ANC secretary-general Fikile Mbalula has taken offence over SACP general secretary Solly Mapaila’s remarks that the ANC has sold out by going to bed with the DA.
Mbalula believes such remarks demonstrate the “ideological paralysis” that the communists are suffering from regarding the ANC-led government of national unity (GNU).
He said this during a wide-ranging interview with the Sunday World Engage podcast, responding to comments Mapaila made at the trade union Nehawu ‘s political school launch this week.
Mapaila poured his heart out about how the SACP tried, in vain, to push the ANC towards a coalition deal with the leftist EFF but failed because the ANC had become a sell-out organisation.
Mbalula took exception to this label and promised to challenge Mapaila and his communist colleagues at the Alliance Political Council, a platform where the ANC, SACP and Cosatu national office-bearers meet behind closed doors.
“In that statement [by Mapaila], there is ideological paralysis because our allies are SACP, Cosatu and Sanco. The DA, EFF, and uMkhonto we Sizwe are not our friends, nor are they close to the ANC ideologically unless it happened while I was sleeping,” said Mbalula.
“There are inherent weaknesses in relation to that conceptualisation that [in the GNU]power has been given to the conservatives and the liberals instead of the progressives.
“It is a matter we need to grapple with in the Alliance Political Council. It is a question of political education and engagement in this regard because the word sell-out is thrown loosely.”
During his speech at the Nehawu political school launch this week, where anti-GNU sentiment predominated, Mapaila got into trouble with Mbalula. According to him, he even cut short his grieving period after losing his brother so he could try to knock some sense into the heads of his ANC comrades.
He told the Nehawu shop stewards that he met EFF deputy president Floyd Shivambu and ANC leaders in efforts to forge consensus. “It would be better to be irritated by the EFF in cabinet than to be irritated by the neo-liberal forces who want to be dominant and take control of the revolution,” Mapaila attacked.
“We agreed this was the new strategy but some of the comrades in the ANC, particularly this neo-liberal faction, were too impatient. Everyone is furious and angry; the ANC has sold out.”
Mbalula disagrees and believes the communists are not the only ones battling to understand the ANC’s GNU move.
The songs sung during the same event, where Mapaila fired missiles in the ANC’s direction, also surprised him. One such song that dominated plenary had lyrics that directly denounced the GNU arrangement, saying, “Asiyufuni i-GNU, hhayi hhayi hhayi. Thina sifuna iState Power,” loosely translated, “we reject the GNU; workers want state power”.
In Mbalula’s view, these shop stewards are confused. “If not GNU, who? Then they answer it, saying, ‘You should have worked with black political parties’ but who are those parties? We gave them a report after an engagement with those political parties about where they stand.
“We did not look for blackness; we looked for the GNU to work with everybody and to form government with the ANC, recognised as the largest expression of the will of the people of South Africa, and all the partners have respected that.”
Mbalula said the ANC had not deviated from any of its policies, adding that the GNU was not a permanent solution for people to act in this manner.
