Red Alert: Defeat vehicles of white supremacy! Defeat a party of white privilege the DA! Defeat corrupt tenderpreneurs!

The DA is essentially a party of white privilege. At its core the DA is a party that represents the interests of the white capitalist class and sections of the white middle strata that were major beneficiaries of apartheid. Even before apartheid, vicious racist suppression was carried out for centuries, through colonial rule based primarily on the system of capitalist production. Black women being the worst affected, suffered the triple-brunt of capitalist exploitation, racist oppression and gender domination. During all this centuries-long period the rise of black, especially African, middle strata and a skilled black working class was ruthlessly suppressed.

This was the basis upon which a white middle, managerial and skilled working strata were consolidated, constituting an elite labour aristocracy, both in the public and private sectors. The black working class was relegated to the periphery and reduced to an appendage in the colonial and apartheid workplace which became a pyramid, black at the bottom and white at the top. This job reservation, the racist and sexist division of labour did not happen naturally. It was deliberately designed. Based on this job reservation black workers were denied access to education for technical and engineering professions, among others.

In fact in the 1924 racist general election, the National Party of Barry Hertzog defeated the South African Party of Jan Smuts by forming a coalition government with the South African Labour Party - the "Pact Government", in order to appease the formerly militant white workers. As apartheid Prime Minister, Hertzog presided over the passage of a wide range of social and economic measures which did much to improve conditions for the white working class: they did not, however, benefit the majority of South Africans, who found themselves the targets of discriminatory labour laws that entrenched white supremacy.

The so-called civilised labour policy was pursued by the Pact Government to replace black workers with whites (typically impoverished Afrikaners), and was enforced through three key pieces of legislation.

The Industrial Conciliation Act of 1924 created job reservation for whites while excluding blacks from membership of registered trade unions. The Minimum Wages Act of 1925 bestowed upon the labour minister the power to force employers to give preference to whites when hiring workers, while the 1926 Mines and Works Amendment Act reinforced the colour bar in the mining industry, and excluded Indian miners from skilled jobs.

After we defeated apartheid in 1994 our movement as led by the ANC in government had the task to undo the legacy of colonial oppression and apartheid including job reservation. When it became obvious that apartheid could no longer function the white population which had supported apartheid suddenly became the "champions of democracy", and no one ever admitted to supporting apartheid. With the demise of National Party this apartheid electoral base realigned behind the Democratic Party - today's DA.

Why?

So that they could defend the privileged position which they attained under apartheid. This is visible in the system of separate development based on race which concentrated the white population into specific areas that have today become DA's support base. As a glaring example, in Cape Town under the DA administration we can see clearly that the rich areas are being well-cared for and the poor areas are neglected deliberately - continuing apartheid.

Though we have abolished racial discrimination in 1994, in general the majority of the rich and well-off remain significantly white whereas the majority of the poor remain significantly black notwithstanding our subsequent advances. When the DA opposed the Employment Equity Act and the recent amendments to it, it did so not accidentally, but purposefully, to defend white privilege in line with its DNA.

The DA has launched an unprecedentedly vicious campaign against President Jacob Zuma, claiming that this administration has failed compared to the early ANC administrations.

Why?

The campaign is not against President Zuma per se. It is actually targeted at the ANC, our revolutionary Alliance and the most successful ANC administration so far building on the successes of the previous ANC administrations. This administration has introduced national planning and significantly improved health, particularly through decisive HIV treatment. The President Zuma led administration has also greatly expanded education and skills training. What the DA really hates as is the case with its opposition to Employment Equity is that this progress forms the basis for an advance in tackling the legacy of job reservation and white privilege.

What the DA also hates is our Alliance's shared perspective of a second radical phase of transition as reflected in our resolve to assert state intervention and increase state ownership in the mining sector. The DA is particularly worried about the acceleration of land redistribution which is enshrined in our programme to re-open lodgements for restitution especially more recently for the Khoisan people as well as our shift from the so-called willing buyer willing seller towards expropriation as provided for legally in our constitution.

The DA also has a serious problem with our Alliance's shared perspective on transformation of the financial sector to serve the people, specifically our resolve protect and develop the rights of public property in this sector through increasing the role of the state among others by fully licensing the Post Bank.

Most of all, the DA has obsessive hatred for the Communist Party and the participation of Communists in the ANC led government. By the way this is a direct challenge against the nature and character of the ANC and our Alliance. This is where the ultra-right, ultra-left, 'parallel left' and the pseudo left alike converge. Most of the attacks that culminated into the attacks against the ANC and our Alliance as a whole actually started with attacks against the Communist Party and Communist's participation in the ANC or the ANC led government.

As a party of white privilege and reactionary agenda the DA does not want our democratically elected government to play a greater role in the economy. Since 1994 racists have viewed our democratically elected government of all people as a black government. In order to keep black people out of the economy the agenda by these racists has been to limit the role of the government in the economy and let it continue to be controlled by unelected corporates which remain predominantly white. This has given rise to the development of racist conservatism dressed up like a drag queen as liberal democratic idealism. This hybrid conservatism-liberalism is for the sole reason of the preservation of white privilege.

DA's parliamentary lists re-affirm its character as a party of white privilege. A journalist Shanti Aboobarker, writing for IOL News (16 March 2014), correctly observed that:

"The DA is punting itself as the new rainbow party of South African politics, but just five black African candidates made it to the top 27 of its Western Cape candidates list - and that, only after senior party officials stepped in and ordered the promotion of black candidates to ensure greater diversity."

