The ANC Youth League (ANCYL) is due to hold its first elective conference in almost a decade this weekend and some task team members are warning about the danger of interference by senior party leaders in the league's electoral affairs.
One of those sounding the warning was Thuthukile Zuma, the task team fundraiser and treasurer-general hopeful.
“We haven’t had a national leadership in close to a decade and that makes it difficult for structures to function effectively.
“We need to fight to be an autonomous structure that is a necessary irritation to the mother body. We need to push for the ANC to effect change and reform in this country and implement policies influenced by the league.”
Zuma said the league should guard against the tendency of senior ANC leaders to meddle in and engineer a leadership outcome for the ANCYL.
“The heavy hand of the ANC’s involvement is where the problem started. There is a grouping whose existence emanates from the pockets of the ANC leaders. It is unfair that certain ANC leaders are using their influence to advance a particular perspective. It's distasteful, because young people should be allowed to elect people based on who they want to lead them.”
Another ANCYL member, Yamkela Fanisi, believes the structure in its current form no longer yields power to champion youth interests, and instead has been reduced to a power bloc for “big man” politics in the mother body.
“The use of money and the overwhelming influence by the old through hand-picking of the youth for task team lists, staffers in ministerial offices and the ‘grootman’ dynamic has compromised the autonomy of the structure.”
Fanisi said this weekend’s conference needs to level the playing field, abandon the obsession with proximity to ANC leadership and emerge with a leadership that will speak true to power.
Former Wits SRC president Cebolenkosi Khumalo has thrown his name into the hat for a leadership position.
“The capturing of the youth league's views led to its death. It has become a toothless dog. The current cohort of the league gets excited at the sight of champagne and Hennessy. You can tell they are waiting their turn to enrich themselves.”
It is critical that we have a spread of young people who come from different socialisations and backgrounds to nudge the rebuilding of the league from all corners of the country
— Mntuwoxolo Ngudle
Khumalo says those in parliament who have held positions in the previous ANCYL national youth task team (NYTT) have failed the youth.
However, presidential contender and MP Collen Malatji has dismissed criticism around how senior ANC leaders influence their processes.
“There are people who want to drag elders into things of the youth. There is no lazy shortcut. If you want to be elected, you go and mobilise your peers to support you. People are obsessed about being paraded by elders of the ANC. The crying is just disputing a process before it starts and that is a problematic attitude.”
The former Cosas president questioned candidates who have made it onto higher structures of the ANC such as the NEC yet want to contest for youth league positions
“The NEC is the highest decision-making body of the ANC. The YL is its preparatory school. When you are a graduate, why would you come back to high school?”
Despite the heated contest, the presidential candidate remained hopeful the league would survive the battle for its throne.
“The youth league is in its rebuilding stage. Over 300 branches and 40 regions have been launched. As a body of opinion in the ANC, we need to emerge with a mixture of those who have institutional memory, rural-based youth, communicators, youth in the sports, economic and academic sector — and of course, extreme radicals and mobilisers. That combination will give us a solid future and take us forward.”
Touted for the position of secretary-general on Malatji’s slate, Mntuwoxolo Ngudle from the Eastern Cape said the radicalism in the ANCYL should be centred on critical thinking.
“The idea that there is unfair ground might be a scapegoat for someone who does not enjoy support from their peers. There mustn't be scenarios created that anyone is favoured,” he said.
Despite the league’s two largest provinces — the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal — forming an alliance before the conference, Ngudle said it was important for the leadership of the young lions to be “fit for purpose”.
“I’m not a person of geography. I grew up in a youth league that emphasises the best among us must lead. It is critical that we have a spread of young people who come from different socialisations and backgrounds to nudge the rebuilding of the league from all corners of the country.”
The ANCYL was disbanded in 2018 when it failed to elect new leaders to take over from Collen Maine. The previous task team was ordered to take the young lions to their elective conference, but the national lockdown caused more delays.
The task team was then disbanded and a new one with a younger cohort installed — and it has seemingly successfully paved the way for the rebuilding of the ANCYL.
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