ANC Today

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Volume 7, No. 33, 24-30 August 2007
 
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THIS WEEK:

* Letter from the President: SADC returns to Lusaka 
* SAYCO Anniversary: Forging a new generation of young lions 
* A fundamental revolutionary lesson: The enemy manouevres but it remains the
enemy / Part I: The ANC must depend on itself to defend and advance the
democratic revolution!
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LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT

SADC returns to Lusaka

On August 16-17, the Southern African Development Community (SADC), which
incorporates 14 (and potentially 15) countries, held its 27th Ordinary Summit
Meeting of Heads of State and Government in Lusaka, Zambia. To emphasise its
importance, the Summit Meeting was attended by all the SADC Heads of State and
Government. 

(Seychelles, a member of SADC for many years, was not represented because of a
continuing discussion about the membership dues it must pay. The Lusaka Summit,
fully sympathetic to the concerns of Seychelles, expressed its determination to
do everything possible to ensure that this island-state, geographically and
otherwise part of Southern Africa, resumes its rightful place as a fully-fledged
Member of the Development Community.)

The SADC Brigade

Undoubtedly, one of the high points of the Summit Meeting was the launch of the
SADC Regional Peace-keeping Brigade. This military-police-civilian brigade is
made up of personnel drawn from 11 of the member states of SADC. It has been
constituted to respond to the challenges of peace, security and stability that
face our region.

At the same time, it constitutes a component part of the African Union (AU)
Standby Force which Africa is forming to ensure that it has the organised and
multi-skilled force to enable it to respond expeditiously to all situations of
conflict on our Continent. Thus the launch of the SADC Peace-keeping Brigade
represented, in concrete terms, the resolve of our region and continent to rely
on its resources effectively to ensure peace and security throughout Africa.

It was indeed very moving to see the 11 mixed formations, each behind its
national flag for purposes of identification, assembled on the parade grounds at
the Lusaka City Airport. Nobody present at the launch ceremony could have
avoided being moved by the fact that despite the variety of the national flags
that led and identified the various formations, all the members of the Brigade
marched and drilled with great precision, responding to the commands of one
Commanding Officer. 

Clearly, here, at the Lusaka City Airport, the combined political leaders of our
region were presented with a palpable example of the readiness of our region of
Southern Africa to act together, to promote African unity, to bind all countries
of our region to the cause of peace, to guarantee peace, security and stability
on our Continent, and to create the necessary conditions for the defeat of
poverty and underdevelopment in Africa.

For us, as South Africans, the ceremony to launch the SADC Brigade had a special
significance. We were very happy and proud to see members of our National
Defence Force and our Police Service parade together with their comrades from
the rest of our region. We felt immensely proud when Colonel Botman, of the
SANDF, was called upon to assume the position of the bearer of the flag of the
Brigade on the very day that the SADC Brigade was born.

Armed and peaceful

In earlier years, the apartheid armed forces, organised in the SADF, had brought
death and destruction throughout our region. They had acted as an instrument of
destabilisation, destruction, subversion and regime change in the service of the
apartheid regime. Their presence, operations and incursions into virtually all
the SADC countries had brought death, suffering and misery to thousands of
people throughout our region.

Undoubtedly, among the officers from the rest of our region present on the
parade ground at Lusaka City Airport, were nationals of various countries who
had had to take up arms to defend the independence of their countries, which was
under armed attack by forces of aggression that falsely claimed to represent our
interests as South Africans.

At the same time, there were officers from the rest of our region who had worked
with the commanders and cadres of Umkhonto we Sizwe, and the rest of our
movement, out of the public eye even in their own countries, to contribute to
the intensification of the struggle to defeat the apartheid crime against
humanity. They did this knowing that inevitably, the apartheid regime, with a
benign nod from the major Western capitals, would carry out terrorist acts in
their countries, targeting both unarmed members and supporters of our movement,
and the civilians of our host countries.

Recalling all these painful circumstances, during which the apartheid regime
supported the LLA in Lesotho, Super-ZAPU in Zimbabwe, RENAMO in Moçambique, and
UNITA in Angola, and various political formations, we could not but be moved to
tears by the concrete representation of the fact that democratic South Africa
has dedicated all our military capabilities to the cause of peace, friendship,
solidarity and development in our region and Continent. 