Aboobarker further correctly observed that:

"But the Western Cape is not the only province where the DA is thin on black African candidates. There is a similar dearth on its list of provincial legislature candidates in Gauteng, a province with very different demographics to the Western Cape. The DA's top 20 candidates in Gauteng includes only five African candidates"

There is a glaring contradiction between the way the DA presents itself as a party with substantial black support (By the way a large part of which we know to be rented and paraded at its events in the same way as the political labour brokering of Mamphela Ramphele) and its predominantly white candidate lists. By the way the DA is a party that supports labour brokering. It is party that opposed the minimum wage of farmworkers from being raised from R65 a day.

The SACP message that workers, black and white together, must unite, close ranks and defeat the party of white privilege - the DA - cannot be overemphasised. We must move South Africa forward decisively to a non-racial, non-sexist, democratic and prosperous future in which there is a better life for all.

Let us, similarly, all unite to defeat the party of corrupt tenderpreneurs - the EFF.

How is it that a young person who has never done an honest day's work owes 16 million Rand in tax. Imagine how many illicit tenders he had to be involved in and how much he has solicited to owe the state this amount of money. The Limpopo provincial government was previously bankrupted through such corrupt activities which among others led to money for the provision of books for school children and medication for patients in hospitals being used up in fruitless and wasteful expenditure. This money largely fell into the hands of the leader of the EFF through among others his Ratanang family trust and his tenderpreneur associates in the quest for the primitive accumulation of wealth on a private basis - all of this under the abused name of nationalisation.

The action of the national government as led by President Zuma to intervene and bring several Limpopo provincial government departments under administration must be applauded as an important anti-corruption measure as was the expulsion of the EFF leader and his associates from the ANC.

It is clear both the DA and the EFF are being bankrolled by external funding in order to destabilise our country among others because of the fear coming from some Western Countries that should the BRICS Bank be established in South Africa it would adversely affect their economic interests particularly in the minerals sector and give not only our country but the whole African continent alternative development finance to the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund which they control.

Both of these institutions are known for dictatorship that replaces participatory democracy in policy making and national sovereignty by universally imposing a neoliberal policy regime that exponentially increases poverty, misery and degradation.

This policy regime is uncritically supported by the DA in the same book where the EFF plays the role of populist demagogic destabilisation chapter aimed at preventing the ANC from getting two-thirds majority which is required to change the constitution when it becomes necessary in order to create an enabling environment for policies that are consistent with our Alliance's shared perspective of a radical second phase of transition towards the achievement of the goals of the Freedom Charter.

In post-colonial societies such as ours imperialist forces are determined to stop at nothing to reduce the support for liberation movements that have come into power. The imperialists will cooperate with both obviously reactionary forces and pseudo left organisations all of which serve their economic interests directly or indirectly. History shows that while the foundation is established from the onset of liberation from direct colonialism, the imperialist agenda is intensified with time. In most countries 20 years after liberation from direct colonialism revolutions experience serious problems from this imperialist agenda to the extent that some, in the one extreme have collapsed while others have experienced social, economic and political retardation.

At present, counter-revolution in our country, backed by both the old and new enemies of our revolution, is engaged in an agenda to attribute blame to the ANC and our Alliance for the problems that our country is facing. The problems that our country is facing, such as inequality, unemployment and poverty, have their roots and were deliberately developed on a racist and sexist basis in colonialism and apartheid, fundamentally through capitalist exploitation.

These are the historical, structural and systemic conditions, products and levers for the accumulation of wealth on a private basis, and are inherent in capitalist exploitation - the foundation upon which national oppression and gender domination were built and perpetuated in our country. The extent of these problems varies according to the cyclical nature of capitalist production, and they become acute during its endemic crisis periods.

All of a sudden, the counter-revolution waged by the right-wing and our detractors is mobilising the people to forget the historical, structural and systemic nature and character of the problems facing our country. This mobilisation relies on the production and distribution of false consciousness to blame the ANC and our Alliance.

The DA, the party that is supported by Western monopoly capitalism has even tried to blame the President Zuma led administration for the global capitalist crisis that erupted in 2008. This crisis, from which the world has not yet recovered, acutely increased global unemployment, poverty, and inequality within and between borders. With its economy historically linked to the West South Africa was by no means an exception.

Yet the ANC led people's government managed the crisis far better than many other countries, cushioning the extent of its impact. In some countries in Europe such as Spain and Greece unemployment sky-rocketed far more than it did in South Africa. In fact, as the ANC manifesto states, we have recovered and surpassed the number of jobs lost during the crisis. Because of the President Zuma led ANC administration, South Africa has more people who are employed right now than at any time in its history!

The SACP says workers unite, close ranks!

On May 7th general election let us defeat anything that is or looks like an opposition party or an opposition! Let us defeat all those who withdrew their support from the ANC, whatever their manifestation, because they have essentially joined the opposition. Let us show them that we have capacity to carry on very well without them. The victory of the ANC in the forthcoming May 7th elections is a victory against both the direct and the indirect opposition, both the external and the internal enemy.

Mapaila is SACP 2nd Deputy General Secretary.

This article first appeared in the Party's online journal, Umsebenzi Online.

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