A letter to Buti Manamela

An open-and-shut letter to Buti Manamela

Dear Comrade Buti,

The Young so-called Communist League is battling to remain relevant. I am making this bold statement because I know that though you may disagree with it you will understand it perfectly. Two years ago I wrote with appreciation for the work that your organisation was doing especially in downtown Johannesburg with the good Bishop Paul Verryn. Needless to say that in the recent onslaught by the incompetents who have never bothered to do anything to arrest that situation, you have been conspicuous by your silence. Besides this half-baked involvement in this cause, you have since let me down with your persistence to shamefully label those who disagree with you “baboons” and feel no twitch of embarrassment about it.

I could excuse this kind of conduct if it came from someone who got a G in matric and had never seen the inside of a lecture room. But you were groomed by the student movement and so some level of grey matter in the character of your engagement is expected. There is something uneducated about a failure to appreciate diverse views and a stint, no matter how minimal, at a university or even a technikon in the case of your respectable self, would have been expected to do a world of good to your perspective. That is why your stunt to sideline and harass Professor Pityana early this year, was an exercise in shame. And so I conclude that it was maybe an attempt to remain relevant at the expense of the intellectual freedom of a person of Pityana’s stature who is intellectually miles ahead of your entire alliance leadership combined. Needless to say he has triumphed over your mindless campaign to discredit him and bring the University of South Africa (Unisa) into disrepute.

It is a total shame that instead of taking the crisis of the so-called lack of transformation to the Unisa council you sought to cowardly cushion Mathews Phosa, the chairman of that council and an ANC apparatchik, freeing the ultimate authority of that institution from taking a shred of responsibility simply because of how you wear your party political blinkers. Similarly amateurish were your tactics to involve Blade Nzimande as higher education minister. To his credit he saw through your cheap shenanigans of wanting to ultimately discredit him in the eyes of the entire sector that he must lead over for the next five years.

This pedestrian episode brings me to the attention-seeking and totally ridiculous call about prosecuting Mbeki for genocide. Like your unwarranted attack on Joel Netshitenze for merely being gifted, this must rank as one of the most banal things you have let yourself believe. A simple fact should have jocked your memory: during the so-called age of madness Mbeki was president of the ANC and therefore a leader of the alliance of which you were a part. The YCL said bugger all about his policy on Aids at the time — in fact a quick search can reveal that the YCL would have thrown their weight with Mbeki against the likes of the Treatment Action Campaign at the time.

I am happy to be proven wrong as I don’t have the time to go through the drivel to find out otherwise. This conduct of silence should make you an immediate accessory to the crime you are accusing Mbeki of. So given the utter logical bankruptcy of this campaign I can only conclude that it was all about keeping the YCL relevant in the face of turning of tables by the ANCYL, who are setting the agenda of public discourse no matter how misguided, no matter how uncouth.

Nevertheless, since you have burst into the circuit of the serious, let me suggest a few other campaigns that could be more useful to your political ego trip and keep the YCL relevant:

Campaign for the removal of Blade Nzimande as secretary-general of the SACP. His quest to hold both positions is as greedy as his taste for sheer driving pleasure. This campaign should free up his post for your contestation after all we will need someone to balance your counterpart, Mbalula, at the mother body.

Campaign for the separation of Gwede Mantashe’s dual leadership position. How on earth your SACP chairperson has enough time to run both organisations would boggle the mind if only the SACP was a serious operation.

Campaign for the declaration of the business interests of the SACP, ANC and Cosatu top six unions including all your treasurers in particular. You have already alleged that some amongst them have unholy links with labour brokers hence their so called “unprincipled” stance on your call for the careless and wanton banning of labour brokers regardless of the millions of job losses that will follow like day follows night.

As a member of parliament, who has not really made any communist waves, and being secretary of the YCL I believe these worthy campaigns will go a long way in making you remain more relevant than the bogus call for the prosecution of your intellectual nemesis whose only sin was to implement the mandate of your estranged alliance. I hope all these suggestions don’t fall on deaf ears. I am making these suggestions because I remain an admirer of your prowess. Let’s make the YCL truly relevant.

Yours frankly,

Onkgopotse JJ Tabane