Cape Town - The ANC and its tripartite alliance partners will hold yet another crisis meeting in a frantic bid to salvage their decades-old, historic relationship.
This after they met without agreement last week Monday and this Monday behind closed doors, in their first meetings since October last year.
Meetings between the SACP and ANC scheduled for this year were postponed several times because of the SACP’s public call for President Jacob Zuma to be removed.
The recent cabinet reshuffle which saw Zuma dumping SACP head Blade Nzimande deepened the impasse between the two organisations.
On Tuesday, SACP spokesperson Alex Mashilo said the sacking of Nzimande was not on the agenda.
He said that since the 2016 bilateral meeting a lot had happened, including the reshuffle in March which saw Zuma remove Pravin Gordhan as finance minister and his deputy, Mcebisi Jonas, from their positions.
“The situation was worsened by the latest reshuffle last month,” Mashilo said.
At Monday’s meeting, a previous agreement that all key appointments in government and state-owned entities should be fully discussed with the alliance partners prior to any appointments or decision to reshuffle was reiterated.
“It was not an issue-based meeting. The matter of Comrade Blade was never discussed.
“All I can confirm is that the parties made the most important agreement (namely) to hold further meetings.
“The parties also agreed to hold (another) alliance political council by the end of this month, where a decision to roll out processes of engagement between them (would be taken),” he said.
But the deadlock between the ANC and the SACP over Nzimande’s dismissal was confirmed by Mapaila when he addressed the central executive committee of Popcru at the weekend in Irene.
Mapaila stated that his party would call for the recall of Zuma as president of the country after the ANC’s national conference.
While the party has yet to pronounce ANC Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa as its preferred presidential candidate, Mapaila urged Popcru members to support the call by Cosatu to nominate Ramaphosa for the presidency.
“That’s why, as workers, we must campaign that Zuma must step down. He can’t be our leader. Not acting against him is a lack of wisdom on the part of the ANC NEC.
“To avoid the consequences is absolute abdication of leadership responsibility. It is the same as keeping a rotten corpse in the house in the ‘wisdom’ that the smell will disappear.
“Surely that’s an absolute game of fools. We can be fooled sometimes, but we can’t be fooled all the time,” Mapaila told Popcru members.
The bilateral meeting between the ANC and SACP comes as the succession battle in the governing party and allies intensified.
This week Ramaphosa announced Science and Technology Minister Naledi Pandor would be his running mate on his ticket.
Fellow party presidential hopeful Lindiwe Sisulu hit back, saying ”slate politics” would plunge the ruling party into an even deeper crisis, “into the quagmire of disunity and divisions currently plaguing our body politic”.
Cape Times