24th July 2002
Comrades from allied formations
Comrades from international delegations and international guests
Members of the diplomatic corps
Media representatives
Comrade delegates
It is my privilege to welcome you all to this 11th Congress of the SACP. The convening of a national Congress provides us, as SACP members, together with our friends and allies, an opportunity to take stock, to note the historic progress made by our Party and our NLM in the past few years. It also gives us the opportunity to ask the hard questions, to square up honestly to challenges, shortcomings, and lessons to be learned.
This Congress belongs to us collectively, the delegates. Congress is our highest policy-making body and the success of the Congress and of the SACP going forward depend, therefore, on the energy, the experience, the concerns, the collective work, that we all put in over these next five days.
The CC will be presenting, through our General Secretary, an extensive Political Report. The CC has also prepared an extensive draft programme that you have been discussing, through its different drafts, in your branches, districts and provinces.
The following five days present us with a collective opportunity to debate and shape the Party`s analysis of the present, and to chart the way forward. Importantly, this Congress precedes the ANC Policy Conference and the ANC National Conference. As we discuss, we should never forget the opportunities and the responsibilities that these major forthcoming national events present to this Congress. We are not engaged in a monologue with ourselves.
Last year, the SACP celebrated its 80th anniversary, 80 years of unbroken Communist activity in this southern part of the African continent. 80 years of worker education pioneered in night schools by TW Thibedi. 80 years of political umrabulo in the tradition of Ivon Jones, Eddie Roux, Johnny Gomas and Albert Nzula.
80 years of selfless trade union work, by stalwarts like JB Marks, Ray Alexander and Billy Nair. 80 years of non-racialism, personified by a Braam Fischer. Practical organisational work amongst the workers and the poor, in the tradition of a Moses Kotane or a Dora Tamana. 80 years of radical, progressive journalism, pioneered by Edwin Mofutsanyana, Govan Mbeki, and many others.
This Congress is the custodian of these traditions.
The SACP is the organisational expression of ideals that have inspired (and that continue to inspire) millions. Some, like Johannes Nkosi and Chris Hani, have paid the ultimate price for these ideals.
Some comrades, perhaps comrades from other parts of the world, might wonder why, if we are now nearly 81 years old, we are only holding an 11th Congress.
In fact, between July 1921 and the banning of the Communist Party of SA in 1950, there were regular, often annual, national conferences. Ours is the 11th Congress counting from 1953, the year of the SACP`s secret re-launching in the deepest underground.
Between 1953 and 1989 there were 7 congresses held by the SACP, most of them held in the diaspora of exile, with delegates making their way from the furthest corners of the globe. Indeed, it is a sobering thought to remind ourselves that it was just 13 years ago, in August 1989, that a still banned SACP was holding its 7th Congress in the Caribbean, thanks to the generosity of the Cuban Communist Party. At that congress there were about 100 delegates, some of them were in disguise, having left SA secretly to come to Congress. (Some of them are here today - but, as far as I can tell, they are now out of disguise).
In the 13 years since then there have been massive changes globally and locally here in SA - some entirely progressive, other posing complex new problems.
What are the challenges facing this Congress? There are many, but there are four that stand out as fundamental:
Governance - the SACP is not a ruling party in the strict sense of the word. Since the late 1920s, as an integral part of our strategy, South African communists have worked tirelessly to help build a mass-based, broad, well resourced ANC - capable of leading the national liberation struggle, and capable, eventually, of governing our country in the complicated revolutionary tasks of nation building and democratisation.
Since 1994 South African communists, together with other comrades, have worked very hard to ensure the ANC wins an overwhelming electoral majority - in the local, provincial and national spheres. And we have succeeded - four times over.
Since 1994 thousands of SACP members have been serving in government positions, in key departments, in local councils, in national and provincial cabinets.
What is more, since 1994, together with the ANC, COSATU and our other partners, we have sought to develop innovative forms of governance. Governance is NOT just government. Governance includes Community Policing Forums, School Governing Bodies, Ward Committees, popular participation in legislatures, and a hundred other ways of ensuring that citizens are active in governance.
The SACP is, to repeat, not a ruling party in the strict sense of the word, but we have never excused ourselves from the responsibilities of governance. We recognise, affirm and work very hard for the leading role of the ANC, including in government. The SACP is not oppositionist, and we are not abstentionist.
This Congress needs to reflect on the many positive lessons and advances we have made on the front of governance over the past 8 years, and it needs to help us to chart ever more effective ways to enhance the SACP governance contribution.
Being practical - related to the above is the imperative of being practical, of being relevant as an SACP to the challenges that are facing our country, our region and our world. We must not be like the philosophers described by Marx, who have been content to merely interpret the world (although that, too, is a major challenge). We also want to change the world, especially this part of the world.
This Congress cannot discuss and analyse the world in ignorance of the huge challenges and crises outside the walls of this Civic Centre - the grim plague of starvation that is currently sweeping across much of our Southern African region; the HIV/AIDS epidemic; the 37 per cent unemployment levels, poverty and deep-seated inequality in our own society. Ours is not to lament - but to square up bravely to these challenges, in practical ways.
But this Congress will have an especial significance, an especial relevance, if we demonstrate that socialism has something very important to contribute to the challenges elaborated in, for instance, NEPAD. We must continue to demonstrate that a socialist analysis, socialist organisation, a socialist morality are absolutely critical to the tasks of advancing, deepening, and defending our NDR.
In taking forward this socialist contribution, we are particularly pleased to have amongst us delegations from fraternal communist and progressive left parties from many parts of the world. Over the last decade, the SACP has benefited greatly from the numerous international exchanges with fraternal parties. We take this opportunity to congratulate those parties that remain governing parties in their respective societies, taking forward the socialist cause in an often hostile global situation. We also salute comrades and parties with a vast experience of socialist struggles in various contexts. We know that this Congress will, once more, benefit from your presence.
Ultimately, the challenge of this Congress is to live up to the content and spirit of the slogan under which we are convening - With and for…the workers and the poor!
In everything we do, in our discussions and resolutions, let us ensure, comrades, that this 11th Congress occupies the trench of the workers and the poor.
It is a great privilege to declare the 11th Congress of the South African Communist Party open.