Alliance hits its sell-by date
by
2009-12-20 14:00
DOES the ANC still need its alliance partners, namely the SACP and Cosatu, given the recent boiling tension between the ANC Youth League and the SACP?
I don’t think so. It appears the SACP wants to advance its communist agenda using the ANC. Why else is the party not planning to go it alone in the next elections if it so believes that communism is the way to go? The young communists have persistently proposed that the party go it alone.
Isn’t it hypocritical of Blade Nzimande to serve as Minister of Higher education and Training in the ANC-led government and then criticise the ruling party when he wears the SACP cap?
During former president Thabo Mbeki’s reign, the alliance partners were alienated, so to speak.
So bad were the relations that Mbeki once told the alliance not to interfere in the ANC’s affairs.
However, his mishandling of the Cosatu and SACP relations partly resulted in his downfall.
President Jacob Zuma’s career was resuscitated by the so-called left (read Cosatu and SACP) – Mbeki’s nemesis – after Zuma was cast into the political wilderness by Mbeki. And now the left wants a handsome return on its investment – catapulting Zuma to the presidency.
The challenge for Zuma is to maintain good relations between the ANC and its alliance. Is he succeeding? According to the SACP, relations have improved since Zuma became president. Interestingly, tensions are already simmering between the ruling party and the communists.
Zuma is failing to show leadership on the challenge facing the alliance.
Additionally, nothing suggests that relations between the nationalists, communists and socialists will improve as the communists would have us believe.
This is history repeating itself. Isn’t it time that the so-called strategic alliance come to an end?
Thabile Mangeemail