Reds caught between a rock and a hard place

Patrick Laurence reflects on the dilemma facing the SACP as it grapples with the future.

Summary - Buti Manamela, national secretary of the Young Communist League (YCL), observes with pride that the South African Communist Party (SACP) is the only party that contested elections prior to the 1950 Suppression of Communism Act to have survived. Pride in the SACP’s longevity, however, needs to be tempered by its reluctance to expose itself to the rigours of competition at the polls.

Under the prevailing agreement with the African National Congress (ANC), SACP members contest elections as candidates on the ANC election list and under the aegis and authority of the ANC.

The central committee is strongly in favour of retaining the status quo, and a discussion paper prepared for the April conference argued forcefully for maintaining the special electoral understanding with the ANC.

Two arguments for doing so seem to have weighed heavily with the drafters of the paper: firstly, a concern that an SACP decision to stand under its own colours might lead to acrimonious contestation with the ANC, particularly as the SACP and the ANC would be campaigning for support “on the turf of the same constituency”; secondly, the conviction that even a “diminished party influence” within the ANC translates “into a massive gain in the SACP influence and capacity to impact upon the broader South African [polity]”.

The SACP is confronted by an unenviable dilemma. If it decides to retain its position as an ANC political auxiliary, it risks absorption into the ANC which, by its own reckoning, is pursuing a macro-economic policy that is strongly influenced by “neo-liberalism” and that is fostering the rapid growth of a black bourgeoisie, as well as a black capitalist class.

If, however, the SACP decides to take the go-it-alone option, it risks humiliation at the polls, not least because, as the SACP central committee discussion paper stresses, that choice entails the real risk of finding itself engaged in political battle against the far more powerful ANC.

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the fall two years earlier of its communist satellite states in Eastern Europe, the appeal of communism has diminished sharply. Where the SACP was once seen as the vehicle to the uppermost echelons of the ANC, that is no longer the case. The clearest sign of its declining influence in the ANC is manifest in the career path of Thabo Mbeki. A former member of the SACP central committee, Mbeki, realising that the influence of the party was on the wane, relinquished his membership in the late 1980s. Further signs of the SACP’s dwindling influence in the ANC include the apparent loss of faith in the party by some of its members serving in the cabinet.

Yet the SACP still believes that by adroit strategising it can establish or re-establish “working-class hegemony” in the ANC and, by extension, over all the main levers of power in post-apartheid South Africa. The chances of that happening appear to be infinitesimally small. The ANC, in contrast, is strategically poised to co-opt the SACP to advance its agenda of black hegemony.

Judging from the YCL discussion document, the SACP still places hopes in the “Cuban route to socialism”, referring to the gradual extension of communist influence within Fidel Castro’s revolutionary movement until the Cuban Communist Party was strong enough to openly assume control.

The SACP might do better by campaigning in elections as an independent party, provided it carves a new identity for itself as an Afro-communist party, functioning within the constraints of “bourgeois democracy” and seeking to persuade the electorate to support a socialist programme. It will be a hard but honourable odyssey to undertake.

Buti Manamela, national secretary of the Young Communist League (YCL), observes with pride that the South African Communist Party (SACP) is the only party that contested elections prior to the 1950 Suppression of Communism Act to have survived.1 His pride is understandable. The SACP is still extant today while the Afrikaner nationalist party that sought to outlaw communism has dissolved itself rather than soldier on under its refurbished identity as the New National Party.

But in the 55 years since the National Party (NP) government of DF Malan proscribed communism as an alien and subversive doctrine, the SACP has not survived as an independent political party. Instead it has become an African National Congress (ANC) auxiliary force. Unlike the Communist Party of South Africa, the political chrysalis from which the underground SACP emerged clandestinely in 1953, it has not even fought a local government by-election under its own banner, not even after its re-launching as a lawful above-ground party in 1991. Pride in the SACP’s longevity thus needs to be tempered by its reluctance to expose itself to the rigours of competition at the polls.

