Gumede is fictional about ANC's internal democracy

One of the crucial building blocks of the African National Congress over the last hundred years is the issue of internal democracy. In fact so strong is such internal democracy that once the party has pronounced on the matter it has always frowned upon those who go outside that discipline to contest views.

Should that internal democracy have been flawed the ANC would have crumbled long ago owing to its wealth of independent and strong headed cadres and branches who would have had none of such oppression. Huge milestones in the history of the movement can only be described as the success of the depth of such internal democracy at work.

Moments such as the adoption of the armed struggle, the adoption of the pillars of the struggle, the crafting of the Harare Declaration, the opening of negotiations with the regime, the rescinding of the armed struggle as well as the adoption of the freedom charter and the country's constitution. Are shining examples, amongst others of our internal democracy at work.

All these moments tested the existence and the strength of the ANC's internal democracy. It is simply fiction to suggest that this rich history of internal democracy does not exist or is so flawed as to produce the kind of fairy tale that William Gumede penned in last week's Sunday Independent (see here).

Gumede would have had to ignore this rich history and tapestry of democracy at work, to conclude that the ANC system is designed to "produce weak leaders". The reality is that all of the ANC's twelve Presidents and their accompanying NEC's were produced by this system and the future leaders will continue to be produced by this very system tried and tested over one hundred years of the ANC's existence with very minor tweaking and changes.

It is clear that Gumede is willing to let his hatred of the current leadership of the ANC get into the way of logic and without much analysis conclude that their flaws are a result of having been imposed on the membership of the ANC by what he terms the "ANC establishment". Nothing is further from the truth.

The article goes out of its way to turn opinion into fact and therefore paint a fictional tale about how the ANC's internal democracy works. In other words Gumede in reaching his conclusion that internal democracy is nonexistent in the ANC had to create a straw man that he then destroys and suggest amongst other platitudes, that we must lap up stock and barrel the American System of primaries without any attempt to analyze what possible flaws there may be in transplanting an American electoral practice into an African context. Strangely he has not suggested this to any other political party in South Africa.

In the interest of imparting education to the public about how the internal democracy works it is important to rebut Gumede's fiction with the facts of how the ANC's democracy works. The article contains at least twenty-five different distortions and outright lies about how the ANC internal democracy works, in order for Gumede to declare it flawed. There is not enough time and space to rebut all the lies so we will pick the most outrageous ones to ensure that there is perspective.

Fiction: The ANC delegates are not representative of the ANC branches.

Fact: Through its history the ANC conference has always been representative of the ANC elected and mandated by the branches to speak on their behalf at conference. Of course, the conference is a gathering of representative of branches not the gathering of an entire membership. There is no example of any political party that has any other better system of representation.

What is also an important ingrained democratic principle in the delegation of branches to conferences is a constitutional introduction of a sliding scale of proportional representativity of all our branches and our provinces taking on board the membership they enjoy. The ANC has over 1.2 million members what number would be 'representative according to Gumede? What method of mandating members to represent the branches will be acceptable to Gumede?

Fiction: Representative are often members already holding powerful positions like mayors and MPs hence they are members of the ANC Establishment and are an elite group.

Fact: ANC internal democracy has not stopped anyone regardless of his or her position in society or government to be elected to represent a branch. At the same time there is no ANC member with an ordained right to be elected to represent the branch at congress by virtue of being a mayor or any such official. The reality is that the majority of delegates to conference are elected on their own merit and not because they hold a position in government.

The mayors and people like that in fact are often non-voting delegates at these conferences attending the conference as guests. It is therefore a gross generalisation that most of the delegates to the ANC conference are from the 'ANC establishment' whatever that term suddenly means. A cursory breakdown of the 2007 Polokwane Conference delegates will bear this out immediately. There is no truth in the assertion that these delegates are not rank and file members from the working class for example. The ANC as a broad church remains a true reflection of South Africa in all its multi-class dimensions.

Fiction: Branch delegates vote based on the preference of the branch leadership and because of the vote is by show of hands they are victimized if they don't vote accordingly.

Fact: The majority of ANC branches have constructive debates about who must be nominated for leadership positions. There is no evidence of widespread intimidation as fictionalised by Gumede. The fact that there are a few incidences of conflict at ANC branches are isolated incidents that get reported in the media and those that are brought to the attention of the leadership of the ANC are dealt with decisively. As we speak almost 85 percent of branches have completed their nomination process without any incident.