We were moved that men and women of the military, police and associated civilian
forces from our region, and their political leaders, openly and unreservedly
expressed confidence in our security forces as reliable partners in the common
struggle to consolidate our region as an African perimeter of peace, democracy
and development.

As President Levy Mwanawasa of Zambia said at the opening session of the SADC
Summit Meeting, it was indeed an important matter of note that SADC was meeting
in Lusaka for the first time since its formation in the same city in 1980 as the
SADCC. As was correctly observed, this was only possible because since 1980,
following the independence of Zimbabwe, both Namibia and South Africa had been
liberated, ending the long period of colonialism and white minority rule on our
Continent.

Regional solidarity 

This statement was significant not only as a celebration of victory, but also as
a signal of what Southern Africa must do to accelerate its advance towards the
eradication of poverty and underdevelopment throughout our region, in the
interest of the masses of the people of our region, who had carried the burden
of the struggle finally to end colonialism and apartheid in Africa and the
world. 

Accordingly and correctly, the Lusaka Summit Meeting focused on the urgent task
to transform the economies of our region, to ensure that as an integrated whole,
they meet the aspirations of the masses of the people of Southern Africa.

In this regard, the Lusaka Summit Meeting was exposed to what can be done.
President Bingu wa Mutharika announced that Malawi would donate 5 000 metric
tons of maize each to Lesotho and Swaziland, in the light of their food
shortages, caused by drought. President Mwanawasa also announced that Zambia had
donated 10 000 metric tons of maize to the World Food Programme (WFP) to be made
available to any SADC country in need.

The Zimbabwe economy

The Summit Meeting also approved the urgent initiation of a process that would
identify the measures that the SADC region should take to assist in the economic
recovery of Zimbabwe. The report prepared by the SADC Secretariat in this regard
says:

“The restoration of the country’s foreign exchange generating capacity through
Balance of Payments support is crucial: however, the most urgent action that is
needed to start this process is to establish lines of credit to enable Zimbabwe
to import inputs for its productive sectors, particularly for agriculture and
foreign currency generating sectors.

“SADC should do all it can to help Zimbabwe address the issue of sanctions,
which is not only hurting the economy through failure to get BoP support and
lines of credit, but also through reduced markets for its products. Sanctions
also damage the image of Zimbabwe, causing a severe blow to her tourist sector.

“Zimbabwe on her part must continue to implement robust policies to reduce the
overvaluation of the exchange rate, to reduce the budget deficit and to control
the growth of domestic credit and money supply which fuel inflation, and to
reduce price distortions in the economy. Equally important is the need to avoid
frequent changes in policy initiatives, which have caused uncertainties and led
to the view that the policy environment is unpredictable.”

In this regard, on Monday, August 20, the Business Day newspaper published a
wholly fabricated story alleging that the SADC leaders were divided over this
report, describing a discussion at the Summit Meeting that never took place.
This is consistent with an unethical practice in sections of our media in terms
of which they manufacture news and information and communicate complete fiction
as the truth.

The newspaper manufactured an unbridgeable “rift” resulting in a non-existent
paralysis among the leaders, arising out of the discussion that never took
place. The fact of the matter is that, acting on the recommendation of the SADC
Organ on Politics, Defence and Security, (the Organ), the SADC Summit Meeting
accepted the report on the Zimbabwe economy, as well as the proposal of the
Organ that our Finance Ministers, in consultation with the Government of
Zimbabwe, should use the report to elaborate specific interventions that could
be made by our region.

The hostile allegation that our countries have recklessly turned their eyes away
from the problems of Zimbabwe, because of the imperatives of solidarity, has
always been nothing more than a product of propaganda, which all thinking
persons would recognise as such. The reality is that in a very real sense the
problems of Zimbabwe are our problems, in the same way that the problems of the
rest of Southern Africa are problems for Zimbabwe as well. Our entire region
stands to benefit most directly from the recovery of Zimbabwe, in much the same
way as Zimbabwe benefits from the progress of the region of Southern Africa, of
which it is an integral and inalienable part.

