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If our branches are drained of moral and political content, they will simply become compliant and symbolic formations with no legitimacy or propriety to be the guardians of the revolution and the architects of a better tomorrow for our communities.By Darkey Africa
Sometimes, odious circumstances can militate against and pre-empt the realisation of the objectives of an organisation. When such situations arise, a critical appraisal is imperative to assess and harness the collective capabilities, experiences and skills of those who constitute such an organisation to prevent any potential crisis or harm to the organisation or the weakening of its resolve to manage change and ef ciency.
In such circumstances, greater weight and emphasis will always be placed on the need for unity. Not unity for its own sake, but unity for organisational ef ciency, recognising and af rming the branch as the basic unit for cohesion, solidarity, development, democracy and leadership in a specific locality. Therefore, the starting point at the current moment is to rethink how we can all positively and openly contribute to the ideal local scenario to achieve our collective objectives, and advance the fullfilment of the demands of the people as articulated in the Freedom Charter 60 years ago.
This, more than anything, requires a commitment to rebuild our common purpose and rejuvenate the spirit of the branch as the oasis for fundamental and sustainable unity and cohesion. As is well-known, unity presupposes forging a common platform and purpose with those with whom you may not see eye to eye within your own organisation. Any exclusion, whether done wittingly or unwittingly, defeats the purpose of unity. In this brief contribution, with the branch at the centre of our efforts, I will outline the steps we need to undertake to strengthen the process aimed at rebuilding our movement in anticipation of the local government elections 2016 and beyond. I will explain how branches can be strengthened to play their combined roles as centres for political education and repositories for unity, positive politics and engines for local change. In this effort, not only leading comrades but also those designated as minor players all have a signi cant contribution to make.
Undergirding the Freedom Charter is a deliberate determination to make people the centre, subject and object of development. This understanding cannot be perceived to be external to the culture and tradition of the movement. Rather, the construction of a people-centred and people- driven government derives precisely from the praxis within the movement, to conceive membership as the key driver and shaper of the movement’s policy direction. Hence, institutionally and organisationally, this translated in the appropriation of the Branch as the basic unit and also the base for the movement in the determination of policy.
The ANC must prioritise the need to address and resolve critical organisational issues at all levels. This must be done to ensure that our collective effort is geared towards maximum unity within our structures, and also ensuring that our collective energy is deployed towards positive developments. As cadres, we have correctly done some introspection and came to the inevitable conclusion that we need to collectively contribute to the re-vitalisation of the branch.
This must invoke in all of us, irrespective of the views we hold about the current situation, and each other, a new and de nitive urgency for engagement and reconnection broadly for the sake of our movement. Sometimes, when our best and sincere intentions are distorted deliberately or simply misunderstood then our revolutionary resilience must be invoked. And such a time is now.
For too long our energies were dispatched and utilised negatively, creating organisational inef ciencies and weaknesses, and also engendering behaviour and solidifying attitudes inimical to the values, tradition and unwritten norms of the movement. Certain positions taken by many, deriving from this environment, are used to justify demeaning and divisive tendencies devoid of politics. This clash of positions is always used as the carrier of our crisis and disunity. We need to recast positively our politics with the branch as our oasis. A better and long-term political and organisational unity trajectory is imperative. Using our collective energy and organising experience as our compass, we certainly can break the “Berlin Wall”, which has cast us as different and hostile sets of ANC members. The ANC’s 53rd National Conference re-af rmed the role of the branch as the basic unit of the movement and instructed all its cadres to carry out and ful l the following tasks, among others: • Intensify branch work in each community through the Imvuselelo (Tsoseletso) campaign, to ensure sustainable mass work and establish ANC branches as vanguards of communities; and to make branches the focus of political and ideological work of senior leadership and cadreship of the movement, including a nationally driven political education programme.
We may ask the question, to what extent were these tasks carried out? If these tasks had been taken seriously, there would probably have been no space for the pervasive community protests which engulfed the country in the recent past. We need to make sure and always measure our branch work against the following:
• its role in mobilising communities around issues of local transformation and development;
• engagement of members in political programmes and campaigns;
• a high level of political consciousness and ongoing engagement with the important challenges of the movement;
• a united, cohesive (local) leadership which provides strategic political direction;
• establishment of Freedom Charter forums to engage our people around issues of service delivery, as we prepare for the 2016 Local government elections;
• its capacity to recruit and induct new members, and practically engage them in the political life of the branch;
• its ability to effectively mobilise the available resources, including the skills, experiences and creativity of all its members in pursuit of ANC programmes;
• its relationship with other sectors, community groups and in uential community leaders and its ability to build local partnerships for transformation;
• its ability to concretise the general programme of action into a local plan of action in line with
local conditions and community
concerns;
• its good relationship with, and
ability to provide leadership to the Leagues and the Alliance (where such exists); and
• its ability to provide leadership and support (not to manipulate) to councillors and ensure that they are accountable to the ANC and the entire community.
