The road to hell, they say, is paved with good intentions. We know this to be true because many people, politicians for the most part, become vituperative while explaining how they plan to create a better life for all. The result, often, is the opposite.
President Cyril Ramaphosa spent years explaining how he intends to “unite” the ANC. Yet the ANC seems anything but united. The latest word in the season is “renewal” in the ANC. With each passing day though many wonder if the party of Albert Luthuli is anything closer to renewal.
In 2017 the ANC underwent a new era underpinned by its ambition to renew and connect with its constituents. At the head of this change was its president Cyril Ramaphosa who had been elected against what some had deemed to be those who stood with former president Jacob Zuma’s corruption ring . At the same time, his clique was considered the reformers who would usher in a new dawn for the party.
Ramaphosa not only placed emphasis on the need to unite — an important task for any president succeeding Zuma — he completely ignored the expectation set out at its Polokwane congress to renew
In his acceptance speech at Nasrec on that December morning, Ramaphosa made very little mention of unity, only once attributing this noun to the need for the alliance to stand together amid growing frustration over its reconfiguration.
But the ANC had long understood the need to renew. At its Polokwane conference, the party realised to comprehensively respond to the new conditions and challenges occasioned by its coming into power it needed to be agile and adapt to the changing times.
This led to a resolution that the organisation should declare a period of renewal. To quote Gwede Mantashe at the time, the ANC needed to adapt and adjust to the current conditions as a living organism with a capacity to self-correct and cleanse itself.
While the ANC realised these pitfalls, it was slow to act. The Zuma years were fraught with factional divides, a cancer that still threatens the party’s existence.
The journey towards renewal was blurred even during the Ramaphosa era. As stated before, Ramaphosa had not only placed emphasis on the need to unite — an important task for any president succeeding Zuma — he had completely ignored the expectation set out at its Polokwane congress to renew.
This was exemplified by its rallying call in the lead-up to the 2019 elections “unity in action”. It was a time when Ramaphosa and Zuma would appear together in the hope of squashing any doubts they were at odds. It served the ANC well to some degree, slowing its decline while ensuring it would emerge if not for the last time during national elections as the majority government.
This rallying call reverberated throughout the ANC membership with many taking up Ramaphosa’s call to unite the party despite its inability to shed its factional divide.
However, it took Thabo Mbeki to emphasise the urgency of renewal. In 2020, while visiting the ANC in KwaZulu-Natal, Mbeki was reported to have expressed frustration with the leadership's preoccupation with unity while ignoring renewal. He would raise this again while commemorating Andrew Mlangeni's life.
To Mbeki, unity would not be possible if the ANC was not committed to the task of renewal. “It will not be possible to deal with all the challenges our country faces, including the matter of ethical leadership, unless we renew the ANC, as was called for by the 54th national conference,” he said.
His words hit home. Ramaphosa and the ANC would shift their focus from uniting the organisation to its renewal. At its 2022 conference, the ANC resolved that organisational renewal was “an absolute and urgent priority” for its survival.
Renewal became synonymous with Ramaphosa as his No 1 priority and part of his legacy as the ANC president.
Emerging reports that the ANC’s renewal commission, now headed by its president, had not sat since its inception would be shocking if it wasn't the ANC. These reports demonstrate that the shock of the elections, the rise of the MK Party and its recent decision to reconfigure Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal, necessitated by a rudderless leadership and the collapse of structures, have made renewal a distant priority for the ANC.
It leaves one to wonder if the president of the ANC takes the matter of renewing the party nonchalantly. Is it any wonder the ANC time immemorial continues to pass the test of ethical and principled leadership?
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