In fairness, however, it should be noted that voices have been raised within SACP ranks for the party to contest elections in its own right, though preferably as an ANC ally. Pressure in that direction accounts for the SACP decision to hold a special congress in Durban in April, at which the issue of a more independent and visible role for the SACP was debated. The situation will remain unchanged, however, as the congress decided to retain the status quo for the immediate future. Under the prevailing agreement with the ANC, SACP members contest elections as candidates on the ANC election list and under the aegis and authority of the ANC.2 The question of an independent SACP election presence has been referred to a commission. The SACP central committee will appoint members to the commission that is mandated to complete its report for presentation at the SACP national congress in July 2007.3

As the central committee is strongly in favour of retaining the status quo for the foreseeable future, the odds are in favour of the commission re-affirming the need to persist with the present arrangement. It is pertinent to note en passant that a discussion paper prepared for the April conference, and approved by the central committee, argued strongly in favour of maintaining the special electoral understanding with the ANC.

Two arguments for doing so seem to have weighed heavily with the drafters of the paper: firstly, a concern that an SACP decision to stand under its own colours might lead to acrimonious contestation with the ANC, particularly as the SACP and the ANC would be campaigning for support “on the turf of the same constituency”4; secondly, the conviction that even a “diminished party influence” within the ANC as a “well entrenched ruling party” translates “into a massive gain in the SACP influence and capacity to impact upon the broader South African (polity).”5

If the trenchant and singled-minded central committee arguments for the status quo partially account for the prudent — or, more unkindly, pusillanimous — SACP decision to defer resolution of the debate to mid-2007, the YCL is not without blame. Its discussion document is not an incisive argument for an independent SACP presence in South Africa’s national, provincial and local legislatures. It is, rather, a synopsis of the pros and cons of contesting elections under the red flag.6

The discussion document asserts that the SACP should “in the final analysis” contest elections as an independent party, only to make it conditional on an ANC refusal to allocate an unspecified number of seats on its electoral list to SACP candidates. Several statements follow that point to ambivalence, at the least, about contesting elections as an independent party. One is that the national legislature is a “bourgeoisie institution which must be smashed”. Another is a warning that the SACP should be wary of locking itself into a bourgeois institution and thereby impeding its quest to establish a socialist state in South Africa. It specifically recalls the fate of Salvador Allende of Chile, the Marxist leader who won the 1970 general election in that country, only to be deposed by a right-wing military junta led by Augusto Pinochet.7

The SACP is confronted by an unenviable dilemma. Like the ancient mariners, it is trapped between the treacherous islands of Scylla and Charybdis: it can avoid the first only by exposing itself to the danger of the second and vice versa.

If it decides to retain its position as an ANC political auxiliary, it risks absorption into the ANC which, by its own reckoning, is pursuing a macro-economic policy that is strongly influenced by “neo-liberalism” and that is fostering the rapid growth of a black bourgeoisie, as well as a black capitalist class. The more numerous and coherent these classes become, the larger they loom as an obstacle to the transformation of South Africa into a socialist state.

Beyond that, to cite the SACP discussion paper again,8 the evidence from opinion polls indicates that only a small component of the electorate is willing to consider supporting an independent workers’ party should it be formed by a breakaway from the ANC-led tripartite alliance of the SACP and the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) or by disillusioned members of the two organisations. Opinion surveys put potential support for the hypothetical workers’ party at between 15 and 17 per cent. Potential support is not guaranteed support, however. It would probably be far less than that, particularly if the ANC launched an all-out campaign to crush the fledgling party.

Another factor needs to be considered. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the fall two years earlier of its communist satellite states in Eastern Europe, the appeal of communism has diminished sharply. Even in the Chinese People’s Republic, the last great bastion of communism, the government has had to sanction the limited re-emergence, under licence so to speak, of profit-motivated capitalist modes of production. It signals a strategic retreat rather than a tactical withdrawal. If, as 19th century French novelist Victor Hugo remarked, there is no force on earth more powerful than an idea whose time has come, that aphorism is no longer applicable to communism. It is an ideology whose appeal is ebbing.