The Lusaka Summit Meeting reconfirmed these fundamental positions, which include
unqualified respect for the sovereignty of Zimbabwe and the right of its people
to determine their destiny. At no point will SADC and its member states act as a
super-power that has the right to expropriate the people of Zimbabwe of their
right to self-determination, as imperial Britain did.

African unity & regional economic integration 

The Lusaka Summit Meeting agreed that the 2008 normal SADC Summit Meeting, which
will be held in our country, will launch our regional Free Trade Area. This
Summit Meeting will also discuss the decision to transform the SADC region into
a Customs Union by 2010. Before then, detailed work will also be done to prepare
the basis for the radical improvement of all elements of the regional
infrastructure. All this indicates the serious commitment of SADC rapidly to
advance the critically important objective of mutually beneficial regional
integration.

As we have reported before, the July 2007 AU Summit Meeting decided that the
African Regional Economic Communities must serve as the driving force towards
the political and economic unity of Africa. This important decision adds an
important dimension to the historic obligation SADC has, seriously to attend to
the issue of our region’s integration, and its cooperation with other regions of
our Continent.

This is particularly important in the light of the fact that our region conveyed
a united view at the Accra AU Summit Meeting, insisting that the only rational
and possible way to proceed towards the realisation of the objective of a United
States of Africa is “from the bottom up”, with the RECs, such as SADC, serving
as the critical building blocks of the architecture out of which will be
realised the age-old continental dream of African unity.

The 27th Ordinary Summit Meeting of SADC confirmed the determination of our
region to respond to this challenge. The launch of the SADC Brigade, the first
component of the African Union Standby Force, represented a practical
demonstration of the commitment of the peoples of Southern Africa to help give
meaning to the resolve of the peoples of Africa to take their destiny into their
hands. This is confirmed by the fact that the entirety of the AU/UN “hybrid
force” for Darfur, which will include SANDF and SAPS personnel, will be composed
of African personnel.

As we knew and said during the difficult years when Lusaka served as the
Headquarters of the ANC, Africa will be free!

Thabo Mbeki  

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SAYCO ANNIVERSARY <Viewpoint – Kgalema Motlanthe>

Forging a new generation of young lions

The launch of the South African Youth Congress (SAYCO) 20 years ago proved the
determination of the youth of our country to continue the struggle even at the
height of repression. The 'young lions' of 1987 met the challenge of the state
of emergency with a proud roar that continues to reverberate through the hills
and valleys of a free South Africa.

Their determination to realise freedom increased at the very moment that the
regime's response grew more deadly. Their militancy and confidence in final
victory deepened even as the prisons were crowded and the townships occupied.

SAYCO's aims and objectives were clear. Their inaugural congress adopted the
Freedom Charter, demanded the unconditional release of Nelson Mandela and all
political prisoners, and the unbanning of the ANC and other organisations.

As we celebrate the 20th anniversary of SAYCO's birth it is fitting to
acknowledge the role of the Congress of South African Students (COSAS) for their
great sense of initiative. It was COSAS that established a commission in 1982 to
establish youth organisations. Following this, the Youth Congresses emerged
throughout the country, in the Cape, Port Elizabeth, Uitenhage, Soweto,
Alexandra, Huhudi and Lebowa, to name a few. SAYCO brought these militant youth
organisations together. It brought national focus in the struggle to unify and
politicise the progressive youth. With a membership of over half a million and
active support of over two million South African youth, SAYCO immediately became
the United Democratic Front's largest affiliate.

The young people who formed SAYCO in 1987 were the product of the resurgence of
resistance at the heart of the theatre of the South African revolution.
Throughout the history of our struggle each generation of youth had defined its
own tasks on the basis of a sober analysis of the time in which they lived, and
the generation of 1987 built on the solid foundation of this legacy.

The generation of youth that included Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu, Oliver
Tambo, Anton Lembede, AP Mda, Nthatho Motlana, David Bopape, Henry Squire
Makgothi and so many others, realised the need to conduct struggle on all
fronts, including in education. The ANC Youth League injected militancy into the
African National Congress when the time was right for a mass based assault on
the apparatus of state racism.

