANC leadership abroad, which had, in every sense, become professional politicians rather than professional revolutionaries. It also demanded that the leadership be committed to the resolution and programme of going home to lead the struggle

"Those leaders attending international conference and other globe-trotting activities had to be reduced to a reasonable few and the remainder should work round the clock at the home front …"

Shubin adds: "The Morogoro Conference was perhaps the most critical moment in the history of the ANC … A serious threat of a split between the leadership and the rank and file members - mainly the fighters of Umkhonto - was to a large extent avoided as a result of Oliver Tambo's unselfish stance. At the most critical moment, though this was only of a consultative nature, he surrendered all power to the delegates."

Also reflecting on the Morogoro Conference, the late Joe Slovo had this to say: "Looking back on it, it could be said that there were moments at that Morogoro Conference when the very future of our whole movement seemed to be in jeopardy. But it was JB Marks's skill as chairman and the greatness of comrade president Oliver Tambo, who was then acting president, which pulled us through and laid the basis for what we are today."

It is also clear from Slovo's assessment that Marks, as a communist leader, saw it as his responsibility and duty to be an example of devotion and loyalty to the political leadership of the ANC.

Throughout the proceedings at the Morogoro Conference he assisted Tambo without any intention to exploit the already explosive situation to his advantage to gain political mileage.

Clearly the leaders of Slovo, Marks and Moses Kotane's calibre were the actual pillars of strength to Tambo and the entire liberation movement. They earned this role and influence through hard political and ideological work within the ANC, MK and Sactu (South African Congress of Trade Unions). The SACP during those days was indeed playing its vanguard role very effectively.

The fact that nowhere does any literature make reference to individual Sactu leaders saying wrong or bad things about the internal problems of the ANC only confirms this assumption. The 1969 Morogoro Conference was a significant stage at which the alliance leadership banded together in support of Tambo and the entire leadership collective of the ANC.

Today, the situation heading into Polokwane is similar in the sense of the drama unfolding, but decidedly different from Morogoro in the roles being played by the various parts of the ANC alliance.

The alliance partners - particularly the South African Communist Party (SACP) and Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) - have not played the expected mediatory role in the ensuing "David and Goliath" political wrangle over the ANC presidency and leadership. Instead they have fuelled the already messy situation with talk of the "unstoppable tsunami".

The current ANC leadership wrangle clearly does not depict any ideology at all. The forces at play are not pulling in different ideological directions. This is all about personalities, bordering the politics of resentment and grief. The unfortunate result of this politicking is the misdirection and waste of otherwise needed energy at the expense of the most strategic policy issues that have subsequently been relegated to the bottom end of the pyramid.

The overriding objective of the "Left Coalition" is to defeat the "cult of the individual" and put an end to palace politics. Some have hopes that the ANC will be shifted more to the left in Limpopo. They are also of the view that the Strategy and Tactics document emerging from the Limpopo conference will be similar to the one adopted by the ANC during the Morogoro Conference of 1969. This is the "sticking effect" that keeps the "coalition" together.

ANC Youth League (ANCYL) president Fikile Mbalula notes: "This is the opportunity we are offered by the 52nd National Conference of the ANC: to abolish the cult of the individual once and for all and elect leaders who will have greater tolerance, greater loyalty, greater kindness and more considerate attitude towards the comrades (including in the tripartite alliance), and a less capricious temper. The power that the president of the ANC has must be clamped and measured, and never again must we give an individual … so much power as would turn them into a superman possessing supernatural characteristics akin to those of a god."

The writing is on the wall and conspicuous. It is a certainty that there will be "a palace coup" in Limpopo. The "coalition" would most like to reclaim and nationalise the legacy of the ANC and its icons. The non-disclosure and vilification of this "single individual" is unfortunate. Well; in isiXhosa we say: "Azilahleki zine nombolo", which simply means that no matter how a message is encrypted, it is always easy to read the message being communicated. Clearly, this "single individual" has been a subject of vicious attacks and vilification spearheaded by the "coalition". The trading of insults and vilification of leaders within the ANC is something that the conference will have to deal with.

The behaviour of the communists at Morogoro in 1969 was consistent with "Leninist" traditions and teachings, namely "winning the battle of democracy". For the generation of Marks and Kotane, it was critical not to weaken the ANC. What the alliance leaders are doing now is the opposite of what leaders like Marks did during Morogoro and beyond.

The leadership of the alliance has a responsibility to assist the ANC in resolving internal problems in contrast to exacerbating the situation via heavily worded utterances directed at individual leaders. Similarly, ANC leaders should refrain from attacking one another in public.

Delegates should remember:
 * South Africa, the Southern Africa region, the entire African continent and the world cannot afford to have a divided, frail ANC, even if the "palace revolution" is successfully staged.
 * The unity of the ANC is paramount; the ANC as an organisation is and should always be bigger than its individuals.
 * The consolidation of democracy is a very complicated and fragile process and cannot afford to have key role players who consistently lower their guards.

The conference provides the ANC with the opportunity to conduct a thorough introspection of how it has conducted itself over the past 17 years since the unbanning. It should allow serious consideration to the question of stability and instability within its own ranks.

It has to make this assessment of each and carefully examine what brings cohesion and what brings instability, preserving those practices that bring about unity and cohesion within its ranks. All pollutants of the internal atmosphere should be discarded.

My personal view is that the main threat to the ANC's internal stability is "populism, histrionics, tub-thumping, irrational and emotional rhetoric", to borrow the exact words of its president, Thabo Mbeki. The delegates should seek to abolish and destroy once and for all this alien culture within the ranks of the ANC. And, as they deliberate, they should remember the words of Oliver Tambo in 1990: "I have devotedly watched over the organisation all these years. I now hand it over to you; bigger; stronger - intact. Guard our precious movement."

Maseti is a political economy analyst


 * From: http://www.thestar.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=2518&fRequestedUrl=%2Findex.php%3FfArticleId%3D4167513**

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