We live in interesting times in the political life of our country. There are a couple of political developments that are bound to define change, significant or not, in the country’s political landscape. Indeed we have our own unfortunate internal party developments which are being escalated by failure of leadership and malicious high level agenda to demise the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC) of Azania from inside.
On these opportunistic inner party struggles we have taken an independent position from any of the squabbling factions in the PAC and refuse to be used to promote this or that individual in the name of the PAC. We are independent. We have outgrown the political sickness of hero-worshipping fellow mortals. We support the PAC, essentially what it stands for.
It is regrettable that unsuspecting PAC members are being hoodwinked and duped by a handful of individuals who have declared that they will relaunch the PAC through PAM reincarnation. We think this is a mistake, and we have warned against this in Botshabela but our advice fell on deaf ears. Now the myopia and flops of advocates of the so-called real PAC is a matter of public knowledge.
We had intended to engage all these factions to merge and elect an inclusive interim leadership to lead the party towards elections and later a national congress where party members will democratically elect a legitimate leadership. These as a precondition of participation in the forthcoming 2009 general elections.
On the leadership question we have come to the conclusion that there must be a generational change in the PAC. Our generation, the bulk of party membership and cream of party grassroots activists and leadership must take over. We are not prepared to fail the PAC again on this one. We shall not compromise. We must start now to build a formidable team of committed, tried and tested collective of young revolutionary leaders from within our ranks.
There is glaring disillusionment and demoralization of party members. [PAC President] Letlapa Mphahlele is the chief perpetrator of these negative attitudes in the party. This is his mission — to divide the PAC, marginalize and disgruntle its members. This agenda has the hallmarks of enemy tricks.
We are calling on PAC members to redirect their contributions to PAYCO and other component structures of the party instead of contributing funds to those whose actions bear testimony of an agenda hell bent on destroying the revolutionary vehicle of African people.
Members of the party must also take a decisive and revolutionary stand regarding the 2009 elections. Those who make the national, provincial and in some instances, regional leadership of the PAC have done everything to retard the growth and development of the PAC. They have no positive programme. They undermine the historic mission, the constitution and the will of PAC members. They trample on its history, heritage, veterans, stalwarts and activists. They are a gross misrepresentation of the PAC in everything they say and do — a bunch of quacks. They refuse to articulate the plight of the African masses. They are silent and neutral on matters that affect the livelihoods and destiny of African people. They do not represent us and neither do they represent the spiritual and material aspirations of the African masses and therefore we should not support their opportunistic and counter revolutionary agenda. We must withdraw our resources from the election campaign and votes from the ballot box.
Never again will anyone use us to achieve their selfish careerist counter revolutionary agendas and undermine the revolutionary mission of the PAC. Careerism and opportunism must be defeated. High revolutionary morale!
Developments in the ruling party will indeed alter the political landscape fundamentally and for good. It all began with the notorious multi-billion dollar arms deal. They are reaping the fruits of the gratuitous arms deal — an object of corruption. The beginning of the fall of the ANC is something we welcome. We do not side with either side.
We did predict the split of the ANC, five years ago, in IOTA and urged the PAC to reposition itself to take advantage of the situation. So far we have missed this opportunity, but we still have a chance as the fall of the ANC will happen over a period of time. This should allow us space to attend to our internal issues and reposition ourselves to take over. The impact of the ANC split (it is not a splinter) is a subject for another day.
As for Barack Obama’s election as the president of the imperialist U.S., I received a text message from a fellow Africanist, a member of PAYCO’s NEC, and he askedp “What is in it for Africa if Obama is elected President?” My instant answer to him was a capital letter “NOTHING”. I have no further comment!
