Richmond Sajini

Many of us who grew up with a reverence for the ANC have mourned its demise. We were labeled " DA coconuts, clever blacks, counter revolutionaries " because those who wear ANC regalia believe they have legitimacy. They ignored the umbilical chord that tied us to this party and the painful separation that HAD to happen because of its own conduct. The party chose itself and not "the people." They didn't ask WHY. So with that in mind, I respond to you. My dear sister, what, exactly, is a “black party”? A party founded by black people? Led by black people? Supported by black voters? And what happens when its leaders steal from the people whose racial identity they share? Does a black official who loots a public institution advance black power? Does a black politician who protects corruption become progressive by virtue of pigmentation? What liberation reaches a black household when money intended for its water, electricity, healthcare or education disappears? A party that helped teach the world the meaning of non-racial liberation cannot respond to electoral rejection by dividing South Africans into racial camps and suggesting that black voters who choose differently are restoring colonial rule. If the ANC has abandoned its commitment to non-racialism, its leadership must tell us. PUBLICLY. And explain which conference authorised that departure. Because history and documents say otherwise. In 1955, the Congress of the People adopted the Freedom Charter, declaring that “South Africa belongs to all who live in it, black and white”. Albert Luthuli addressed precisely this in his 1961 Nobel lecture. He explained that the liberation movement had consciously rejected the easy mobilisation of racial resentment, despite the brutality inflicted on black South Africans. He described its vision as “a nonracial, democratic South Africa”. The refusal to answer racial oppression with racial exclusion was a considered political choice. Mandela expressed that commitment at Rivonia in 1964: “I have fought against white domination, and I have fought against black domination.” Those words placed a moral limit on the exercise of power, including power exercised by black leaders. The ANC translated principle into organisational decisions. At Morogoro in 1969, it opened membership to South Africans of all races, although the NEC remained restricted to Africans. At Kabwe in 1985, it removed that leadership restriction. Tambo subsequently described the opening of membership as “a giant leap forward towards the true nonracialism within the ANC”. These were deliberate changes to who could belong and who could lead. So wena what are you saying here? And is this the party's position or are you all saying what you want, when you want? The constitution adopted at the ANC’s 2022 conference retains non-racialism as part of the organisation’s defining character. Rule 3.4 commits it to combating racial, tribal and ethnic exclusivism or chauvinism. None of this requires silence about racism, white economic power or the enduring distribution of deprivation along racial lines. The people harmed by corruption do not experience it less brutally because the person responsible looks like them. You invoke historical and dialectical materialism. This makes your argument especially vacuous. A serious materialist analysis would examine ownership, class interests, institutions, labour and the distribution of resources. Counting parties by the presumed race of their leaders tells us remarkably little about whose interests those parties actually serve. Black citizens are entitled to withdraw support from a party that disappoints them. Their freedom includes the right to reject the ANC without being accused of betraying their people. You celebrate the political wisdom of black voters when they support you, then diagnose their ignorance when they leave? You, @MYANC abandoned us. YOU have made us a laughing stock. Don't you dare preach to us about what we do next.