They articulated a clear and realisable objective: 'Freedom in our Lifetime!'
They understood the instrument they would need to achieve this objective. They
understood and accepted the sacrifices that this struggle would entail and
committed themselves to a lifetime of service to the people.

Their manifesto proclaimed: "Youth is laying its services at the disposal of the
national liberation movement, the African National Congress, in the firm belief,
knowledge and conviction that the cause of Africa must and will triumph."

True to this assertion, the leadership of the ANC Youth League became central in
all the campaigns that the movement embarked on from the moment of their
formation: the campaign to defy unjust laws, the Congress of the People Campaign
which led to the adoption of the Freedom Charter, the treason trial, the anti-
pass campaigns and the formation of Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK). All were marked by
the participation of the 1944-generation at the heart of struggle. Through their
action and clarity of purpose they answered the call made by the then President
General Chief Albert Luthuli when he said we need courage that rises with
danger.

Following the Rivonia trial of 1964, the apartheid state succeeded in
temporarily disrupting the organised machinery of the liberation movement. It
would be almost ten years before the working class sounded the trumpet of
renewed mass action, in the strikes of 1973. In 1976 the youth and students of
Soweto led the way towards a resurgence of resistance, which became the final
battle in the centuries of struggle to defeat an unjust system.

While the machinery of the liberation movement had been temporarily disrupted by
the repression of the1960s, hundreds of activists who were products of the
earlier generation of youth activism remained in harness, ready to take up the
battle and guide the new generation. They were willing and able to provide the
inspiration and wisdom that comes of a lifetime in struggle.

These revolutionaries provided a critical link of continuity between the
militancy of the 1970s and 1980s and the struggles that had preceded them in the
1950s and 1960s. They established a network of political mentors that could give
clear direction to the revival of mass organisation directly in the theatre of
the revolution.

The theatre of the revolution was always on home soil – in the factories,
schools, villages, townships, mine compounds and on the streets of South Africa.
Whether in underground work, MK operations or mass activism, the South African
revolution was forged within South Africa. Those forced into exile or in prison
provided vital and critical rear bases for the conduct of revolutionary
struggle.

They were at all times aware that the theatre of revolution was among the masses
of our people within the country. They understood only too well that revolution
means the mobilisation of social forces, that without the masses there is no
revolution.

The militant path that had been pioneered by the youth of 1944, and opened anew
by the youth of 1976 was ably followed by the generation which formed SAYCO.
Every generation has its own historical obligation. The Young Lions, however,
would have to identify their own approach to struggle in the new conditions of
the revolution. Their task was to be in the trenches of revolutionary struggle,
at the forefront of resistance, and they were not found wanting. Whereas the
earlier generation had called out, "Freedom in our Lifetime", the new generation
said: "Freedom or Death: Victory is Certain!"

The title of young lions was inspired by the heroic battle fought by a young
militant of the ANC called Linda Jabane - the Lion of Chiawelo, so named by ANC
President Oliver Tambo. He had taken up arms and become a militant combatant of
MK. He belonged to a generation of MK combatants who were inspired by a spirit
of no surrender. They were prepared to fight to the death. It was in recognition
and in honour of what he represented that OR Tambo described Linda Jabane as a
young lion. This is how the young lions got their name.

But, like everything else, revolution is not a destination. It is a journey.
While victory has been achieved, in the sense that the racist regime has been
replaced by a democratic order, the revolution is not over. In fact, it has just
begun in earnest following the 1994 democratic elections.

Today, the generation of '87 is playing a leading role in so many parts of our
society – in the public sector, in the corporate sector, in academia, and in
politics. In all these areas we are facing the challenge of transformation. How
do we avoid the danger of ourselves being transformed by the institutions we
participate in, by the state, by the corporate sector? How does the generation
of SAYCO help us to unpack the problems of transformation and reduce them into
clear tasks?

Twenty years ago the programme of SAYCO tried to explain to the youth how our
society was structured, and what were the historical processes that led to the
present challenges. 

