SACP Western Cape augment Provincial Executive Committee Statement
27 June 2024
The 7th democratic elections are over and did not produce an outright winner to form a government. The political fluidity of the present moment requires sober class analysis and solutions based on concrete situations. For this purpose, the South African Communist Party (SACP) in the Western Cape convened an Augmented Provincial Executive Committee (PEC) meeting on 25 – 26 June 2024 on a virtual platform.
For comprehensive analysis, the Augmented PEC was extended to districts of the Party across the province, PEC Invitees, the Young Communist League, Alliance representatives and Central Committee deployees to the province. Our Augmented PEC took place ahead of the Central Committee Meeting scheduled for the coming weekend, 28 – 30 June 2024.
The meeting assessed the role and contribution of the SACP in campaigning for the ANC led alliance. In addition, the meeting reflected on the state and functionality of the Alliance in the province.
Our Augmented PEC received political inputs from the organised labour federation the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU and the South African National Civic Organisation (SANCO). These submissions highlighted major concerns about the worrying state of the Alliance under the current ANC leadership in the province.
Clamp down acts of crime such as extortion and gangsterism on working-class communities
The SACP is concerned about the levels of crime and criminality, in particular the extortion syndicates that continue to terrorise working-class communities. The fact that these syndicates stop development projects in our communities demonstrate that they are emboldened hence they act with impunity. Extortion activities threaten any possible economic developments in the townships. Therefore, we call on our law enforcement agencies to heighten their efforts to combat this criminal enterprise in our communities.
Further, recently, there has also been a spate of mass killings, including the killing of toddlers, and gang fights on the Cape Flats of Khayelitsha, Nyanga East and Manneberg in particular. This situation is untenable and requires revamping of police intelligence capacity and efficiency within the justice system. We call on the DA government in the province to work with national law enforcement agencies and root out gangsterism and all crime in our working-class communities. Given the killings of innocent people, we express our condolences to the families of the deceased!
Deteriorating conditions of farms workers in the Western Cape
The Augmented PEC sharply raised concerns about the deteriorating conditions of farm workers in the Western Cape. The SACP, working with Cosatu, has discovered that farm bosses in many parts of the province such as Cederberg, Ceres, Grabour and De Doorns are now using foreign nationals, particularly undocumented ones, as cheap labour, displacing locals.
It is against this background that the SACP in the Western Cape will be joining Cosatu’s joint efforts with the Department of Labour and Employment this weekend in Citrusdal in the visit to farms. Farm bosses who are not complying with South African laws and using undocumented foreign nationals must face the full might of the law.
Holding the ANC at ransom is not in the national interest: NO to a Grand Coalition with the neoliberal DA
The Augmented PEC reflected on the current political conundrum confronting the formation of the Cabinet and deliberated on the way forward. The current political situation requires the Party to respond to the challenges posed by the outcomes of 2024 general elections, in which the African National Congress (ANC) failed to garner at least 50 plus 1 percent nationally, this included failure to topple the DA from power in the Western Cape.
In the aftermath of the May 2024 general elections, as the vanguard party in the province we recall that before the elections we stated that: “Neither the Right Wing Moon-shot Pact nor the Bantustan Political Parties are a threat to any ANC Prospect of Winning the 2024 General Elections, but only Neo Liberal Austerity Agenda and Corruption.” It is a historical fact that the opportunistic moonshot pact is now effectively and definitively in the dustbin of history and none of the parties organising along tribal lines emerged hegemonic. This confirms the correctness of our analytical perspective.
However, there is no denying that the ANC suffered gravely due to a confluence of issues including the persistent load-shedding, reneging on collective bargaining resolutions, austerity measures (cutting on public spending), the demon of corruption, the devastating youth unemployment, the crisis of National Student Financial Aid (NSFAS) student allocation and student accommodation. Cumulatively, these challenges contributed to low voter turn-out and some voters deserting the movement.
Our analysis also indicates that these elections were highly contested mainly between the ANC and proxies of capital (both foreign and domestic) as well as other imperial forces. This is evinced by massive financial injection that neoliberal parties such as the DA and other fringe parties received from big business. It is through the declaration of political party funding that the invisible hand of capital is revealed. It is clear that big business harbours hatred for the ANC led government hence their massive financial injection in a calculated project to support the proliferation of fringe parties in order to fragment the political landscape to reduce the ANC’s dominance.
There remains a vacuum in the executive branch of government as the Cabinet is yet to be established mainly because the elections did not produce an outright winner. The Augmented PEC rejects with contempt the power grabbing machinations of the DA that seeks to usurp the power of the President to appoint a Cabinet.
The Augmented PEC reaffirmed the position of the Party to urge the ANC to move speedily to appoint a Cabinet and thus form a government with formations that are genuinely committed to the national interest and exclude the DA. The arrogant belief of the DA that they can dictate to the ANC and other parties must not be rewarded.
