Why the ANC needs to cleanse itself

The ANC needs to cleanse itself like the ocean. If it does not do that, then the rest of us and our dreams are doomed. The bloodletting in this movement that carries the aspirations of the African people in our country needs to come to an end so that the delivery of key basic services to the needy begins.

Whatever the spin that government PR offices put on things, the truth is that the backstabbing in the ANC is delaying the emancipation of the marginalised lot. It is denying us our rights to a better life. This madness is tying us down on our collective journey to a better day.

We have come to a fork on our road and leaders are pussy-footing over which road to choose.

Nelson Mandela, OR Tambo and other heroes of our struggle got us to April 27 1994.
Their protégés who took the baton at the end of the old struggle and the beginning of the new struggle are now fighting over who should get their hands on the cookie jar.

Having achieved the first phase of the national democratic revolution (the capture of state power), we seems to be twiddling thumbs, unsure of how to achieve the second stage of the NDR (dishing out the country’s wealth equally).

Instead, a handful of friends of the cabal that governs us are becoming billionaires — they are looting the wealth of the people. Some say they did not struggle to be poor.

I tell you, they are rolling in the stuff. They have so much of it, they think they can buy even the presidency of the ANC.

In the meantime, friends of the cabal that is seeking its turn at holding the cookie jar are scheming about how to loot more of whatever will be left by the time the current lot vacates office. The rest of us are fucked.

They must have plugged cotton wool in the ears even as Nelson Mandela said: “I have walked that long road to freedom. I have tried not to falter; I have made missteps along the way. But I have discovered the secret that after climbing a great hill, one only finds that there are many more hills to climb. I have taken a moment here to rest, to steal a view of the glorious vista that surrounds me, to look back on the distance I have come.

“But I can rest only for a moment, for with freedom comes responsibilities, and I dare not linger, for my long walk is not yet ended.”

But the looters will not listen. Maybe a voice of reason will emerge in Limpopo and displace the current looters and those salivating for their turn.

People claim to be protégés of our great leaders and shame us so much that nations question whether the native can rule.

Has this generation of leaders imbibed nothing from its mentors? What will become of this great movement when this generation leaves? What will the next generation inherit?

Already the ANC Youth League — the organisation that is supposed to champion the aspirations of South African youth and lead the fight against social ills driving the youth to self-destruction — is itself wallowing in political wilderness.

Men with wives and children, heads of extended families, so-called bread winners are casualised en mass in the workplace, and Cosatu — that organisation set to fight for the rights of workers and improve conditions in the workplace — is dumb-founded. It seems to long for its turn — directly or indirectly — at the cookie jar.

The same goes for the SACP — should we go, should we stay?

For the record, I have never been a member of the ANC. I have, however, gate-crashed many ANC branch meetings.

I am not sure if I will in the near future part with R12 to be a member of this movement. The spirit of the ANC — not its cabals that are busy fighting over how best to destroy it — runs in my veins.

And my preaching of the spirit upon which the movement of the people was founded is like gospel to me. It’s like going to church. It’s culture, it’s tradition. It’s a way of life, to misquote Barney Mthombothi.

It’s like Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who carries no ANC membership card yet feels he has a right to denounce kow-towing, the tendency to behave as yes-men and the stifling of debate within the broad ANC church.

I comment on this movement as if it is mine by birth. It’s as if it was handed down to me by previous generations in my family tree. Actually I think it should be that way. (Maybe an ANC membership card should be passed from generation to generation.)

I believe I breathe more of the spirit of the struggle of the African people — a struggle championed by the ANC — than a bunch of floor-crossers who have in the past defended the most brutal of regimes and now carry party membership cards.

I suspect they are here for the loot.

I think having allowed myself to be influenced by the ideals of this — allow me to speak.
Don’t think I am trying to justify why I should have an opinion on the struggle of the African people. I am not.

I am addressing this matter once and for all so that those “ANC members” who wish to be “ANC owners” may realise this pipe dream will never come to pass. The ANC belongs to the people. Anything else is a lie.

Incumbent president Thabo Mbeki, in his last interview with former Metro FM talk-show host Given Mkhari, says affairs of the ANC, certainly in the minds of the African people, have never really been matters than concern only members of the ANC.

UZizi was responding to a question about whether South Africans were indeed within their space and right to debate the affairs of the ANC.

I lament the goings on in the movement that, I suspect, if they are left to thrive after the Limpopo conference, will destroy the collective dream of the underprivileged to see a better day.

I suspect that the demise of the ANC will mean I will never have a water tap in my home at uMvuzi village, KwaBhaca, in the Eastern Cape.

I cannot see any other political organisation bringing this important source of life to my doorstep if the ANC does not.

If the ANC does not bring this “better life” to me — including an improved quality of life — I suspect that would mean I am doomed to wallow forever in backwardness as my forebears did for the past century.

The existence of the ANC as an organised movement and a powerful political force in our country is therefore, to me, the only hope of seeing a better day.

Leaders pussy-footing and backstabbing each over who should keep the cookie jar are therefore sabotaging my chance at a better life.

The watershed conference in Limpopo in December should therefore not fail me and throw away my dreams along with those of the African people who have yet to taste the fruits of freedom. It dare not fail the people of uMvuzi village.

If those who are busy fighting over who should have his hands on the multibillion-rand cookie jar that comes with running a country do not get their acts together for the sake of millions in our country, what shall become of our dreams?

These millions reduced to being voting cattle face a possibility of being forever reduced to lesser humans with their dignities stripped. Doomed to dwell forever in tin shacks — freezing in winter and being cooked in summer. They shall forever be concentrated on the fringes of South Africa’s bustling cities with no ablution facilities.

These people, my people, should not be sabotaged by a bunch of stooges standing up and saying, “Elect me, I want to be your leader.”

We know our leaders. In fact, I have dispatched three boys to Johannesburg, KwaZulu-Natal and Luthuli House with clear instructions that they should return — in particular — with Cyril, Nkosazana and Kgalema. Open the ring a bit!