Unisa online - Debating the changing political landscape

From left: Dr Somadoda Fikeni, Prof Tinyiko Maluleke, Mr Gwede Mantashe, Mr Aubrey Matshiqi and Prof Zodwa Motsa

Senate Hall on the Muckleneuk campus was crowded as staff, students and invited guests gathered to hear Mr Gwede Mantashe, Secretary General of the ANC, address a seminar entitled "Debating the changing political landscape and its implications for democracy" on 28 October 2008. The seminar formed part of the Research Directorate's Seminar Series and was hosted together with the Institute for Security Studies. In his keynote address, Mr Mantashe reminded the audience that the ANC was formed some 96 years ago with the sole objective of uniting the people of South Africa. "Over the years, all the programmes of our movement have been directed at the objective of uniting our people," he said. This objective remains paramount and he felt that an attack on the unity of the movement was an attack on the essence and the very reason for its existence. "The implications, therefore," he stated, "will be a divided movement and such a divided movement will reduce our capacity to improve the lives of our people." He felt that the ANC members who were leaving the party were not driven by ideological reasons, but were driven by anger and an obsession with power. The ANC will not campaign in defence, but will instead remain focused on its five-point programme.

The first panellist, Dr Somadoda Fikeni, Walter Sisulu University Council Chairperson, noted that Polokwane was a watershed in the political calendar since 1994. "It unleashed a number of political processes and forces and it was also a culmination of a number of developments that took place before." He felt that one of the questions that needed to be asked was whether the ANC conference at Polokwane was just a change of guard or a policy or ideological shift. "The one thing I can say," he noted, "is that pre-Polokwane and post-Polokwane what has been the main focus has been the beauty contest of personalities, and very little focus has been on substantive issues of policy." He was hoping that, as the country moved to elections, there would be a move to a policy debate that focused on issues rather than on personalities.

Prof Zodwa Motsa, Chair: Department of English Studies at Unisa, and the second panellist, felt that while politicians and social humanists discussed the social turmoil, she would like people to be more proactive and cast their nets further than the present turmoil. "We need level-headed planners who will take us ahead in the changing landscape of our politics." She reminded her listeners that there had been a war in South Africa and she felt that this needed to be acknowledged to manage the resultant post-war trauma. "We need to incise that wound, clean it and stitch it up," she emphasised. "We still need to heal ourselves so that intolerances can be resolved." She also felt that the South African society did not have a vision, that the youth did not have an ideal, that there was too big a gap between the haves and the have-nots, and a worrying class system.

The final panellist, Mr Aubrey Matshiqi, Senior Associate: Centre for Policy Studies, felt that while there was a multiplicity of explanations and reasons, at least some of the tensions could be ascribed to deep state theory. "According to this theory, there are times in the lives of nations when senior politicians, senior government officials, criminal syndicates, rogue intelligence officers, elements of big business, work together in pursuit of question of a common business or economic goal. The question we must ask is whether this is not what has been happening in post-apartheid South Africa. If this is correct, we then have to accept that there are possibilities that these senior politicians, senior government officials, criminal syndicates, rogue intelligence agents, and elements of big business, do not always belong to the same deep state project. And what that means is that there may have been or there may be in existence several deep state projects which at some point came into conflict and competition with one another and this conflict and competition has been manifesting itself as political tension. If this theory is correct, it explains why in part, the tensions have extended to the state." He also believed that at some point after 1997, the ANC had crossed the line between political party and cult, leader and high priest, which also led to the tensions seen at the present time.

Questions and comments from the floor gave the speakers an opportunity to clarify certain points they had made, and concluded a morning of stimulating and varying points of view that was ably managed by Prof Tinyiko Maluleke, Executive Director: Research, as programme director.