ANCYL seeks to redefine nationalisation research mandate

Julius Malema's ANC Youth League insists that the inquiry into the nationalisation of South Africa's mines must not be "depoliticised".

The ANC Youth League, headed by Julius Malema, sought today to qualify the mandate of the party's National Executive Committee to a team that will investigate the nationalisation of the country's mines.

"The ANC Youth League will support all research on nationalisation of mines which is not depoliticised and taken out of its original political context and strategic vision of the ANC, the Freedom Charter," spokesman Floyd Shivambu said in a statement.

The league appeared to threaten to reject a conclusion based on economic and business realities, saying "a depoliticised research outcome which ignores the politics of the national democratic revolutionary agenda will not find resonance in the African National Congress".

The party's NEC announced after a weekend meeting that it would appoint a team to investigate nationalisation and report in time for its 2012 conference, at which the youth league hopes to win a formal endorsement for Malema's flagship project.

"The NEC has resolved to appoint two senior researchers and a project manager to investigate successful models that could be considered on the role of the state in mining," secretary general Gwede Mantashe said in a statement on behalf of the NEC.

"We are engaging the research institutions to provide researchers to the project. Our Economic Transformation Committee will provide terms of reference for such research and will also give us a reference group to oversee the work on behalf of the NEC," he said.

The mining industry welcomed the ANC decision but said it assumed the researchers would be independent.

Chamber of Mines CEO Zoli Diliza said he hoped that those who wanted to gain personally from state involvement in mining would accept the pragmatic and constructive approach the ANC was taking.

"We hope that the researchers will investigate all the potential roles of the state in mining. These could include the role of a state mining company and identifying conditions conducive to rapid growth and transformation," he said.

But the youth league, which forced the issue onto the ANC agenda at the party's National General Council in Durban recently, insists the proposal must be looked at as part of the revolutionary agenda.

Charging that "neo-liberal politics and economics were previously smuggled into the ANC through what is called independent research and expertise", the league said the research should be "neither a technocratic, nor academic exercise, but a political and economic transformation programme".

"The ANC Youth League will provide all the necessary support to the research team, partake in the ETC (Economic Transformation Committee) reference group, and ensure that all these processes do not falsely interpret the Freedom Charter and as a result wrongly advise the determination of the best model for the role of the State in mining and other sectors of the economy," the league said.