By Doreen Mokgolo
- Cyril Ramaphosa asked SACP not to break away from ANC for next local elections.
- SACP insists it will run alone in local polls after differences over working with DA.
President Cyril Ramaphosa has made an impassioned plea to the struggling tripartite alliance partner not to go it alone.
Ramaphosa pleaded with SACP leaders not to break their long friendship with the ANC.
The ANC president was speaking at an event marking 30 years since the death of Communist Pary leader Joe Slovo in Soweto on Monday.
Ramaphosa said the two parties need each other.
“The SACP has been the strength behind the ANC; similarly the ANC has been a pillar of strength to the SACP,” he said.
“The two movements are like twins. They need one another, and separating them will weaken the ANC.”
The president was responding to the Communist Party’s decision last month to run alone in the coming local elections.
The SACP is angry that the ANC ignored its complaints about working with the DA in councils.
Ramaphosa said the SACP has helped shape ANC thinking over many years.
“The two formations have undertaken common programmes that have advanced the cause of the people of South Africa. We must pick up the spear where it has fallen,” he said.
“The ANC must be willing and prepared to listen to comrades who are saying the GNU was a mistake.”
He admitted the ANC did badly in recent by-elections but said the party wasn’t beaten yet.
“The outcome of the general results signalled a terminal decline of the ANC, but doesn’t represent the defeat,” he said.
“It has sent a clear message that we must act differently with urgency to restore the confidence of our people in the ANC.”
But SACP leader Solly Mapaila said they would still run alone in local elections.
“We will not allow our movement to be destroyed by reactionary forces and sit down and do nothing about it,” he said.
“We will fight them to the tilt, we reject neoliberalism in its entirety and believe we have a mechanism to make interventions from the fiscal policy and monitoring policy.”
Pictured above: President Cyril Ramaphosa.
Source: Supplied
