NEWS & MEDIA LETTERS FROM THE PRESIDENT

"The tasks ahead of us"

[ Previous Letters ]

With the elections concluded and the new national and provincial governments formed, we must now focus on the further pursuit of the political, economic, social and international tasks of the National Democratic Revolution (NDR). The questions we must answer in this regard are what are these tasks, and how shall we accomplish them!

Our long-standing characterisation of the strategic tasks of the NDR has not changed. The first of these was the defeat of the apartheid regime, the transfer of power to the people, and the defence and consolidation of that political victory.

The second is the use of that people's power to eradicate the centuries-old legacy of colonialism and apartheid in all areas of human activity.

The third will be the achievement of the goal of a better life for all, well beyond the targets for the decade beginning now, which we set in our Election Manifesto, as well as the UN Millennium Development Goals. We would achieve this on the basis on the successes we would have scored as we pursue the second strategic goal of the NDR.

Obviously, though different from one another, these strategic objectives are not isolated and separated from one another by a Chinese wall. Rather, they are linked, interdependent and mutually reinforce and impact on one another.

Accordingly, the work our movement has to carry out must be based on a sound recognition of this interdependence.

The planning and implementation of our programmes must similarly fully take into account this dialectical interconnection of our strategic objectives, which is fundamental to the further advance of our struggle.

In large measure, the political victory of the NDR in 1994, and therefore the accomplishment of its first strategic task, came about as a result of the heroic struggle waged by the masses of our people, led by the ANC. We speak here of the black working people and the black middle strata. These constituted the principal component of the motive forces of the first phase of the NDR.

When we assessed the results of the 1994 General Elections we made various observations. One of these was that, naturally, the African working people and the middle strata voted overwhelmingly for the ANC, the movement that had led them as they conducted the struggle that resulted in the democratic victory of 1994.

By and large, the Coloured and Indian middle strata also adopted the same posture and voted for the ANC. Surprisingly, the Coloured and Indian working people in the areas of their largest concentration, the Cape Peninsula and Durban respectively, voted in favour of the forces of reaction, at the time represented and led by the National Party.

Not surprisingly, the white section of our population followed suit, placing its confidence in the parties of reaction, and essentially the National Party. We had to consider the implications of this, fully cognisant of the influence and power of the white minority, given its dominant positions in the economy, the professions, the management echelon in both the public and private sectors, and so on.

The 1994 General Elections also demonstrated that a significant proportion of the African masses in KwaZulu-Natal, and some around the Johannesburg area, supported the IFP, which had been utilised by the apartheid system to oppose the mass struggle and the mass formations led by the ANC.

To carry out our responsibility to defend and consolidate the political victory of the NDR, we had to pursue a number of objectives.

One of these was to ensure that we maintained the unity, cohesion and focus of the forces that had secured this victory, which they sealed by voting the ANC into power. We had to ensure that these masses maintained and heightened their commitment to the pursuit of the goals of the NDR, under the leadership of our movement.

Another was to win back the allegiance to the NDR and the ANC of the Coloured and Indian workers who had for many decades identified with, and participated in the struggle for the defeat of the system of white minority domination.

Thirdly, we had to engage the African masses that had voted for the IFP to educate them to understand that they shared common political, economic and social objectives with the much larger numbers of our people who had voted for the ANC.

We had to work to persuade them that there were no contradictions between them and the rest of the people, which obliged them to defend their own interests by resorting to the violence that had been a feature of the period before and immediately after the 1994 elections.

We had to do similar work among our white compatriots, to show them by word and deed that the best guarantor of their future was a stable and successful non-racial democracy. We had to work to convince them that it was in their interest to work for the realisation of this national objective.

As a result of all the work we did, we increased our support during the 1999 General Elections, our share of the national vote rising from 62% in 1994 to 66%. In his Report to our 2000 National General Council, our Secretary General, Kgalema Motlanthe, noted a number of issues in this regard. He pointed out that:

• "The overwhelming victory scored by the ANC in the 1999 election is a clear statement of confidence in the ANC...to defend the interests of the great majority;
• "An important characteristic of the election was the growth of our support in areas such as KwaZulu-Natal, Western Cape, Northern Cape, Gauteng, Free State and Mpumalanga;
• "We managed to increase our support among whites, though this support is still small and unsatisfactory;
• "We increased our support among Coloured people and - with the exception of Durban - the Indian population;
• "The victories scored also forced a change in the balance of forces in KwaZulu-Natal...and Western Cape;
• "The vote for and the number of representatives of the forces against transformation - represented through their political parties - were reduced during the last elections;
• "The elections saw a number of our people voting for formations such as the UDM and the UCDP, particularly in the former Bantustan centres... (because) our continued commitment to improve the lives of all our people was not supported by the former beneficiaries of apartheid Bantustan policies; and,
• "The elections demonstrated that the further we move away from the years of struggle against apartheid, the greater the danger of the depoliticisation of sections of our population, especially the youth.

During this year's General Election, we increased our support from 66% in 1999 to almost 70%. This was 4% more than in 1999, similar to the 4% we registered in 1999 compared to 1994.

The question we will have to answer is whether this quantitative increase between 1999 and 2004, and between 1994 and now, represents a qualitative transformation in the balance of forces in our country, signifying a new phase in the development of the NDR!

