The second phase of our transition to the national democratic society is both about our style of work and the radical nature of the programmes we must pursue to transform our country. ANC cadreship is central to each of these two components of the second transition. Our style of work is about our cadres - how they operate and perform. The radical programmes that we must implement require cadres who are ideologically strong and with the capacity to think creatively in search of solutions that can take our country forward. We must not be complacent, enjoying our comfort zone. We should resist dogmatism as this can prevent us from thinking outside the box. We are all in the uncharted territory but we must reach our goal of a better South Africa. “The democratic breakthrough of April 1994 must now be decisively consolidated and taken forward. Central to this will be rekindling a sense of a common moral vision, a new patriotism, a collective effort to transform our country. And absolutely central to all of that is the ANC and the re-affirming of the ANC cadre.” This is true today as it was in 1997. We are two years into the “Decade of the Cadre” that we declared at our 53rd National Conference in Mangaung, because of our acknowledgement that “the neglect of cadre policy is at the centre of most of the current weaknesses and challenges faced by our Movement in the post-1994 era.” We also accepted in Mangaung that “the gradual erosion of the core values of the ANC threatens its continuing existence in the second centenary.” Therefore, as a collective we must look back at what we have done to implement our conference resolution on cadreship policy and safeguarding our core values. We undertook to •Strengthen our political education programme, including the establishment of political educations schools; •Create Integrity Commissions across our structures; •Enforce our guidelines on lobbying; and •Improve our capacity to monitor the conduct of our cadres and enforce our code of conduct. We said in this Decade we want a cadre that is: •Ideologically rooted and schooled in ANC politics, •Skilled and competent to undertake assigned tasks, •Disciplined, •Ethical, and •Conscientious. Our cadres have been under attack from our detractors who do not want the ANC to lead, to be a hegemonic force in our society. We are told that the deployment of ANC cadres to strategic positions is a problem and cause of many of our challenges. This we dispute. ANC cannot delegate its leadership role. ANC cadres are deployed to implement ANC policies that enjoy the support of the majority of our people. ANC cadres must be in the front line of building a national democratic society. But we are also the first to admit that our cadreship is not homogeneous and immune from challenges that individuals encounter Any revolutionary movement needs five things if it is to succeed in its cause: •An organisation, •A leadership, •An ideology, •Strategy and tactics, •And fifthly,a cadreship who are its blood and soul without which no Movement can grow, let alone survive. The ANC is a mass movement,a leader in our society,working for change and transformation,for a better South Africa. But the ANC earned this role and stature in the trenches, through the work carried out by generations of its cadres who won the respect and admiration of our people. ANC cadres are always ready to sacrifice their individual interests for a collective cause. ANC cadres are a role model. Each ANC cadre is a leader,an organiser,an agitator,a campaigner,an inspirer. Without our cadres the ANC would not be the great Movement it is today. Not all South Africans are ANC members. Yet the vast majority of South Africans vote for and love the ANC because of the trust they have in us. They do so because of your work as ANC cadres in our communities and across different sectors of our society. ANC cadres are embedded among the people. They breathe the struggle. They preach ANC politics. They live and embody ANC values. Today we pay tribute to all our cadres, some of whom had to pay the ultimate sacrifice. We remember Comrade OR Tambo. Solomon Mahlangu. Chris Hani. Lilian Ngoyi. Helen Joseph, and thousands and thousands of our heroes and heroines who fell on the road to our freedom and since 1994. As we do so we must also dedicate ourselves to what these cadres represented and continue to represent in our collective memory. As the ANCYL in Maquassi Hills we bitterly en unflitchingly distance ourselves from the ongoing pseudo political anarchy of the prevailing lists, of 2016 local government succession debate. we remain firm dat its premature en devoid of organisational rich content to do so wen the Movement is at war, trying to absolve wateva daunting tasks dat are confrontal to our discourse............. aluta!!! continua!!!! Branches remain at the centre of all political programmes, it is in such spirit dat we believe dat dey be given ample time to do their work sufficiently!!!
Posted on: Thu, 15 Jan 2015 10:57:22 +0000
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