Crossroads+for+communists,+Mde+and+Brown,+Weekender

Business Day Weekender, Johannesburg, 2007/02/24 12:00:00 AM
=Crossroads for communists=

//An SACP commission puts three paths for the future of the tripartite alliance on the map, write// **VUKANI MDE AND KARIMA BROWN**

THE ruling tripartite alliance, led by the African National Congress (ANC), is in for a major overhaul, if the South African Communist Party (SACP) has anything to do with it.

A draft report, prepared by a commission established in 2005 to review the party’s relationship with the ANC, concluded that the alliance can no longer be allowed to function as it had since 1994.

The commission had drawn up three possible scenarios for “restructuring” the alliance — each of which would have serious implications for the two parties, as well as the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu).

The commission was made up of members of the party’s high-powered politburo, including Intelligence Minister Ronnie Kasrils, Trade and Industry Deputy Minister Rob Davies, Cosatu president Willie Madisha, general secretary Blade Nzimande, deputy general secretary Jeremy Cronin and former trade unionist Gwede Mantashe.

The commission’s first scenario is the status quo, but “with much greater focus on transforming the ANC and Parliament itself, and a bolder, independent role (for) the SACP”. This scenario was similar to Cosatu’s stated aim to “flood the ANC” with working class leaders to give it a pro-poor outlook.

This could see an escalation of the party’s role in the ANC’s succession race in an attempt to “transform” the ruling party from within. Such a move could also deepen tensions with senior ANC leaders and fuel the dissent of SACP factions, such as the Young Communist League, which believe this strategy is short-sighted.

The SACP was already divided over ANC deputy president Jacob Zuma’s presidential ambitions.

The second scenario suggested the SACP “engage the ANC on a quota system”. According to the document, “SACP nominees would be under SACP mandates and the party would exercise the right of recall” against its elected representatives. This option would allow SACP backbenchers to exercise greater oversight over the state and be more vocal on issues on which the party finds itself at odds with government and the ruling party.

However, party sources conceded that the ANC was unlikely to accede to this demand, which would mean a loss of control over a big portion of its parliamentary caucus. The alliance would have a hard time explaining to voters why members elected on an ANC ticket were answering to the SACP.

The third option was what the document called “a variety of independent lists/candidates (standing) either directly as the SACP or as some new Workers’ Party, or even a broad left coalition”. This option had two sub-scenarios. The existing alliance could be preserved, with the party and its coalition reaching a series of “tactical and strategic agreements with the ANC” over which elections to contest. There were others in the party who favoured this option as a way of building an SACP that runs in opposition to the ANC, the report said.

Overall, the commission recommended that the SACP should “focus its attention” on options one and two. But neither of these options were likely to succeed. A senior party source said option one would have no support in the SACP because it meant business as usual. Even the commission’s report acknowledges there is no appetite for the status quo.

For its part, option two would be resisted by an ANC used to having a monopoly on power. Unlike Cosatu, the SACP lacks the leverage of a mass base that can be used to force the ANC’s hand.

The party’s central committee is to meet this weekend to discuss the document to decide which option to recommend to delegates at its national congress in July.

The SACP was the second of the ANC’s partners — after Cosatu — to come up with proposals aimed at reconfiguring the alliance. Both allies have been unhappy with what they see as centralisation of power in the state, especially the presidency.

The creation of the commission was an attempt by party leadership to put a lid on the “go-it-alone” impulse that had been growing in the party, and give its July congress a set of more moderate options to consider.

Cosatu’s 2006 congress, after debating a set of five scenarios for the alliance, resolved to stay in the ANC-led alliance but to intensify campaigns for pro-poor policies.

However, the stakes are higher for the SACP: electoral failure could mean oblivion for the party.

“If the party achieves a low electoral score (less than 10%) will that have advanced or retarded our political standing?” the commission’s report asked.

The commission was also aware of the danger of pushing the ANC towards the right.

“If the party achieves more than 10%, and perhaps even brings the ANC below 50% — which way does the ANC then go, forming a governing pact with the SACP, or with centre-right parties?”

Independent research commissioned by Cosatu and the SACP had shown potential electoral support of about 20% for the SACP or a Cosatu-backed workers’ party.

The commission also had to grapple with the realities that electoral politics will present. With the ANC increasingly caught in a web of corruption and scandal because of its relationship with business interests, the SACP could find itself in a similar dilemma should it seek public office independently.

“The terrain of multiparty electoral politics in relatively advanced capitalist societies always presents radical left-wing/communist parties with something of a catch-22 dilemma. Election campaigns are a costly matter. Where will a principled left-wing party that is boldly anticapitalist receive campaign funding?” the report asked.

There was unlikely ever to be a simple “parliamentary route to socialism”, the document said, though the party did not advocate insurrection or any other armed seizure of power. However despite the dangers of “bourgeois electoral democracy”, the SACP could not have failed to notice the electoral advances of radical parties in South America. Nzimande recently visited Bolivia as part of a tripartite alliance delegation.


 * From: http://www.businessday.co.za/Articles/TarkArticle.aspx?ID=2573430**

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