However, we should caution against the mistake of slavishly copying the 'young
lions'. Rather they ought to learn from the good example of SAYCO and determine
their own slogans relevant to today's challenges. This means adapting the
content of revolution in a world that has been changed by the sacrifices of
those who came before.

The task of youth is not to bask in the glory of earlier generations. Its vital
work in mobilising social forces in contemporary conditions cannot be
overshadowed by the heroism of the past. New heroes, with new ideas and new
revolutionary skills are required for the new society and new struggles we face.
Just as in the past, the new generation must define new tasks which are
appropriate for the present.

At the centre of these tasks is the question of education. Education is central
in giving impetus to the forces of production. It is essential for progress. It
is not a cost, but an investment in the future. We must therefore continue to
support the call for free and compulsory education.

The young lions said, "Freedom or Death! Victory is Certain!" But, freedom means
recognition of necessity. For it to have meaning it must acknowledge and
correspond to necessity. Whenever our government delivers a brick and mortar
house to a homeless family or anybody living in a lean-to shack, it is not for
the ANC to gloat about that but to remain very close to the recipients. Taking
delivery of a new electrified house simultaneously multiplies the needs of the
recipients. When the recipients of the new house are confronted by the need for
various electrical gadgets or home implements the ANC must be with them to help
in finding solutions to such challenges.

The youth of '76 and '87 were fortunate that in their midst they could draw on a
network of cadres and revolutionaries, who had remained in harness throughout
their lives. They could learn the lessons of the past, emulate their experiences
and reformulate the challenges of the present. The youth of today also need
revolutionary mentors of this nature. And we hope that the SAYCO generation will
come forward to mentor COSAS leaders and members considering that COSAS was the
midwife who delivered SAYCO. 

We call upon the leaders of SAYCO who are still in our midst to remain steadfast
to the aims and goals of revolution. To quote Yusuf Dadoo's tribute to Moses
Kotane: "In the life of every nation, there arise men who leave an indelible and
eternal stamp on the history of their peoples; men who are both products and
makers of history. And when they pass they leave a vision of a new and better
life and the tools with which to win and build it."

** Kgalema Motlanthe is ANC Secretary General. This is an edited extract from a
speech on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the formation of the South
African Youth Congress (SAYCO), 18 August 2007.

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A FUNDAMENTAL REVOLUTIONARY LESSON: THE ENEMY MANOUEVRES BUT IT REMAINS THE
ENEMY / PART I

The ANC must depend on itself to defend and advance the democratic revolution!

It is a fundamental truism of all revolutions that to guarantee its victory,
every revolution must learn to defend itself. Necessarily, the task to lead the
struggle for the defence of any revolution falls squarely on the shoulders of
both the vanguard formation and the masses which constituted the combat troops
of the victorious revolution.

This task cannot be delegated to any other organisation or to different
fractions of the masses of the people. Neither should we, as revolutionary
democrats, expect approval or judge our success on the basis of endorsement by
our historical opponents. This fundamental law of revolution, in all its
elements, also applies to our national democratic revolution. 

This means that our movement, the ANC, and the multi-class black masses whose
struggle and sacrifices led to the historic political victory of 1994, have the
obligation to defend their victory and use this success to build the national
democracy focused on the creation of a united, non-racial, non-sexist and
prosperous South Africa, depending on their own strength.

This requires that the ANC and the revolutionary democratic masses it led and
leads must, at all times and in all field of human activity, assert and exercise
their hegemony as the leader of the process of the fundamental social and
national democratic transformation of our country. Both in the field of theory
and in practical activity, this united force must act resolutely and
successfully to protect and advance its interests.

It has been perfectly obvious ever since the victory of the democratic
revolution in 1994 that the forces opposed to our revolution would not give up
their offensive to weaken, defeat and destroy the ANC, the leader of our
democratic revolution. Current developments in our country stand out as a
concrete expression of this offensive.

The tactics of our historical opponents may and will change from time to time,
as will the theatres of struggle they choose. None of this will signify a change
in the nature of our opponents and the outcomes they seek. Like commanding
officers in conditions of military combat, we must understand that the enemy
manoeuvres but it remains the enemy!

