A wet and muddy four days in Polokwane, Limpopo, in 2007 fundamentally changed the ANC and shifted the course of SA — like a railway switch turning a train onto a track bound for an abyss.
It was there, at its 52nd elective conference, that the party voted Jacob Zuma into its presidency.
But that wasn’t the only decision that would have a profound effect on SA’s political life. Another key move was the ANC resolution to implement its 1942 goal of attracting 1-million members to the party.
By January 2012, it had reached that target — but what of the calibre of that million-strong party membership?
National executive committee (NEC) member Lindiwe Sisulu is of the view that this emphasis on quantity over quality is at the heart of the ANC’s inability to renew itself, despite its awareness of the deep problems that have eroded its moral standing.
It is perhaps apt that she quotes ex-president Thabo Mbeki, ousted as party leader at Polokwane, when she explains why the governing party’s attempts at renewal have fallen flat.
"[Vladimir] Lenin and Mbeki’s prescription for dealing with parasitic characters was captured in the slogan: ‘Better few but better,’" she says. "I find a fundamental contradiction in wanting a million-member organisation and renewal at the same time. We need quality over quantity."
Mbeki had made the observation, drawing lessons from the Bolsheviks, in reference to the "precarious dynamic" that organisations find themselves in on assuming state power.
Sisulu is cutting. "The ANC has attracted some rather unsavoury and contemptible characters whose primary goal is material accumulation, status acquisition and general self-service at the expense of both the organisation and the state," she says.
As human settlements, water & sanitation minister — a merged portfolio created by President Cyril Ramaphosa when he restructured the cabinet in 2019 — Sisulu is charged with cleaning up the embattled water department. It’s been enmeshed in allegations of corruption and maladministration for years, with auditor-general Kimi Makwetu in 2018 already casting doubt on its ability to continue as a going concern.
Sisulu, 65, was herself a contender for the ANC presidency in 2017. Now there’s talk of a renewed push for her to ascend to higher office in 2022.
Her written response to the FM’s questions comes as the ANC seeks to renew itself, clean up the party’s image, and shift perceptions after a lengthy period in which corruption and state capture became normalised.
The ANC is under pressure to reform as its electoral support continues to decline. It’s looking to win back three major cities — Joburg, Pretoria and Nelson Mandela Bay — in the 2021 local government elections.
The loose coalitions that took over the running of the metros in 2016 have disintegrated, but this doesn’t mean the ANC will easily reclaim control of the key cities.
The party’s fortunes have been severely damaged during the Covid-19 pandemic, battered by allegations of the looting of budgets destined for protective equipment and similarly contemptible misdeeds involving food parcels and relief funds.
The economic impact of the almost six-month lockdown has also placed the party under pressure: the economy was already under strain when the pandemic hit — a result of mismanagement, state capture and corruption during the Zuma era.
The ANC has embarked on a number of processes to clean up its image — including compiling a list of individuals implicated in allegations of corruption. It’s a process being led by national party officials who, in an unprecedented move, announced the far-reaching outcomes of a special NEC meeting.
The decisions included that those implicated in allegations of corruption should step aside, and those convicted should resign their positions and face disciplinary processes by the party.
The NEC also endorsed a letter written by Ramaphosa to ordinary party members. In the pointed letter, he declared that "those who see the ANC as a path to wealth, to power, to influence or status must know that they do not belong in our movement".
The ANC has attracted some rather unsavoury and contemptible characters whose primary goal is material accumulation, status acquisition and general selfservice at the expense of both the organisation and the state
— Lindiwe Sisulu
"They must change their ways or they must leave," Ramaphosa wrote.
"If we are to rebuild the ANC as an ethical movement that enjoys the confidence of the people, then we need cadres of integrity, honesty and commitment. I am raising this matter with you, my beloved ANC member, because it is you who has the power to bring corruption to an end in our movement and in our society."
For all its rhetoric, the ANC has battled to enforce these decisions, and many question whether this will in any case be sufficient to halt corruption that, by all accounts, has become endemic to the party.
They’re also being used as a battering ram in the ANC’s blistering factional battles.
Sisulu bemoans the "institutionalised factions" in the party.
"They are beloved by the corrupt and powermongers, as it allows them to pit different leaders against one another," she says.
"The casualty of the pornographic factional theatre is the unity of the organisation and the erosion of its legitimacy — and, importantly, the business of the people that we have all been elected to carry out."
Not helping the party’s clean-up are those who seem to believe the rules apply only to others.
Corruption-accused MP Bongani Bongo, for example, has refused to step aside, saying he must be given a "legal basis" to do so, the Sowetan reports. A number of municipal officials in the North West have taken a leaf from the same book.
Then there are those who would appear selective in their support for the motion.
A number of prominent ANC members, including Ekurhuleni mayor Mzwandile Masina, have publicly voiced their support for convicted Nelson Mandela Bay councillor Andile Lungisa, who was jailed for bashing a fellow councillor over the head with a glass water jug during a heated sitting.
The problem is not limited to politicians; there is a "culture of impunity" and "blind self-interest" at all levels of the public service, says Sisulu, who in the past served as the minister of public service & administration.
"Callousness and contemptuous lack of accountability" are the manifestations of this culture in the public service, she says.
To fix the state, then, will require bureaucratic reform. But doing that, she says, requires an awareness that "the underlying problems of bureaucracy are political".
"When political leaders and the institutions they preside over fail to provide clear and coherent policy goals, rarely allocate resources to deal with the scope of the problems, and [don’t] allow suitable technocrats to do their jobs, it is not difficult to imagine the results being the governance morass we find ourselves in."
Sisulu herself has been accused of making poor political appointments. Among these was the appointment of former social development minister Bathabile Dlamini — who oversaw the social grants fiasco that placed the payments of grants to 17-million vulnerable South Africans at risk — as the interim chair of the social housing regulatory authority. She also placed the seemingly inexperienced former ANC Youth League leader Magasela Mzobe as chair of the interim board of Umgeni Water, SA’s second-largest bulk water supplier. And she drew criticism from the DA for appointing former minister in the presidency Susan Shabangu as an adviser, despite Shabangu’s lack of experience in the water sector.
Sisulu, however, has consistently defended her appointments, and she tells the FM that she had responded to that criticism before parliament.
The solution to the ANC’s renewal conundrum, says Sisulu, lies in the calibre of its membership. She believes members should be recruited, rather than simply join the organisation voluntarily, as is the case at present. This implies a sifting process.
"The ANC should be consciously recruiting the legions of incredible South Africans — as was the practice during the underground and exile period — especially the youth, who are excelling in their respective professional and entrepreneurial endeavours," she says.
"We need a cadre whose value system is education, service to our society and excellence. We need to recruit members and not have them joining us," she says.
Sisulu believes ANC members should be recruited, rather than simply being allowed to join
While there is talk of Sisulu positioning herself once again to contest for higher office, she brushes aside succession talk, and instead pledges her support for Ramaphosa.
This may in itself just be a strategic move, should she opt to challenge for the post of deputy president in 2022.
"The ANC has a president, comrade President Ramaphosa, who is doing a good job in spite of the many and sometimes seemingly insoluble challenges facing both the country and the organisation," Sisulu tells the FM.
"My role as a disciplined ANC cadre is to support President Ramaphosa. He has, in his dual roles, as both leader of the country and my party set out clear priorities of what needs to be done to get out of the challenges we face. Where I am deployed, I have faithfully acted on the president’s commitment of clean governance and confronted corruption wherever I find it."
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