Premier Oscar Mabuyane provided a searing analysis this week of the ANC which he referred to variously as ailing, diseased, crippled, divided and internally conflicted.
While what he said may draw criticism from some within the party who may consider his words disloyal, the opposite is true.
Mabuyane is the chair of the provincial ANC and has a unique view of the party he says he loves.
He is not demeaning the party, but rather those who have brought it to its knees.
He sees that the divisions between President Cyril Ramaphosa and his deputy, Paul Mashatile, are replicated at every level of the ANC.
There is constant squabbling over policy issues, over their government of national unity partners and over positions of power.
And as Mabuyane so correctly points out, the victims in all of this are the communities which the ANC governments at national, provincial and, particularly, local level serve so poorly that millions of them opted not to vote for the party in the last general election.
If the party leaders had remained loyal to their voters and put their needs above their own petty politicking, then it is likely the ANC would have retained its majority and would not have had to seek out alliances with other parties which some find so distasteful.
The ANC needs to work on creating policy coherence and unity in its message.
Perhaps the starkest example of the ANC’s policy schizophrenia was its decision to increase VAT.
It advertises itself as a pro-poor party, but VAT increases disproportionately affect low-income households.
It was left with egg on its face when not even its main GNU partner, the DA, supported the increase, citing its inevitable effect on the poor.
The ANC has since had to walk back the increase and do exactly as other parties suggested — look to make up the deficit elsewhere.
Mabuyane also described a candid, brutally honest engagement with Ramaphosa where the party confronted its many failings as a “moment of political therapy”.
One can only hope that the therapy and the prescribed cures which Mabuyane spoke of during his extended metaphor will work to bring into line those seemingly so hell-bent on imploding the ANC.
It is unhealthy for a country, province or local entity to have at its helm a party whose leaders are constantly at each others’ throats.
A little less focus on elective conferences and a bit more on service delivery will go a long way to earning the forgiveness of the party faithful.
The ANC would be wise to take the “medical” and “therapeutic” advice being dished out by its Eastern Cape leader.
It needs to check itself before it wrecks itself.
Daily Dispatch