The issue of intimidation by branch leadership is lazy conjecture and not based on facts. There is fierce contestation and the branch leadership is not immune from such contest. It is wrong to suggest that by virtue of their positions they will necessarily impose their will on the branch. In many instances it is the broad branch membership, through it's obvious majority that carries the day on any decisions of the branch including decisions on nominations and elections.

Fiction: Secretaries can make branch delegates who disagree with them on choice of candidate 'disappear'. At national level Secretary General decides which branches are eligible to vote and can make them 'ineligible to vote at the conference'.

Fact: For Gumede's information and those that are equally naive on ANC nominations and elective processes, we first want to state, as fact that the starting point for preparations for any conference at all levels is a cut off date that determines which branch and which member in good standing are eligible to attend conference. In the instance of the 53rd National Conference, the cut off date is the 15th of June 2012. Logic dictates that branches and members who were not in good standing at that date are not eligible to attend conference.

The second important fact for Gumede is that a national audit is then undertaken throughout the length and breadth of the country to determine and establish factually the number of members and branches who are in good standing as of the 15th of June. We can now inform Gumede that a total of 3687 branches that qualify are the branches that hold quorating BGMs to nominate their delegates and nominate their preferred leadership.

These are processes that culminate in the national conference of the ANC. Save to say that there ill be a consolidation by all provinces and Leagues of branch nominations to a provincial list of nominations. These processes cannot be interfered with by any secretary or Secretary General as that would constitute a violation of the Constitution of the ANC. All these nomination processes are overseen and directed by the Electoral Commission that has no interest in the outcome of the conference and is supported by an independent elections agency.

The Secretary General does not unilaterally decide on credentials. The NEC has a final say about who will constitute the branch delegates overseen by an Independent Electoral Commission that is answerable to the organization as a whole. The credentials also have to be adopted by the conference at the beginning of the conference to militate against exactly what Gumede is suggesting.

Conflict of interest by a Secretary General who is available for re election does not arise. Similarly at branch level it is utmost wild to suggest that merely being record keepers they can simply make members disappear. Surely the members can present themselves and produce their membership card at any branch general meeting exposing such illegal practice if it exists.

Fiction: The deployment committee present branches who can be nominated for President and Mayors etc. They also make decisions on who can be awarded tenders. This therefore influences somewhat how branch delegates vote - they vote in fear of this committee.

Fact. This is one of the most nonsensical assertions from Gumede. The facts are simple. Any ANC member can stand for any position and no deployment committee tells branches who can be elected. Many things are blamed on the deployment committee but it's a first to hear that the committee now determines tenders. This would be impractical and bizarre if it were true. This is yet another outright lies by Gumede. Gumede needs serious schooling on the role of the deployment committee, unfortunately there is no space here.

The deployment committee has no role in any ANC conference, in fact before elections take place, including in Mangaung, the leadership structure of the ANC, in this instance the NEC of the ANC is disbanded together with all the committees it has established during its term of office, including the deployment committee. When voting happens there is no deployment committee to be feared as ludicrously claimed by Gumede.

Littered with other fictional notions as well as giving the incumbent President too much power Gumede's article cannot be taken seriously as an assessment of the inner workings of the ANC. Anecdotal analysis to weaknesses in the internal processes cannot be used as a reckless" dismissal of the ANC's processes that have been used over the good part of its one hundred years history.

The modernization that Gumede is referring to has been discussed by the same branches that he dismisses as voting fodder and has nothing to do with what is effectively fraud accusations against an entire membership of the ANC and its leadership. Gumede makes no reference to any other political party in South Africa that has been as open as the ANC to subject itself and its internal processes to public scrutiny.

The ANC is on course to renew and modernise but none of that modernisation is as a result of the wild and fictional assertions that Gumede states as fact. If I were a Professor of politics and I had assigned this Fulbright Scholar called William Gumede with an assignment on ANC internal democracy he would have failed with distinction.

Gumede must take leave to read with a view to acquaint himself about the ANC before venturing into a written or oral word on our glorious movement. He will save himself the pain of public embarrassment and all of us from the unnecessary pain of publicly correcting him.

>> Jackson Mthembu is an ANC NEC member and National Spokesperson of the ANC. This article first appeared in ANC Today, the weekly online newsletter of the African National Congress.

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