ANC first deputy Secretary-General Nomvula Mokonyane paints a bleak picture of the party’s relationship with its alliance partner, the SA Communist Party (SACP).
While the ANC wants the partnership to continue, Mokonyane says the organisation cannot “abuse itself in a relationship where there is total rejection”.
“We were the partner that kept saying, ‘If you no longer love me, let us use my feelings for you and try to keep the relationship together’,” she explained.
Dual membership set to end
That is why the party’s highest decision-making body between conferences, the National Executive Committee, has resolved to end dual membership between the two parties.
Mokonyane was speaking on the sidelines of the ANC National General Council at the Birchwood Hotel and OR Tambo Conference Centre in Boksburg On Tuesday.
The ANC’s four-day NGC will mull over this decision behind closed doors. This is what could end as the party’s greatest heartbreak since severing ties with former president Jacob Zuma.
Mokonyane raises the issue of dual membership in the context of election campaigning. She believes it is impossible to campaign for both parties.
“Hence why the issue is about how we move forward. The reality is that you cannot wear a red T-shirt at 9am and go door-to-door saying ‘vote for the Communist Party’, and at 3pm come to the same street and say ‘vote ANC’.
Lessons learnt from Zuma saga
“We are fishing from the same pond. This ANC must take expression. And this NGC must take a decision so that we do not do what we did with Zuma: prolong the pain and become a casualty,” she said.
The SACP took a resolution to contest elections independently at its 2024 conference. Since then, the ANC has been working tirelessly to persuade the party to rescind this resolution and find other modalities to contest under the ANC banner.
While SACP chairperson Blade Nzimande has suggested that the party call an early conference to reverse the decision, he has lost the debate within the Central Committee.
The dominant view to fly solo, spearheaded by SACP general secretary Solly Mapaila, continues to prevail.