Some of the results suggest that it would be correct to conclude that the end of the First Decade of Liberation also represents a qualitatively new phase with regard to the tasks we had set ourselves in 1994 and 1999. In this regard, we must draw attention particularly to the following developments:

• the ANC is the only truly national political formation in our country both with regard to the spread of support throughout the country and the level of support among all national groups: for instance only 56.04% of our national votes came from the four provinces of the Western Cape, the Eastern Cape, Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal, and 27.94% from the Western Cape and Gauteng;
• the relevant figures for the DA are 78.99% and 74.26%;
• 97.4% and 8.84% for the IFP, with 88.56% being from KwaZulu-Natal;
• 87.17% and 76.19% for the NNP;
• 76.23% and 64.79% for the ID, with the figures rising to 84.57% and 73.13% if we add the Northern Cape; and,
• 80.87% and 18.34% for the UDM, with 57.90% from the Eastern Cape.

These figures signify that:

• the ANC is the only truly national movement in our country, representative of our people as a whole;
• the DA is essentially concentrated in the Western Cape and Gauteng, centred in the major urban areas in these provinces, representing white South Africa, encompassing all classes within this section of our population;
• the IFP is essentially a regional KwaZulu-Natal party mainly based on African Zulu-speaking rural support;
• the UDM is essentially a regional Eastern Cape party with African Xhosa-speaking support in the Transkei and among other Xhosa-speakers in Gauteng and the Western Cape; and,
• the ID is essentially concentrated in the Western Cape, Gauteng and the Northern Cape with Coloured urban support.

Further to this, the ANC has:

• maintained and increased its support among the urban and rural African masses across the emerging class divisions within this section of our population;
• made significant inroads into African rural KwaZulu-Natal, weakening the IFP, with significant numbers staying away from the polls to avoid being victimised for voting against the IFP;
• won back large numbers of Transkei African voters away from the UDM, winning the former stronghold of the latter, the King Sabata Dalindyebo region, with 59% of the votes, having lost it in 1999, having taken 36% of the electorate;
• retained the Mafikeng municipality, increasing its majority from 59.2% in 1999 to 65%, with the UCDP declining from 35.7% to 30.2%, signifying the further weakening of the influence of the Bantustan factor, as has happened with regard to the Transkei Bantustan factor;
• succeeded to mobilise large numbers of young people to register and vote, and secured the support of many among these;
• emerged at the national level as the single largest political formation among both Coloureds and Indians: it is the dominant representative of the rural Coloured communities and has made significant progress in winning back the support of the Coloured and Indian working class; and,
• increased its support among the white population, some of whom were responding to ANC concern about the poor within this section of our population: the "Daily Dispatch" of April 23, 2004 reported that Afrikaner Magdeline du Preez, aged 66, said "I was a member of the National Party from childhood, but after reading President Mbeki's statement in the Rapport newspaper (about poor whites), I felt that the ANC makes a difference in my life." She voted for the ANC.

All this means that the ANC is succeeding to unite the majority of our people both urban and rural, black and white, men, women and the youth, around the perspectives and objectives of the NDR. In terms of its support, our movement is reasserting its character as the 'parliament' of the people of South Africa, signifying the progress we have made in addressing the tasks we set ourselves after the 1994 and 1999 General Elections.

On the contrary, the complex of ideological and political propositions and programmes advanced to oppose the NDR have, over the last decade, been forced into an uninterrupted retreat, being rebuffed by continuously increasing numbers of our people. The 2004 General Elections confirmed this tendency.

In the 1994 elections the opposition garnered 7.3 million votes. In 1999, this dropped to 5.38 million. This fell further this year, to 4.7 million votes, amounting to about 30% of total votes cast.

Figures for the three parties that formed the Democratic Alliance (DA) - the DP, the NNP and the Federal Alliance (FA) - also confirm this tendency. These are 4.32 million, 2.71 and 2.2 million for the successive General Elections.

The combined total votes for the "coalition for change", the DA and the IFP, totalled 3.02 million, amounting to 27,76% of the ANC vote and 19.03% of the total votes cast. This put paid to the declared ambitions of the DA that its "coalition for change" would obtain 30% of the national vote and demolished its claim that it represents our country's national minorities and that it would gain significant African support.

The figures we have cited indicate the extent of the rejection by the masses of our people of the positions advanced by the forces of reaction in our country. These include those based on racist and ethnic platforms, religious fundamentalism, neo-liberalism, hostility to our pan-African agenda, the use of the 'fear factor', and the mobilisation of so-called 'social movements'.

Our movement has won increased support on the basis of its consistent projection of the objectives of the NDR and the implementation of a programme of transformation that makes the majority of our people, of all races, classes, genders and ages feel that "the ANC makes a difference in my life", as Magdeline du Preez put it.

This highlights the tasks of our movement during the current phase of the NDR.

• We must intensify our work to mobilise all our people to act together in the people's contract to advance the goals of the NDR, further reinforcing the process of national unity and reconciliation.
• We must ensure that the government implements programmes that accelerate the process of making a difference to the lives of all our people, focusing on the fight against poverty and joblessness.
• We must improve the government's performance to respond to the call for batho pele!
• To achieve these goals, we must further increase the organisational strength of the ANC and the rest of the democratic movement, and ensure that our members and activists are in daily contact with the people, capable of and ready to respond to the varied demands of these masses.

At the beginning of the Second Decade of Liberation, the masses of our people have given us an unprecedented mandate to pursue the goals of the National Democratic Revolution. They have indicated their readiness to ensure that ours becomes a people driven process of change.

The overwhelming support we received in the General Elections confirms that there is no force in our country strong enough to stop the advance of the national democratic revolution.

The task ahead of us is to mobilise and lead all our people to achieve decisive advances in the struggle to eradicate the legacy of colonialism and apartheid and thus accomplish the second strategic task of the National Democratic Revolution. That is what the masses of our people have mandated our movement to do and that is what we must do.