The Jacobin option

The primary motive force of our national democratic revolution, the ANC and the
revolutionary democratic masses it leads, is the principal architect of
democracy in our country. It is also the main guarantor of the process of
national reconciliation, which has even given the historical forces of reaction,
of various hues, the possibility to continue to exist and freely represent their
views and interests within our evolving national democracy.

Wisely or otherwise, and by conscious decision of our movement and the masses it
leads, our national democratic revolution has deliberately avoided any resort to
the “Jacobin option”. It has therefore not used revolutionary force to suppress
and destroy its historical opponents, as did the English, French, Russian,
Chinese and many other revolutions.

This means that the motive force of our national democratic revolution, the ANC
and the masses it leads, must defend and advance the democratic revolution
conscious of the reality of the continuing existence and vibrancy of exactly the
same forces that had, to one degree or another, opposed the victory of the
national democratic revolution.

We must also recognise the reality that this situation makes it very easy for
some who might have been inspired temporarily to attach themselves to the
ascendant revolution to change their positions. This includes those who might
find greater comfort among, and in the positions advanced by a necessarily
sophisticated opposition to the political vanguard of national democratic
revolution, in the aftermath of the victory of the democratic revolution.

It also encompasses those who, for partisan reasons, might find themselves
acting in collusion with the ideological opposition forces which would
consciously avoid presenting themselves as opponents of the national democratic
revolution, while openly positioning themselves as adversaries of the vanguard
movement of the national democratic revolution.

In our determined effort to build our national democracy in these challenging
circumstances, we have sought to avoid highlighting the fundamental fissures in
our society that defined the centuries-old and bitter conflict and
contradictions which were “resolved”, in part, by the 1994 democratic victory.

However, what has happened since then, and given prominence by the most recent
events, has brought to the fore the critical importance for the vanguard
movement of the national democratic revolution, the ANC, and the revolutionary
democratic masses, unequivocally and without apology, to assert and exercise
their hegemony as the leader of the process of the fundamental social
transformation of our country.

Of the greatest importance in this regard is the incontestable objective reality
that in successive democratic elections since 1994, our movement, the ANC, the
vanguard of the national democratic revolution, has been confirmed with ever-
increasing majorities as the trusted leader and representative of the masses of
our people. 

We must therefore exercise the hegemony we have spoken of not on the basis of
access to superior access to repressive force, as has happened elsewhere on our
Continent and other parts of the world, but on the basis of the democratic and
popular mandate of the majority that was the victim of colonial and apartheid
oppression and super-exploitation.

Our historical opponents

The first echelon of the opponents of this majority is composed of those who
opposed the national liberation struggle, and therefore the national democratic
revolution, whom the national democratic revolution deliberately let be, having
decided against the Jacobin option. We will now proceed to mention some of
these.

The principal political opponent of our movement and struggle was constituted by
the succession of organised political formations that espoused white racist
superiority as their fundamental outlook, culminating with the National Party
(NP). 

In the aftermath of the 1994 victory, the democratic revolution took no steps to
suppress this and other formations. Accordingly and similarly, it also did
nothing to suppress the Democratic Party, and the successor Democratic Alliance,
when these used the racist positions of the NP to secure the support of a still
racist white minority.

The white population as a whole supported the system of white minority
domination and willingly participated in the struggle to defeat the national
democratic struggle. However, the national democratic revolution did nothing to
oppress or disintegrate the classes and strata that constituted the white
population, including depriving them of their democratic rights and property,
and destroying the organisations they had created.

The democratic order also inherited the state machinery created during the long
period of colonialism and apartheid. This included the personnel which populated
this machinery. The democratic revolution instituted various measures to
transform this machinery and change its personnel peacefully and gradually,
without resort to the Jacobin option. Essentially, it relied, instead, on
persuasion and financial incentives.

