Thu, 7 Feb 2008 22:42:09



THE BREAKUP OF ANC LEADERSHIP IN SOUTH AFRICA

ANC (African National Congress) in collaboration with the South African Communist Party (SACP) and the Congress of South African Trade Unions(COSATU) was the tripartite alliance that brought down the WHITE MINORITY REGIME(Apartheid) in South Africa.

Well, things are about to change and this grand organization is about to collapse. The methods being used to bring this alliance to the ground are similar to those used to neutralize KANU at the dawn of Kenyan independence.

The ODM party needs to understand the importance of a strong united party because the public is counting on them. These leaders must hang together or they will be hanged separately. Disunity is an exploiter lethal weapon. A weak opposition party cannot mount any formidable opposing view against anybody who is hell bent to leave everybody behind.

Apparently, democracy means leaving many, many people behind and foreign investors are determined to ensure that there is no party strong enough to help the common man! They are willing to bust the trade unions, jail, use tribalism or eliminate anybody who dares to stand in their way.

The common man is then discouraged from participating in the political system, allowing the rich and the well connected to do pretty much what they want without a challenge from any quarters. People are beaten to submission!! Foreign Aids are there to ensure that the "window curtain" government does not collapse. This is what is happening in Kenya and many countries in the Africa South of the Sahara Desert.


William Gumede: This vote heralds the break-up of the ANC

Sunday, 23 December 2007

Such is the electoral dominance of the African National Congress in South Africa that all the politics that matters takes place in the former liberation movement. The complacency that such dominance breeds is what lies behind the humiliating defeat of Thabo Mbeki in the election for the party leadership by his rival, Jacob Zuma, who is now in prime position to succeed Mbeki as president in 2009 if he is not found guilty of corruption.

But the result, and the likely fallout, may hasten an outcome that is essential for the long-term health of democracy in South Africa: the break-up of the ANC tripartite alliance with the South African Communist Party (SACP) and the Cosatu trade union federation. What was a broad-based liberation movement will have to become at least two political parties creating its own government and opposition.

The Achilles heel of South Africa's democracy is its weak opposition parties. Coupled with the ANC's overwhelming majority, the result has been diminished trust in government, politicians, democratic institutions, and the ANC's leadership. Despite presiding over the longest economic boom since 1981, Mbeki became increasingly unpopular, not least because so many poor black South Africans, the alliance's core membership, were seeing so little benefit.

The president's remoteness and the spectacular complacency of his ruling circle were reinforced by the lack of opposition. This meant that Mbeki could question the existence of Aids while millions were dying of the disease; could dismiss rampant crime as a "figment of white imagination", as his police minister described it; and could, days before the conference that ousted him, bitterly attack an independent survey showing that the poorest in South Africa have become poorer since 1996. Voters have reacted the only way they could, by staying away from the polls.

In the last general elections, in 2004, only 58 percent of those entitled to vote did so, compared with 64 per cent in 1999 and 85 per cent in 1994. The lack of electoral competition is compounded by a proportional system that gives voters no say in who goes to parliament, only what parties they represent. Since parties select candidates, MPs are more accountable to the party leadership than the electorate.

Tensions within the ANC grew with Mbeki's attempts to make it an even broader church by incorporating forces more in tune with his market-friendly, centrist policies. Thus the party of apartheid, the National Party, merged with the ANC, and members of the Zulu nationalist Inkatha Freedom Party joined in droves. For many ANC members these changes have been too quick and too much.

Mbeki himself has said publicly, in the early 1980s and again in the early 1990s, that in a "normalised" South Africa the ANC would split from its alliance partners, becoming a centre-left party, the other two forming a new party further to the left. One suspects not without reason that this lay behind his efforts to bring new elements into the ANC.

The succession battle has opened divisions between the left, rallied by Zuma, and the centrist wing that will be difficult to heal. If Zuma is prosecuted, his supporters will call it a witch-hunt, adding to the pressure for a political reconfiguration.

Last week's leadership contest was the ANC's first competitive election in 58 years, and the democratic space it has opened will be difficult to close, no matter who leads the ANC or the country.

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/
william-gumede-this-vote-heralds-the-breakup-of-the-anc-766929.html


What to look for in an opponent is the the weakness. Use that weaknes to bring him down. They do not want a populist like Hugo Chavez. A Populist is supported by the people and a way must be found to soften that support. The way the two freedom fighters are being described is quite telling. I do not understand how these people were able to convince Nelson Mandela that his statue should be erected in London. This guy is being used to demolish Africans in South Africa and everywhere else!!

QUOTE

Mr Zuma is self-confident but not bright. Mr Mbeki is bright but insecure. Mr Zuma is affable, expansive and good with a crowd. Mr Mbeki is uptight. Mr Zuma is an African traditionalist who looks good in a leopardskin and knows how to wield a big ceremonial stick. Mr Mbeki is a pipe-smoking, whisky-drinking, Shakespeare-quoting Sussex University academic who affects to portray himself as an African renaissance man.

When in an interview the other day Mr Mbeki scorned the notion of a leader being chosen on the strength of "how well he dances", he revealed how out of touch he was. Everybody else at that conference has been dancing. Mr Mandela used to dance, and they loved him for it. Mr Zuma dances and, without opening his mouth, without spouting one clever argument, he has the crowd in his hand.

You look at Mr Zuma and what you see is a black South African writ large. Big-smiling, affable, warm. When he opens his mouth to speak at this conference, he won't be taut and tense and afraid to let his passions rip.

But it is the sense in which Mr Mbeki's aloof manner is perceived by so many in the ANC to reflect a solitary, extraterrestrial style of government which has been the clincher for Mr Zuma; the secret of the support he has received, for all his flaws. If Mr Zuma is chummy, cuddly, "one of the boys", then that means he will be chummy and cuddly in the way he governs. Parliament and the ANC branches will be part of the decision-making process; they won't be scorned by a brainbox leader.

Or so, at any rate, goes the logic of the heart to which Mr Zuma appeals. That's the message more by body language than by words that Mr Zuma is transmitting. And it is an effective one right now; so effective that it has propelled a man who on the substance is one of the least qualified to run the ANC, let alone the country, within an inch of so doing.

As of yesterday, feeling in Polokwane ran high and the political energy was more visibly (and audibly) aligned with Mr Zuma. With voting not due till today or tomorrow, and with the Mbeki camp putting pressure on ANC delegates to vote their way, there is still time for the logic of the head to kick in. But the mood in Polokwane suggests that the time may have come for Jacob Zuma, the leader who appeals to the unreasoning heart.

Both men have a power base in the ANC. But Mr Zuma's backing from the Congress of South African Trade Unions, the Women's League of the ANC and the Communist Party seems to have swung the outcome of the imminent leadership vote in his favour. It is small wonder that the prospect of this Chavez-type figure being chosen to succeed Mr Mbeki has spooked international investors. The rand sank to a three-week low against the dollar yesterday.

UNQUOTE

Here is the link for the rest of the story:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/
the-new-struggle-for-south-africa-765681.html

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/
jacob-zuma-leftwinger-with-the-common-touch-has-beaten-all-odds-765683.html


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" Despite presiding over the longest economic boom since 1981, Mbeki became increasingly unpopular, not least because so many poor black South Africans, the alliance's core membership, were seeing so little benefit. "

Hmmm...  A lesson for Kibaki?  - Jaluo Press