2 November 2004
The African National Congress welcomes the SA Communist Party's 'Red October' Campaign in support of accelerated land and agrarian reform.
The ANC supports the broad objectives of the campaign and commends the SACP for its efforts to mobilise South Africans, particularly workers and the poor, in pursuit of this critical national goal.
While much progress has been made over the last ten years in redressing the apartheid legacy of land dispossession and rural underdevelopment, the challenge of land reform remains significant and pressing. The ANC therefore welcomes efforts which complement government's ongoing programme of land reform and agricultural development. It also welcomes the SACP's contribution to the national debate on how best to accelerate and deepen land reform, and will continue to encourage ongoing engagement among all social partners on this issue.
The ANC calls on its members, public representatives and supporters to turn out in support of the SACP's actions, and to continue to engage in public discussion of the issues raised by the SACP on the basis of the ANC's policies, positions and programmes.
The ANC further calls on all other social partners, including organised agriculture, to constructively engage in the struggle to fundamentally redress the legacy of apartheid and improve the lives of the rural poor.