This has also meant that the democratic revolution took no action fundamentally
to dismantle the repressive machinery established by the apartheid state. Even
the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), created to help our democracy to
bury the past through open disclosure of past wrongs, without retribution, did
not help us to achieve this objective, despite the outstanding work done by the
TRC Amnesty Committee. Among other things, this means that:

* we did not succeed to uncover the networks at all levels of society
established as part of the so-called National Security Management System; 
* we didnot succeed to uncover the army of thousands of intelligence agents,
informers and their handlers, who constituted a critical part of the apartheid
repressive machinery;
* we have former apartheid agents in the ranks of the political formations in
our country, in the machinery of the democratic state, in business, the
professions, including the universities and the media, and civil society in
general, who will voluntarily act in a manner consistent with what they did in
the past, or submit to blackmail by their former “handlers” to advance a
reactionary agenda; and,
* some of those who served within the apartheid machinery have not given up
their objective specifically to defeat the ANC. 

Despite our access to statepower, which has enabled us to gather information not
disclosed during the TRC process, and in other ways, the ANC and our government
have chosen not to use the possibility they have, to confront those who, in
reality, served as part of the apartheid forces of repression. This remains an
important part of the uncompleted part of the TRC and related processes, which
must be addressed.

Let a hundred flowers bloom

We acceded to power in a situation in which, naturally, many institutions in our
country, including business, the universities, the media and other sectors, were
inspired by political and ideological perspectives with which we disagreed.
Deliberately, the democratic revolution did not use state power to suppress
these perspectives. Rather, we adopted the position – let a hundred flowers
bloom: let a hundred schools of thought contend!

We were and remain confident that precisely in the context of this contest of a
hundred schools of thought, the views of the national democratic revolution
would and will emerge triumphant in the minds of the masses of our people. 

The necessary corollary of this is that despite our identification of various
ideas and perspectives as being inimical to the national democratic revolution,
we nevertheless allowed the proponents of these the space to propagate them.
This was, and is, consistent with our historic task to discharge our
responsibility as our country’s principal architect and defender of democracy,
including the freedom of speech. 

Consistent with this, during the period preceding, as well as during the
Constitutional negotiations, and afterwards, our movement made and has made
every effort to accommodate the plurality of views that constitute our inherited
polity. Even during the years when we have had the required majority radically
to change our Constitution, our country’s basic law, we have done nothing to
change the fundamental socio-economic order that was negotiated in the period
between 1990 and 1996.

The hegemony of political power

In the period since the political victory of the national democratic revolution
in 1994, we have experienced an intense and sustained contest to define the
tasks of this revolution. This has manifested itself in various struggles
against the ANC, within the ANC, within the broad democratic movement, and in
society as a whole. Interventions in this regard have been made both from within
our country and from elsewhere in the rest of the world.

With regard to the latter, we would like to recall the bold statement made by a
member of the then US Administration, many years ago, that – South Africa is too
important to be left to the South Africans! Taking into account what has been
happening during the years of our democracy, and the antecedent period, it is
clear that this view is shared by both leftist and rightist forces within the
global community. 

Again, the democratic revolution did nothing to obstruct the intrusion of
external leftist and rightist ideas, and their foreign representatives, into our
national space, consistent with the conviction of the motive force of the
national democratic revolution that its fundamental nature dictated that it
should uphold the objective of establishing a truly open society.

Nothing we have said subtracts from the reality that our movement, and the
masses it leads, have a revolutionary responsibility to assert and exercise
their hegemony as the leader of the process of the fundamental social
transformation of our country, without which the democratic revolution would
have no meaning.

On the political and ideological plane, the exercise of this hegemony is
challenged both from the left and the right. Consistent with what has happened
in other countries in the past, more often than nought, this left and right
opposition usually comes together in the political positions it expresses and
fights for. 

We are our own liberators

Thus, actual social practice must serve as the teacher of the national
democratic movement as it strives to assert and exercise its hegemony as the
leader of the process of the fundamental social transformation of our country,
without which, as we have said, the democratic revolution would have no meaning.

This extensive but necessary introduction to this short series, without whose
understanding our democratic revolution cannot discharge its responsibilities,
lays the basis for a revolutionary understanding of the ideological, political
and organisational struggles that have been a feature of our recent and current
reality, and what we must do as a truly independent revolutionary democratic
movement.

