Cope's flirting with 'imperialists' and 'white interest'

Recent utterances from Cope Youth Movement (CopeYM) leaders on a potential strategic cooperation with other opposition parties stand as a testament to a total lack of political education and complete ignorance about political strategy.

Such unfortunate and lamentable actions will not only harm the prospects and interests of the broader organisation in the long run, but also serves as a severe indictment against the character and integrity of the Youth Movement.

This utter claptrap has included labelling the Democratic Alliance as “imperialists”, their cause as the “white interest” and being outright resistant to even preliminary talks on cooperation while making unsubstantiated and unfounded claims about Cope’s youth.

Simplistically this can be labelled as “desperation and grandstanding“. While the casual observer can easily ignore it and move on, nobody in Cope or CopeYM should be as foolish as to not take heed of the dangerous faultlines these events have exposed.

Allegations of racial prejudice are not unfounded and in serious contradiction with the party’s vision and principles endeavouring for a non-racial, inclusive South Africa devoid of racial divisions and inequality and striving to heal the wounds of the past. As a white person I’d be very interested to know what exactly this “white interest” is and why it is irrationally associated with only one political organisation.

Racial prejudice, while a grave issue, is but the tip of the iceberg and can easily cloud a much deeper, more disconcerting, four-fold and problematic reality. Fortunately this is not irreparable, but will require an immense, conscious effort to address.

Such statements reflect an untransformed organisational culture directly inherited from the ANCYL merely transplanted into the new organisation without resolving obvious contradictions with the vision and principles of Cope. The language and tactics are virtually indistinguishable from the complete drivel emanating from the likes of Julius Malema and Floyd Shivambu. This is compounded by a lack of effective political (re-)education reflected in the hurling around of words that are unqualified and unsubstantiated, even completely misused, misunderstood and irrelevant to the points at hand. This is also quite reminiscent of the ANCYL’s bandying about of words like “reactionary”, “counter-revolutionary” and “imperialist” when it is clear that they have absolutely no idea of what they’re talking about.

Additionally, the total absence of a media and communications strategy, let alone an effective one, further brings to the fore these faultlines and leaves everyone with egg on their faces. The handling of press, statements and speeches has an appallingly amateurish air about it and shouts of the desperate need for competent PR officers and speech writers. CopeYM leadership’s handling of the media has thus far made the wing one of the few exceptions to the adage that “there’s no such thing as bad publicity”.

Furthermore, without even adequately investigating or convincingly arguing against a strategic cooperation initiative among opposition parties, CopeYM’s leadership’s outright rejection of talks between Cope and the DA points to a wholesale failure to demonstrate a grasp of even basic political strategy. It is also unfortunate that, despite the multi-party reach of the talks, inflammatory statements are only directed at the DA, singled out from among the three other organisations. There is also not even a mention of the potential disadvantages or advantages (which, in my analysis, outweigh the former) of such an initiative or a demonstration of a sufficient understanding of the realities of undertaking an effective local government election campaign.

Any sensible and pragmatic person would observe that where DA and Cope policies differ, they are in general not incompatible and the profiles these organisation’s support bases are not in conflict. Additionally, any sensible and pragmatic person would look at the outcomes of the 2009 provincial election results and identify strategic focus areas like the Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan Municipality: an immensely strategic municipality in which the ANC, in the aforementioned elections, managed to get only 49.64 %. Thus, if the outcomes of a local government election were solely proportional, the ANC would have failed to gather even a simple majority. It will also then be observed that Cope, the UDM, DA and ID received a cumulative 47.72% in this municipality. Although this is not enough to secure a majority coalition, it is worthwhile considering consolidating and extending this electoral support to produce an opposition victory.

In short, the only way this can be done is through strategic cooperation by these parties that effectively target specific wards in which they know they have potential to grow avoiding splitting the opposition vote on ward ballots and focusing on their own particular strongholds.

Sadly, this logic escapes CopeYM’s leadership which is busy publicly discrediting and attacking Cope’s national leadership and the DA. I believe an applicable expression would be “people who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones” because observers will just point and laugh as your house comes tumbling down.

Until all of this is resolved and effectively addressed, CopeYM’s claims to be a legitimate wing of a modern, dynamic and progressive force in South African politics advancing a “new agenda of change and hope” is an unconvincing joke, albeit a tragic one that rings hollow.