We have been through worst times. The NEC must be reminded

    In times of political upheavals and uncertainty, few countries have weathered what South Africa has gone through without an entire combat war. Despite our clearly diverse and muted demographic makeup in race, class, and tribal terms, there has always been a way we would choose for the greater good of all, even if that posture is at the expense of the majority and somewhat accommodating to an arrogant minority. In all the epochs where we were tested to the limit, it has always been the wisdom of those that were in charge of the oldest leader of society, the African National Congress. We are on a recovery path from a punishing COVID-19 pandemic that might yet again make its return if reports from Beijing are a guide. We are recovering from a global economic meltdown occasioned by cyclical market conditions, still pursuing the Leeman Brothers-induced evaporation of value in the global financial markets, the burst bubble. 

More acutely to our situation, we are recovering from the July 21 reversal of the economy and destruction of the country's logistics hub and outlet. We are recovering from the KZN floods that wrecked infrastructure havoc, whose costs have become a burden on the capacity of our economy to respond without worsening our debt crisis. We are grappling with an energy situation that is bleeding the economy of its available jobs and industries. 

In politics, we have since gotten into an unstable roller coaster from the historic 52nd Conference of the ANC in Polokwane, which impacted the leader of society cadence the ANC had built as a resilience mechanism to drive the transformation of society. The 60:40 divide inside the ANC, which started in Polokwane, had declined until it reached an almost 50:50 crest in NASREC 1.0 and threatened a worse than the rest in NASREC 2.0. While it remains true that the ANC has always had these factions since its formation, and they get pronounced towards and during its conferences, it has been the maturity and 'leader of society consciousness' of those that win the privilege to lead the ANC that advances it to further heights. 

The muted tensions that followed the release of Nelson Mandela when the 'leadership question' was discussed found in the wisdom of the 1949 Congress League generation maturity levels that managed the Tambo-Mandela transition. These tensions found expression in the discussions around the folding of the United Democratic Front, the redefinition of SAYCO into the youth league and the future role of the progressive youth alliance, the definition of SACTU into the COSATU architecture, the accommodation of homeland parties into the ANC and crafting a different part for former Bantustan leaders. These tensions were in all organised sectors of society in which the ANC has had a hand in their formation and/or direction. The Mandela succession debates, the Winnie Mandela discussions as a possible immediate successor and potentially the first woman president of the ANC and country. The choreographed Cyril Ramaphosa exit and 'deployment' to the private sector and the KZN positioning of JZ as the succession juggernaut. The economic policy direction tensions within the alliance and the processes leading to the adoption of a Washington consensus-driven posture on the economic future of South Africa. 

In this vortex of tensions, Chris Hani was assassinated, and the conspiracy theories within the ANC continue to linger today. The reaction to the Jaluz parole clearly indicates how far healing has gone in South Africa and, interestingly, within the elite political ranks. In fact, it also exposed the inherent differences within the political elite about the constitutional democracy that drives the rollout of the liberation promise through the Constitution. 

The ANCs latest turmoil, which blew into the open at NASREC 1.0, and conditioned the whole of Cyril Ramaphosa's presidency, is arguably driven by the spoils of war fights manifesting themselves as corruption and its adjunct state capture. The sub-context of 'it is our turn to ascend', with its many euphemisms, including defining legacies of the ANC by the ANC as wasted years, has only served to brew hermetically sealable factions with which the Polokwane birthed 60:40 divide could be hosted. The way of doing business with government and in government, within an undefined ideological framework, has landed many in leadership in contexts where they defend economic trajectories that are no solution to what fundamentally defined the essence of the ANC-led liberation struggle. 

For much of the post-Polokwane ANC, the liberation movement has mostly remained on the margins of economic transformation and better-life-for-all-driven socio-economic transformation. The preoccupation has, in the main, been about the 26% stake in the economy instead of opening new avenues and defining a new economy. Credit to pronouncements and actions during the famous 'nine wasted years', notwithstanding their later mixing up with what was classified as state capture, there was an attempt to start a black industrialist program and 'others'. The trust deficit, mainly because of the anti-then-economic-establishment rhetoric, has tended to keep the two most active agencies of the state, government and capital, apart. As this unfolded, the ANC was consumed instead by its own internal issues and acutely factional interests. On the one hand, its immediate after, Polokwane leadership seemed to have been preoccupied with defending their Polokwane gains to levels where a swimming pool became a Public Works-approved fire pool. Its NASREC 1.0 President, on the other hand, drove a government-wide posture of fishing for corrupt senior government executives to justify the narrative of corruption and state capture as the new reason there is inequality. 

The first Presidential posture has the Zondo, Nugent Commissions, and several Public Protector reports to demonstrate how it defined the cadence of government. The NASREC 1.0 presidential posture created a condition of poor bureaucratic discretion, and senior government officials and ministers started to be afraid to take management risks required of a developmental state. The search for scandals to take each other down within the liberation movement became so intense that law enforcement agencies prioritised it over other worse crimes afflicting society. In this circumstance, the PhalaPhala matter became a trump card with all its wrongs, and arguably, many are still waiting for the right moment. 

The crisis that is supposedly facing the ANC, 'musani uku dlala nina man', is significant to the extent that people don't know how significant others were. Trapped in the cocoon of poor analysis within and close proximity to decision centres, the ANC needs to pause and appreciate that its role is leading society and not feeding its factional interests. The ANC NEC must act beyond what its members want but what is in the interest of its members as part of the broader South African Society. 

Using the metaphor of metamorphosis, if in the NEC the majority are still eggs, or are the caterpillar, or the cocoon, and not the butterfly, let those that led before joining the NEC bring stability of reason tomorrow. Please be reminded that unless President Ramaphosa is taken out through a proper process, if he really should go, our democracy would have reclassified itself differently. We might live to regret not following the processes we have. In the parlance of a CEO of a fund management company, "governance and process should be your best friends; when you need them, they must be fit and ready". 

That the ANC is an institution of leadership and leader of society as opposed to being a coterie of self-aggrandists, will be tested in how they carry society along in their process. CUT!!!🤷🏿‍♂️