Boksburg, 13 – 16 July 2022
The General Secretary of the SACP, Dr Blade Nzimande.
All member of the SACP 14 th National Congress Central Committee present here today.
Representatives of our Alliance partners, the ANC and COSATU.
Esteemed guests, national and international.
Media practitioners present here today.
Delegates representing our provinces and branches.
Dear comrades,
On behalf of the 14 th National Congress Central Committee, I would like to take this opportunity to welcome all of you present here today. Some of the delegates are still on their way. I also want to take this opportunity to welcome them in absentia. Once they arrive and after their accreditation, they will form part of this SACP 15 th National Congress. This SACP National Congress takes place at a very challenging time in the history of our liberation movement, struggle, and democratic dispensation. As we say in the discussion documents that we published since April, building on the concrete analysis of the concrete conditions that we produced before, this National Congress is taking place at a time of multiple, mutually reinforcing crises of the capitalist system.
Our national unemployment situation has gone beyond a crisis. At one of our recent Central Committee plenaries, we characterised the unemployment crisis in our country as a catastrophe. Let us recall. The lowest unemployment in our democratic dispensation was a whopping 16,5 percent in 1995. In 1996, the year in which the government imposed the neoliberal economic policy called Growth, Employment and Redistribution (GEAR), unemployment shot up to crisis-high levels of above 20 per cent. These two figures, dear comrades, are in terms of the officially preferred narrow definition of unemployment. They exclude the discouraged work-seekers. If discouraged work-seekers are taken into account, the unemployment history of our democratic dispensation is worse than it is narrowly defined. However, even in terms of the narrow definition, since GEAR was adopted, and its legacy institutionalised in our economic policy framework unemployment never came down to 20 per cent.
In fact, the catastrophe has been worsening with every global crisis, namely the 2008 global economic crisis, the end of the global mineral commodity super cycle in 2011, and the COVID-19 pandemic and great lockdowns. As things stand, the unemployment rate of active and discouraged African work-seekers, regardless of gender, is 50 per cent. This means 50 out of every 100 Africans of a working age are involuntarily unemployed. Coloured regardless of gender, are the second most affected national group after Africans, while
Coloured are followed by Indians/Asian. The racial characteristics of the unemployment catastrophe reflect the legacy of colonialism of a special type. In terms of age, the youth is the most affected, while women are the most affected in terms of gender. However, Africans remain the most affected within these two social categories.
The legacy of colonialism of special type is also reflected in the inequality, poverty and what we call the crisis of social reproduction, meaning the enormous difficulty facing working-class and poor families to make ends meet. Inequality and poverty, like unemployment, have also worsened as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Over and above that, we are faced with an unfolding global cost of living crisis. The prices of fast-moving consumer goods, such as food, have risen rapidly and continue to rise. This is because of the impact of COVID-19, the climate change crisis, the NATO-provoked war in Ukraine, and the extra-territorial sanctions imposed by NATO on countries like Venezuela and Russia. Russia is a major oil producer and while Venezuela has the world’s largest proven oil reserves.
In the energy sector, our country is dependent on oil imports. Increases in global oil prices impact us directly, driving up the prices of other consumer goods. In addition, we are facing load shedding in the electricity sector. This impacts on households needs, the economy and the ability to create employment.
Dr Blade Nzimande, the SACP General Secretary will expand on the multi-crises of capitalism during his presentation of the 14 th National Congress Central Committee Political Report to this 15 th National Congress tomorrow, Thursday 14 th July 2022.
As the National Chairperson, I am taking the opportunity of opening this 15 th National Congress of the Party to highlight some of the challenges that the congress must unite in discussing, to produce the way forward. We are meeting here not representing ourselves as SACP leaders and members but as a working-class party. The workers and poor of our country are looking forward to the success of this congress. They are waiting for the outcomes of this congress with anticipation as they search for solutions to the economic and social problems that they face.
Without unity, the workers, and the working-class in general, will not go anywhere in class struggle. We are facing the responsibility to rebuild our movement and unite ourselves and the working-class at large to drive radical structural economic and broader social transformation and development. This is one of the reasons this congress is convening under the theme: “Together, Let’s Build a Powerful, Socialist Movement of the Workers and Poor”. This theme is crucial to taking forward our strategic slogan: “Socialism is the Future—Build it Now!”
Dear comrades, this congress should emerge with a more decisive programme to dismantle the networks of state capture and to clamp down on other forms of corruption, as well as crime. This is not going to be an easy task, as the networks of state capture are fighting back with everything at their disposal. However, there is one thing that as communists we must
stand firm on. We must never go back. We must march forward decisive and fight the battle against state capture and corruption to the finish.
Our communities live in fear, because of rising levels of crime and violence, notably including gender-based violence. This congress has to come out decisively on these fronts, to build safer communities, to ensure security and comfort, and to advance the struggle for a just and equal society. We must win the battle against drug dealing and substance abuse. We must rescue our youth from the destruction caused by these and other scourges. On the international front, we have the anti-imperialist struggle to intensify. We have to build a global peace movement in pursuit of a just and equal world. We must intensify our internationalist struggle to end the exploitation and domination of one country, social class and person by another.
Cde Pat Horn on behalf of this Congress presented our tribute to all other fallen comrades and heroes. I want to take this opportunity to express our Party’s sincere condolences once again to our fallen comrades and heroes, including to the families of the frontline workers who passed away, both in our country and across the world, fighting COVID-19, saving the lives of those who contracted the deadly virus. In the same vein, I want to express our condolences to the families that lost their loved ones since our 14 th National Congress in July 2017 because of violence, including gender-based violence, femicide and the July 2021 counter-revolutionary offensive.
I would like to take this opportunity to thank the SACP for electing me to serve as the National Chairperson of the Party for the 14 th National Congress Central Committee tenure.
In the same vein, I want to thank the SACP for electing each one of the of its 14 th National Congress Central Committee members led by Dr Blade Nzimande as the General Secretary.
Our tenure as the SACP 14 th National Congress Central Committee ends at this 15 th National Congress of the Party. We all understand that, and that this 15 th National Congress of the Party will discuss and adopt the 2022 iteration of the SACP Programme the South African Struggle Socialism, discuss and adopt other resolutions and declaration, and based on this the programme and strategic perspectives and tasks elect a new Central Committee for the five-year term which will end in July 2027.
I officially declare this 15 th National Congress of the Party officially open.
