SACP Eastern Cape Provincial Executive Committee Statement
17 February 2014
The SACP in the Eastern Cape Province convened its 5th session of the 6th Congress Provincial Executive Committee (PEC) meeting on 15-16 February 2014 at the Gonubie Council Chambers, East London.
This was the first PEC meeting following our Provincial Council held late last year. The meeting dealt with the state of the organization and the prevailing political situation here at home and abroad since the council.
The PEC meeting also dealt with and adopted a program of action for the year 2014, which is the year of our 7th Provincial Congress. This year is also the year of the 5th general elections in our country which we have no doubt will be highly contested. We will also be marking 20 years of our historic democratic breakthrough and the defeat of the apartheid regime an elitist government serving the minority. We ushered a government of all the people of South Africa, inclusive, responsive, responsible and accountable to the people as a whole.
The PEC meeting has in this context affirmed the need to ensure the overwhelming victory of the African National Congress (ANC) in the forthcoming general elections, by among others being active in the election campaign as ANC members in our own right and independently as the SACP the longest ally of the ANC on a reliable basis.
The national context
The meeting has noted with disgust the failed provocation march by the Democratic Alliance (DA) to the ANC Headquarters Chief Albert Luthuli House disguised as the genuine concern for real jobs in appearance. In essence, the march was a provocation and high-jacking of the plight of our people Africans in particular and blacks in general in a desperate attempt to co-opt their votes for what is fundamentally white and racist power. The PEC asserted that a wolf in a sheep skin will always be a wolf!
We affirm the right of our ally the ANC to defend its headquarters when under attack from the DA and other agent provocateurs. The DA leader is on record having said they were "taking [a] fight to Luthuli House". We believe that the DA should be held responsible for any violence if there was any during the march which is the culmination of their declared war during peace time.
The PEC also discussed challenges facing school and post-school education and training.
The challenges that have emerged during the registration processes in the institutions of higher learning throughout our country are glaring and require all of us to work together in assisting and working together with the Department of Higher Education and Training against these challenges.
We are also concerned by the fact that there is less said about the learners who failed matric on the year 2013 as some maybe roaming the streets. We are of the view that the concept of finishing schools should be re-introduced with a tighter policy framework. We should also ensure the de-stigmatization of the FET Colleges as they have a crucial role to play in skills development which our country needs.
Provincial context
The PEC was gravely concerned with the high numbers of deaths of initiates in each initiation season. The situation has now reached alarming proportions and therefore requires more hands-on-approach from the peoples organs in the province, working with and for the people. The situation ought to be arrested to ensure there is no more lives lost during this passage to manhood.
We welcome the relative stability in the Department of Health under the MEC Sicelo Gqobana as the past few months have been marked by a more hands-on-approach from his side as the MEC and the Head of the Department.
We also appreciate the notable improvement of the Department of Education with a record pass rate since 1994. Whilst the Eastern Cape might be ranking last in the pass rate, the province has not only improved quantity as represented by the passing rate but also quality as we have produced more students qualifying to study for degrees and diplomas.
The PEC registered its concern on the continuous existence of corruption networks in our provincial government departments. It is important that corruption is defeated as it represents a stumbling block on government delivering on its core mandate. We should as the ANC-led alliance collectively ensure that there is no political protection of corrupt elements within government, wittingly or unwittingly.
The state of the local government in our province remains a cause for concern. Some municipalities are struggling to focus on the provision of service delivery owing to the political infighting, maladministration and corrupt elements on the tendering processes. It is in this context that we are calling for de-tenderization of the state in favour of increasing state capacity for it to deliver to our people. We should as an ANC-led alliance rescue the local sphere of the state from the deep seated crisis it is facing.
We have noted the reported use of the millions of Rands by both the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan Municipality and the Buffalo City Metropolitan Municipality during the passing of our late former President Nelson Mandela. We are calling upon the Department of Local Government and Traditional Affairs to get to the bottom of what has transpired in relation to the matter and ensure that anyone who might have misused money is brought to book.
Impasse between workers and the BCMM
The dispute between the Buffalo City Metropolitan Municipality and the workers has proven that with the alliance shared approach, we are capable of resolving what may appear as high mountains to climb. Out of what happened in Buffalo City, many lessons should be drawn, and amongst those is that whenever workers or people in general are raising their genuine demands we need to engage them in finding a solution and avoid being ignorant and thus making them feel less important. This has also vindicated our Party on what we have long said, that SALGA is incapable of resolving disputes between workers and municipalities as they have failed to give benefits to their employees for more than a decade now.
We are calling upon organized labour in particular and people in general to be vigilant and guard against those who highjack their genuine protests and vandalize property and other services. As the SACP we say: "Be vigilant against agent provocateurs who seek to delegitimize genuine demands through violence and public disorder".
We commit to work with our allies in particular and the workers and the poor in general in finding solutions to the challenges faced by the people. We commit ourselves in deepening, defending and advancing the National Democratic Revolution as a direct and uninterrupted route to a socialist South Africa.
Issued by SACP Eastern Cape
Contact:
Siyabonga Mdodi - SACP Provincial Spokesperson
Mobile: 083 3588 070
Email: simdodi@gmail.com