Have our branches ful lled these ideals? If not, why not? If partly so, what needs to be done to consolidate progress and inspire and support those who strive hard to create functional, viable, united and motivated branches at all times, not only for conferences and elections? If our branches are drained of moral and political content, they will simply become compliant and symbolic formations with no legitimacy or propriety to be the guardians of the revolution and the architects of a better tomorrow for our communities.
We need to and can in our individual capacities and collectively contribute to a branch which can do Good. In diagnosing certain disorders in local politics we need a prognosis which will bring rigour with respect and renewal with magnanimity. We need to use our branches to re-earn ANC support in the community and as a school for political consciousness. Each branch is unique with diverse personalities and varying capacities. They also span a number of generations. We must ensure that the potential of each branch and cadre is unleashed.
Unlike in Gauteng, in the North West we have never conducted any study to help us to evaluate the ef cacy of our branches and determine what ANC members really value about belonging to the ANC. Neither have we done a comprehensive survey on the state of branches. Maybe this task is for a different period. For now, our immediate task is to rebuild, reconnect, unite and work sustainably together, to position the ANC as the force for a comprehensive and home-grown phase to work with everybody who is a member of the ANC in good standing to forge unity, restore leadership and legitimacy; and to cease and desist from the politics of “label-marketing”. We need to owe allegiance to the ANC and its alliance partners.
What minimum steps are possible therefore under the circumstances? The following list, whilst not exhaustive, could help to chart a new common political trajectory:
of priority, constitute the rst steps towards claiming and creating the space and necessary inspiration in which the ANC and its collective membership can really do Good to itself and the community it has a historical obligation to serve. To effectively and strategically prepare for 2016, we must reconnect our people with the ideals of the Freedom Charter 60 years on, and remove the aws from all oors.
Our mission, therefore, executed with commitment and conviction, is to make sure that all sets of members feel at home in the ANC. Maybe then a new trajectory or sustainable unity could evolve and manifest itself amongst us.
Communication as a Strategy Instrument
All revolutions are sustained through ideological hegemonic stories of success and acknowledgements of failures. The recognition of failures is the means by
Each branch is unique with diverse personalities and varying capacities. They also span
a number of generations. We must ensure that the potential of each branch and cadre is unleashed.
which leaders of the revolution wish to improve on past performances. The perception of non-delivery among our communities and the emergence of an anti-ANC ideological pathogen are indicative of the communicative weakness of the ANC both inside and outside government. As cadres it must concern us that possibilities exist for counter-revolutionaries to in uence and shape the thinking of our people.
One of two conclusions may be drawn from this: rst, that we have not done enough to advertise the decisions of the movement regarding any matter, and that therefore a fertile breeding ground exists for counter- revolutionaries to impregnate the minds of communities with falsehoods and to misrepresent the objectives of the ANC. Or, secondly, that indeed there exists a degree of legitimacy in the protestations about service delivery in the province. As regards the latter, we must scienti cally engage with the performance of the ANC in government with a view to enhance the ability of government to meet the delivery needs of our people.
Concerted efforts must be made to strengthen the capacity of government to adequately communicate its achievements and explain its inability to deliver in certain cases and the challenges it faces and the complexities of the situation where necessary. As a liberation movement our communication with the masses should start from the premise that they are entitled to know, that the ANC in government is about them. It is only if we pursue an honest dialogical approach that our people will stay with us, as they did during the dark days of repression. However, where our failures result from bureaucratic inertia, we must communicate how these are to be dealt with to ensure that service delivery is not compromised simply because of lack of capacity, corruption or incompetence.
Similarly, the communication lacuna that exists in between elections between our communities and the ANC does provide the material conditions for the forces of reaction and agent provocateurs who nd our people susceptible to infestation with reactionary ideas. We must strive to disseminate the perspective of the ANC on all aspects of our socio- political programmes to ensure that no room for doubt exists among our communities. We must ensure that all our members are imbued with the knowledge and information on the rationale for any policy position and the perspective within which such policies are articulated.
The solution to this challenge may be multi-pronged, but must, of necessity, include an open and honest dialogical engagement with our communities on a continuous basis
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