2005-10-30,+Where+the+DA+stands+on+ANC+rivalry,+Leon,+B+Day

Business Day, Johannesburg, 26 October 2005 = Rivalry in the ANC: where the DA stands = Tony Leon

THE date for local government elections has not been set. The municipal campaign has not yet started. The 2004 general election is still fresh in recent memory. Yet it is clear that the race for the African National Congress (ANC) presidency in 2007 has already begun, with all its implications for the 2009 elections.

Former deputy president Jacob Zuma is touring around the country, whipping up the crowds, rallying his supporters outside the court and in streets around the nation. It is quite clear that Zuma is campaigning for president.

The question for the official opposition is, quite simply: what to do about the Mbeki-Zuma fight?

It is true that we have no vote in the ANC’s leadership race — nor should we. It is equally true that we should not risk our own political fortunes faction-fighting. And it is also true that the Mbeki-Zuma squabble may be the opening round in a much larger campaign. It is possible that a compromise candidate is waiting in the wings to enter the ANC race.

Yet the Democratic Alliance (DA) cannot remain neutral and detached. The Mbeki-Zuma fight is affecting the performance of the government at every level. And for that reason alone the opposition has to speak out and take action. But which side, if any, should the DA support in the ANC’s internal battle?

Many people seem to think that the DA would support the Mbeki faction, almost instinctively, because of President Thabo Mbeki’s responsible macroeconomic management and his tentative steps towards supporting growth-oriented, market-friendly economic policies. Even though he has retreated on nearly all of his promises on privatisation and labour-market reform, the president’s half-hearted economic reforms are still far better than the alternative represented by the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu)-South African Communist Party (SACP) wing of the tripartite alliance, which is supporting Zuma.

At the same time, the DA and the ANC’s left wing see eye to eye on a number of issues. Both support a basic income grant. Both support urgent interventions to help those living with HIV/AIDS. Both support a tougher stance on Zimbabwe and Swaziland.

To the extent that there is democratic debate about policies and principles in SA today, it is being upheld by the DA and by the ANC’s left wing, against the attempts by Mbeki and his acolytes to quash dissent. At the same time, however, Cosatu and the SACP have taken an approach in support of Zuma that the DA can never support.

The Mbeki-Zuma fight has become a battle over whether this country will be governed by the rule of law. And there is no question about where the DA stands on that issue. The DA must support the president, the law enforcement agencies and the justice system. If it comes to a choice, that is where the party’s loyalties must lie. At the same time, the DA must also stand up for SA’s institutions — not only the Scorpions, but the constitution itself — which have been caught in the crossfire of the ANC’s civil war.

That is the true danger of the Mbeki-Zuma fight — that it may expand and erupt into a fight over democracy itself, that it may become a choice between the autocratic racial nationalism represented by Mbeki’s faction and the anarchic populist socialism represented by Zuma’s partisans.

The DA must, and will, stand and fight in the corner of the rule of law. We will support the president, though he is a political rival. But I would like the president to take note that the people burning effigies in the street, the people complaining that SA has a corrupt justice system and the people condemning the government today are not DA members. They are ANC members.

It is time Mbeki realised who the true friends and the true enemies of constitutional democracy are.

‖Leon, MP, is leader of the opposition.

From: http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/opinion.aspx?ID=BD4A105987