IT seems the South African Communist Party was caught unaware.
This was the feeling following the ANC’s national general council (NGC) resolving to recuse members of the SACP from meetings on election strategies, considering the 2026 local elections.
During the close of the NGC held in Boksburg over four-days, President of the liberation party Cyril Matamela Ramaphosa told thousands of delegates that the NGC resolved that a number of SACP leaders felt conflicted and therefore believed they should recuse themselves until the two parties met and ironed-out the differences.
“All we are saying is that as we continue to engage, particularly on our strategies and tactics for running the elections, they should recuse themselves,” Ramaphosa said, soliciting rapturous applause from delegates drawn from all provinces.
“Accordingly, this NGC has supported the NEC’s assessment that the SACP’s resolution to have the SACP field candidates in the 2026 local government elections will not only have technical implications but will also have strategic implications for the alliance as a whole and for the prosecution of the NDR (national democratic revolution), ” he said.
“The NGC has agreed that the alliance leadership must meet urgently to develop a common approach to the reconfiguration and renewal of the alliance in a manner that safeguards unity, cohesion and avoids further confusion, division and conflict among the rank and file on the ground.”
Fikile Mbalula- ANC’s SG said those belonging to both parties would now have to choose between the ANC and the SACP, this dual membership does not work.
He said the SACP’s decision to go it alone in the elections was “erratic and very dangerous” for the national democratic revolution (NDR) project led by the ANC.
“The party had failed to persuade the SACP to rethink its decision,” Mbalula told reporters at the NGC.
SACP general secretary Solly Mapaila first announced December 2024 that the party’s national executive committee had decided to contest the next local government elections alone.
The party felt that the ANC had “sold out” by working with the DA in a government of national unity (GNU), and was also unhappy that it had not been consulted prior to that decision.
The SACP has previously threatened to stand alone in elections but has backed down after securing concessions from the party, that’s until Thurday that seemed to have caught some of the officials unaware at the NGC.
Question is- what’s going to happen to the likes of Gwede Mantashe, Enoch Godongwana, and others, who are seniors within both the ANC and SACP?
Whatever decision, the grass is going to suffer- in this instance the constituents.