The SACP concedes as much. In a discussion document on its medium-term vision, it states unequivocally: “Relative to the high point in SACP ideological hegemony within the ANC (from the late 1960s through to the 1980s), it is obvious that the SACP’s influence within the ANC has diminished in the last 15 years”. To elaborate on that recognition: where the SACP was once seen as the vehicle to the uppermost echelons of the ANC, that is no longer the case.

The clearest sign of the SACP’s declining influence in the ANC is manifest in the career path of Thabo Mbeki. A former member of the SACP central committee who was once hailed as a star by his communist mentors, Mbeki, realising that the influence of the party was on the wane, relinquished his membership in the late 1980s. As William Mervin Gumede points out in his analysis of ANC-ruled South Africa, Mbeki’s decision did not endear him to the then general secretary of the SACP, Joe Slovo, but neither did it prevent him from succeeding Nelson Mandela as ANC president in 1997 and as South Africa’s head of state in 1999.9

Former Marxist-Leninist governments in Africa offer little hope. The tyrannical regime of Mengistu Haile Miriam in Ethiopia has been overthrown, while the governments of Angola and Mozambique have jettisoned Marxist-Leninism for an African variant of multiparty democracy linked to a partially free-market economy. In Zimbabwe, where Mengistu cowers in exile, the government is fast becoming renowned for its Afro-fascism.

There are further signs of the SACP’s dwindling influence in the ANC. They include the apparent loss of faith in the party by some of its members serving in the cabinet. So much so that they are no longer classified as “active members” by the SACP.10 Former SACP stalwarts in the cabinet who are regarded as non-active or lapsed communists are Essop Pahad, Alec Erwin, Jeff Radebe and Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi. They seem to have been weaned from their communist convictions by their bourgeois confreres in the cabinet. On the face of it their loyalty to the ANC takes preference over their allegiance to the SACP.

Yet, notwithstanding all these signs of the declining influence of communism in general and of the SACP within the ANC in particular, the SACP still believes that by adroit strategising it can establish or re-establish “working-class hegemony” in the ANC and, by extension, over all the main levers of power in post-apartheid South Africa. The chances of that happening appear to be infinitesimally small. The ANC, in contrast, is strategically poised to co-opt the SACP to advance its agenda of black hegemony, a notion that is not incompatible with the emergence of a class of, in the words of a black non-communist minister11, “filthy rich” blacks. Subversion of the proletarian sympathies of communist ministers with the powers and perks of high office may be an important though unintended, or perhaps undeclared, item on the agenda.

Judging from the YCL discussion document, the SACP still hopes that the “Cuban route to socialism is viable in South Africa”. It is referring to the gradual extension of communist influence within Fidel Castro’s revolutionary movement until the Cuban Communist Party was strong enough to openly assume control of the movement and of the newly installed government. Another fate might overtake South African communists however. Like their comrades in Iraq, who formed an alliance with the Baath Party and were awarded seats in the cabinet12, they may eventually be swallowed by the increasingly nationalist-inclined ANC or, if indigestible, spat out.

Though not an easy route to take, the SACP might do better by campaigning in elections as an independent party, provided it carves a new identity for itself as an Afro-communist party along the lines of the Euro-communist parties of Spain, Italy and France. That implies dispensing with notions of attaining power by force or stealth and, instead, functioning within the constraints of “bourgeois democracy” and seeking to persuade the electorate to support a socialist programme. It will be a hard but honourable odyssey to undertake.

Endnotes
1 Undated YCL statement replying to a Business Day editorial on 12 April 2005.
2 SACP statement on its participation in election, 10 April 2005.
3 Ibid.
4 Central committee discussion paper: Should the party contest elections in its own right?
5 Discussion paper prepared for the Durban conference entitled Our medium term vision.
6 The relationship of the SACP to state power: A discussion document of the YCL.
7 Ibid.
8 Central committee discussion paper: Op Cit.
9 Thabo Mbeki. and the battle for the soul of the ANC, William Mervin Gumede, Zebra 2005. Page 39.
10 Interview with high-ranking SACP official.
11 Minerals and energy Minister Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka.
12 Comrades: The rise and fall of world communism. Robert Harvey. Pages 299-301.