{"id":96300,"date":"2017-07-09T22:47:39","date_gmt":"2017-07-09T20:47:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/anc-policy-anarchy-its-leaders-are-too-weak-to-lead-or-too-weak-to-take-over-the-conversation\/"},"modified":"2017-07-09T22:47:39","modified_gmt":"2017-07-09T20:47:39","slug":"anc-policy-anarchy-its-leaders-are-too-weak-to-lead-or-too-weak-to-take-over-the-conversation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/anc-policy-anarchy-its-leaders-are-too-weak-to-lead-or-too-weak-to-take-over-the-conversation\/","title":{"rendered":"ANC policy anarchy – its leaders are too weak to lead, or too weak to take over | The Conversation"},"content":{"rendered":"

ANC policy anarchy – its leaders are too weak to lead, or too weak to take over<\/a>: <\/p>\n

Protesters expressing their view of President Jacob Zuma's government ahead of the ANC National Policy Conference.<\/span> Siphiwe Sibeko\/Reuters<\/span><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Disputed resolutions, deferred decisions and policy uncertainty were the prime bequests of the policy conference of South Africa\u2019s governing African National Congress to the troubled organisation. Hot on the heels of these incongruities were opaque proposals on how the ANC will act on wobbly state institutions that need to implement policy, and porous pitches on improved ethics and integrity.<\/p>\n

Even more, the proceedings confirmed that the ANC leadership is in stalemate. Leadership is in transition and factional leaders lack the authority to steer policy in directions that will address the country\u2019s massive delivery backlog.<\/p>\n

To the question: is President Jacob Zuma leading the ANC onto a path of implosion, the verdict is a sad but unambiguous \u201cyes\u201d. The conference confirmed that the president and his faction are not letting go \u2013 neither of their ambitions to determine Zuma\u2019s successor, nor of their efforts to make \u201cradical economic transformation\u201d their platform. <\/p>\n

The conference confirmed that the ANC recognises that the cancer of corruption and capture afflicts it badly. Yet the organisation remains stunted in finding ways to deal with it. <\/p>\n

While the conference opted for unity, it\u2019s a unity that precludes cutting out the cancer because it\u2019s embedded in a faction that\u2019s not budging. It will do everything in its power to retain power. That includes gambling with the conference\u2019s policy outcomes.<\/p>\n

The policy conference was, in effect, a six-day war over policy. Factional forces manoeuvred relentlessly to secure influence and power. The epitome of this deep factionalism was that Zuma in his closing address put forward a \u201cpower-sharing\u201d proposal. His intervention tried to influence delegates to campaign for sharing the top ANC leadership positions. But the president\u2019s factional interests meant that his proposal carried little weight.<\/p>\n

Affected by the succession campaign, the overall outcome was approximate policy anarchy. It was directed by leaders who were either too weak to lead or too weak to take over. <\/p>\n

Stalemate state of the ANC<\/h2>\n

The national policy conference , held every five years, is the ANC\u2019s precursor to the December national elective conference that also adopts the final policy resolutions to supplement or substitute previous policy.<\/p>\n

The character of the conference itself revealed a great deal about the indecisive and stalemate state of the current ANC. Unlike previous ones, there was no reliable stream of reports containing draft resolutions. And it failed to deliver consensual recommendations on crucial matters. <\/p>\n

Several of the media briefings were delayed or rushed due to ongoing contests \u2013 some rhetorical, some ideological \u2013 between factions in commissions. The Secretary General\u2019s report, which mentioned the problem of how Zuma has allowed the Indian-born Gupta family to wield undue and corrupting influence, was tabled. But it was immediately discredited by the pro-Zuma faction.<\/p>\n

Some media briefings, like the pivotal report and proposed resolutions on legislature and governance \u2013 which presumably put the spotlight on issues of corruption, capture, and lack of cadre capacity \u2013 never happened. The briefing on organisational renewal was largely made up of a shopping list of issues that had been discussed. Very little else. <\/p>\n

Policy certainty was a mirage. The best indicators of future policy were to be found in the subtly changing balance of forces in the succession contest for national ANC leadership. This was the price that the ANC and its factions paid for its short-term goal of unity.<\/p>\n

The factional struggle was clearest around the battle over the terminology of \u201cradical economic transformation\u201d. Under this umbrella lay issues such as land expropriation, the mining charter and the role of the Reserve Bank. Where resolutions on these matters materialised, such as \u201cmonopoly capitalism\u201d winning vis-\u00e0-vis \u201cwhite monopoly capitalism\u201d, the battle was merely deferred. The reported losers proclaimed that party branches, and thereafter the December conference, would be the next battleground.<\/p>\n

Share of contested positions<\/h2>\n

Previous ANC policy conferences have also had their fair share of contested positions. Five years ago the fight between whether South Africa finds itself in a \u201csecond transition\u201d or in the \u201csecond phase of the transition to a democratic society\u201d was resolved. <\/p>\n

Ten years ago the divisive question was whether then president Thabo Mbeki could contest for a third term as ANC president. Opposing factions compromised, deciding that the ANC president should \u201cpreferably\u201d only run for two terms. This was followed by the Polokwane national conference at which Mbeki lost to Zuma as party leader.<\/p>\n

If the ANC still has the power to self-correct \u2013 or ensure that its centre holds \u2013 it certainly didn\u2019t show at this recent policy conference. The need to be radical and ensure equity and justice were conflated with the opportunistic appropriation of \u201cradical economic transformation\u201d for factional succession and continued capturist control of the South African state. <\/p>\n

A compromise position of \u201cradical socioeconomic transformation\u201d \u2013 a long-standing and considered to be sufficient pivot of the ANC\u2019s ideological stance \u2013 was announced but rejected by those supporting the president, including some of the so-called Premier League members (a group of provincial party leaders) and the party\u2019s youth and women\u2019s leagues.<\/p>\n

This policy conference will be remembered for an ANC in disarray, plagued with internal dissent. It was a policy conference with ambiguous, unresolved policy stances. It ended without a definitive positioning on reconnecting the party with South African citizens and voters. This was the price the ANC paid to keep two powerful factions in the same broad church. <\/p>\n

Chances are that the conference exacerbated rather than ameliorated the credibility of the ANC in the eyes of voters. The best hope for this haplessly acting ANC at this stage is not self-correction, but that opposition parties will make mistakes that surpass its own.<\/p>\n

\"The <\/p>\n

Susan Booysen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond the academic appointment above.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Source:<\/strong> The Conversation \u2013 Articles (AFRICA)<\/a><\/small>
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Read more on The Conversation<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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ANC policy anarchy – its leaders are too weak to lead, or too weak to take over: Protesters expressing their view of President Jacob Zuma's government ahead of the ANC National Policy Conference. Siphiwe Sibeko\/Reuters Disputed resolutions, deferred decisions and policy uncertainty were the prime bequests of the policy conference of South Africa\u2019s governing African […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4584],"tags":[4555,26720,8890,3787,4391,2296,8737,3801],"class_list":{"0":"post-96300","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-africa-news-2","7":"tag-weak","8":"tag-anarchy","9":"tag-conversation","10":"tag-lead","11":"tag-leaders","12":"tag-over","13":"tag-policy","14":"tag-take","15":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96300","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=96300"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96300\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=96300"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=96300"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=96300"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}