The SACP has noted the content and spirit of your editorial "Zuma's cheerleaders want to turn SA into banana republic" (April 10) with grave concern.
The editorial is not only misleading and racially polarising but is based on a misinterpretation of facts while being out of context about what our general secretary, Blade Nzimande, has said, as well as about the character of his content.
As general secretary of the first non-racial political organisation in this country, Dr Nzimande is a committed non-racialist who works closely with his deputy, Jeremy Cronin, as well as people of all races in the SACP and ANC, and as a government minister.
You accuse him of speaking for black people and taking them for idiots, which is completely baseless. In contrast, it is your editorial that does exactly the same with "self-appointed authority to do so" and in a racially condescending undertone.
This reinforces our general secretary's contention that sections of the media are untransformed and continuing to reflect amanga abelungu in their content. This must not be left to go on unchallenged.
Lastly, neither the SACP nor its general secretary is a cheerleader for President Jacob Zuma and neither seeks to turn South Africa into a banana republic as alleged by your response - in fact, a self-conviction - to what Nzimande correctly characterised as "the opposition and its media cheerleaders".
The SACP is an independent political formation with its own programme and policies. It is on the basis of its independence that the SACP is in an alliance with the ANC, based on our shared history of struggle that led to the defeat of apartheid, and our shared perspective of the national democratic revolution to move South Africa forward to a non-racial, non-sexist, democratic and prosperous society.
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