As an integral part of the struggles to which we have referred, the opponents of
our movement have sought to present their interpretations of various issues that
confront the democratic revolution as constituting elements of a revolution in
crisis. Thus they have sought to argue that our revolution will succeed, and
achieve universal acclaim as a successful revolution, if it responds to a whole
variety of matters according to their prescriptions, directives and wishes!

The media speaks

In this regard the opponents of our democratic revolution, who lack a
significant political base among the masses of our people, have sought to use
the domestic and international media as one of their principal offensive
instruments, to turn it into an organised formation opposed to the national
democratic revolution and its vanguard movement. Because of this objective
reality, which is not of our making, this short series will, in part, rely on
what some in the media say. 

The cover page of the July 13, 2007 edition of the South African weekly business
journal, Financial Mail (FM), carried the title “A nation adrift”, referring to
our country. This was done to advertise a feature series, comprising four
articles, which sought to argue that our 13-year-old democracy is immersed in a
crisis. 

Whatever the intentions of the authors of these articles, which we do not know
and on which we cannot comment, obviously what the journal would achieve, first
because of its cover page, would be to tell the story that once again, and as
expected, yet another African country, South Africa, was sliding towards the
dismal failure that necessarily characterises the African continent!

The lead article of the series is headed “Can the centre hold?”, to implant in
the minds of the readers the idea of a failing state. (A poem by Yeats says:
“Things fall apart. The centre cannot hold. Mere anarchy is loosed upon the
world.”) This lead article was contributed by the editor of the journal, Mr
Barney Mthombothi.

The introduction to the series, immediately preceding Mr Mtombothi’s article
says:

“In the twilight of Thabo Mbeki's presidency, a silent mood of trepidation, fear
and helplessness seems to be stalking the land; things seem to be getting out of
hand. Violence and all manner of danger to the citizens are the rage. Anarchy
reigns in discrete parts of the country. People aren't safe. Government can't
protect them. It looks confused and flustered. Without a safe environment and a
sense of comfort, it becomes difficult to build a growing economy and a stable
future. Though corporate SA continues to support government's economic and
business programme, a sense of disquiet is creeping into the business psyche as
the fractious struggle for power within the ANC threatens to undermine the
economic and commercial gains of the Mbeki years.”

The opening paragraph of Mr Mthobothi’s article says: “In the past few years,
especially since dismissing his deputy Jacob Zuma, Mbeki and his government have
seemed tentative, unsure, almost unable to deal with critical issues confronting
the country. He seems to think things will sort themselves out. The sense of
gloom is captured in recent events.” 

The media and society

By merely reading the limited text from the Financial Mail we have cited,
without exposure to the rest, any normal human being would begin to experience a
sense of great unease about the future of our country. The central question that
would vex the very soul of the citizen – and others in the world interested in
the future of our country – would be, will the South African democracy survive!

Naturally, many of our people depend on media reports to gain an understanding
of our objective reality. However, unfortunately, almost all of us, including
our intelligentsia, are not exposed to such journals as the New York Review of
Books. If we were, we would have gained some insight into the place of the media
in contemporary society.

An article entitled “Goodbye to Newspapers?” by Russell Baker, in Volume 54,
Number 13 · August 16, 2007 of the Review, says:

“The American press has the blues. Too many authorities have assured it that its
days are numbered: too many good newspapers are in ruins. It has lost too much
public respect…It is easily bullied into acquiescing in the designs of a
presidential propaganda machine determined to dominate the news…Then there are
the embarrassments: hoaxers like Jayson Blair and Stephen Glass turn journalism
into farce. The elite Washington press corps is bamboozled into helping a circle
of neoconservative connivers create the Iraq war. What became of
heroes?...Instead of heroes, today’s table talk is about journalistic frauds and
a Washington press too dim to stay out of a three-card-monte game.”

With regard to our own media, which seems to thrive on marketing the negative
and underplaying the positive, with little regard to the objective reality that
ours is a society going through a complex and exciting period of truly
revolutionary change, we too must ask the question – where are the heroic
journalists and scholars who will tell the whole truth, and nothing but the
truth, about the unprecedented process of the rebirth of our country!

** Part II of this series will be published in our next edition. 

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