The SACP in the Western Cape stands fundamentally opposed to any coalition arrangement with the right-wing DA which is determined to neutralise the hegemony of the ANC and derail the deepening of the national democratic revolution (NDR).
The ANC’s electoral performance and ongoing by-elections in the province
It is a recorded fact that the ANC liberation forces suffered a massive setback or electoral shock in the Western Cape. This poses serious questions as to what the underlying reasons for this dismal performance are. The Alliance and the Mass Democratic Movement more broadly must interrogate its role and contribution to the current situation.
It is equally important to underline that the Independent Electoral Commission also showed significant ill-preparedness for the election, hence many voters were turned away or got discouraged by the inefficiencies in the voting process. Irregularities and discrepancies between the Voter Management Device and voters’ rolls affected the ability of many voters and impacted on the electoral outcomes.
A cursory analysis of the ANC electoral performance by regional breakdown shows that the ANC continues to regress in areas where it is in coalition arrangements with the Patriotic Alliance. This begs the question: in whose interest is the ANC participating in these coalition arrangements in the province? Some believed that the PA is a halfway station of voters from the DA on the way to supporting the ANC. However, there is no scientific evidence to support this claim.
The DA lost substantial votes by numbers, the ANC dropped by almost 10% and the Good party also suffered major losses. The beneficiaries are essentially the conservative Coloured chauvinist parties such as Patriotic Alliance and National Coloured Congress. And these parties were basically organising on racial or ethnic lines and thus exploiting the sentiment that the Coloured working class is neglected by the National Liberation Movement.
Further, given how the ANC performed in the recent by-election from 2023, the SACP in the province calls on the ANC in the province to make deep reflections. The continued marginalisation of organs of the Alliance in by-election processes within the ANC is in part responsible for the ongoing defeat.
The SACP is concerned about the state of the ANC in the Cederberg sub-region, and if the ANC does not do things differently it risks losing the upcoming by-election. Therefore, prudent ANC internal processes will be important to avoid the Clainwilliam humiliating defeat.
Now is the time to rebuild youth formations
The youth stratum constitutes another important dimension of analysis in terms of voting patterns. At a glance, in higher education institutions located within the radius of voting districts around Rondebosch, Cape Town CBD, Bellville and Stellenbosch invariably the Economic Freedom Fighters performed far better than all the parties with a few minor exceptions. The youth vote is an important determining factor in elections given the population size, therefore it behoves us to analyse this stratum properly.
Could it be that the movement is punished by the student population for some of the challenges relating to student accommodation and NSFAS disbursement fiasco? Also, given the state of the Progressive Youth Alliance, African National Congress Youth League, Young Communist League of South Africa, South African Student Congress, Congress of South African Students, the ANC was bound to suffer such a defeat in institutions of higher learning as their absence presents a void. Therefore, the Alliance in the province should take responsibility to assist in the rebuilding of our youth formations.
Widening tensions in the strategic geo-political terrain
The Augmented PEC noted the geo-political tensions in the Middle East and the destructive role of the United States imperialist regime in fuelling the escalation of hostilities. We commend the United Nations agencies including UN Relief and Works Agency for their steadfast and principled resolutions based on credible findings of atrocities and war crimes committed by the Israeli apartheid regime. The Augmented PEC further notes and appreciates the application to the International Criminal Court (ICC) for arrest warrants for those responsible for perpetrating war crimes and crimes against humanity within the Israeli regime. It is concerning though that the ICC has moved swiftly to issue arrest warrants for leaders of the Russian Federation but less so for the Israeli apartheid regime.
The Augmented PEC further noted that the tide is turning in the international order with more countries calling for a ceasefire, recognition of Palestinian statehood and the end to illegal occupation. In addition, the UN Security Council has once again reiterated its longstanding resolution against land grabs and illegal settlements of Israel in all occupied Palestinian territories.
The Augmented PEC also applauded the young university students in the United States for courageously and bravely fighting for the rights of Palestinians and putting pressure on institutions as well as the government to stop supporting the genocidal Israeli apartheid regime.
On the home front, we also applaud the courage of the University of Cape Town’s council decision to boycott academic institutions affiliated to the Israeli Defence Force. This is a step in the right direction which may yield fundamental shifts in the international isolation of the genocidal regime.
Further afield, the Augmented PEC noted the unfolding situation in Kenya where common people reacted to the imposition of a stringent capitalist offensive by the current government. The public anger escalated when the government sought to implement tax hikes. In the ensuing skirmishes, 23 people were reportedly shot dead by police. The people emerged victorious in that the President was forced to drop the tax bill but innocent people paid the highest price in the face of capitalist onslaught against the poor. The triumph of the toiling masses must be a signal to the government to abandon their capitalist offensive.
Issued by Benson Ngqentsu, Provincial Secretary, 27 June 2024
