Umsebenzi Online Volume 24, Number 4, 7 August 2025
Red AlertPreserving the Alliance crucial for the ANC* |
 |
David Masondo
Several analysts have predicted the continued decline of the African National Congress (ANC), with some even forecasting its eventual exit from government.
There is little doubt that the ANC faces yet another tough test in the 2026 local government elections. A dominant narrative has taken root — that the ANC's decline is inevitable, based on the historical pattern that post-independence liberation movements rarely remain in power beyond three decades.
The electoral decline of post-colonial parties like the ANC is neither inevitable nor permanent. It is not determined by grand historical cycles, nor does it conform to a thirty years universal political timeline. The fate of liberation movements in state power cannot be explained by general theories akin to the law of gravity. Rather, their trajectories are shaped by concrete, country-specific realities and historical contingencies, including ability to undertake organisational renewal to remain relevant to the material needs of the people.
The ANC's current electoral setbacks are not solely the result of its failure to drive sustained and inclusive economic growth. The ANC's ongoing internal fragmentation — marked by the emergence of splinter parties and breakaway factions, has played a major role in its electoral decline. The ANC should avoid further splits, especially with key alliance partners like the South African Communist Party (SACP) and the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), which was experienced during the expulsion of NUMSA.
The experience of other post-independence progressive movements — such as Indian National Congress, Zambia's United National Independence Party (UNIP) under Kenneth Kaunda and Nicaragua's Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) — demonstrates that electoral defeat often stems not only from economic stagnation, but also from internal fragmentation and factionalism. The ANC and its allies would do well to heed these lessons if it seeks to reverse its decline and renew its relevance the aspirations of South Africans and the world.
The ANC's ability to retain electoral support will not be restored through ritual breast beating about its achievements and history and internal rhetoric on organizational renewal.
What further undermines the ANC's ability to renew itself is the growing number of members with money price tags without political values. This shift from collective political purpose to narrow, personalized and factionalised politics makes it increasingly difficult to reconnect with disillusioned voters. The situation has been further complicated by the South African Communist Party's (SACP) resolution to contest future elections independently of the ANC.
Depending on how the SACP's recent decision to contest elections independently is interpreted and managed within the Alliance, it could lead to further fragmentation of the ANC, thereby accelerating its electoral decline.
While the SACP maintains that its decision to contest elections does not constitute a break from the Alliance, it has nonetheless sparked intense debates and opportunism both within and outside the Alliance.
Some ANC leaders are already drawing up hit maps targeting SACP members for systematic removal from ANC structures—an effort to repurpose the ANC into a vehicle for narrow, elite interests.
At the same time, the SACP's electoral platform has unintentionally opened space for opportunism, with some individuals excluded from ANC candidate lists will now use the SACP as an alternative route to political office.
So far, both the ANC and SACP have acknowledged the importance of preserving the Alliance. The ANC, in a document presented two weeks ago during bilateral meeting with the SACP officials, argued that the continued presence of the SACP and COSATU within the Alliance has helped to restrain the most regressive forces within the ANC.
It remains unclear how the SACP's decision to contest local elections will strengthen the alliance's ability to serve South Africans. This is especially contentious given the SACP's weak presence among workers, professionals and students.
Since both the ANC and SACP affirm the strategic importance of maintaining the Alliance, the SACP's decision to contest elections is being discussed within the alliance itself. The move has direct implications not only for the SACP, but also for COSATU, SANCO, and the Alliance's unity and future direction. If poorly managed by the ANC and SACP, this debate could push COSATU toward a right-wing workerist stance— politically distancing itself from both the SACP and ANC to preserve internal trade union unity. This risks further fragmenting the Alliance and weakening its influence in both the workplace and electoral arena.
At the abovementioned ANC-SACP officials meeting, it was agreed that the Alliance Secretariat should answer a fundamental strategic question: what is the best organisational form for the Alliance to contest elections, including the 2026 local government elections, in the light of the SACP decision? Only once this question is resolved by the alliance, can related issues — such as dual membership, electoral strategy and campaign coordination — be meaningfully addressed.
If the SACP's electoral resolution is interpreted by both the ANC and the SACP as a form of direct electoral competition — leading to hostile battles on the ground — it could mark the end of dual membership and the Alliance.
However, if the SACP's decision is viewed and implemented in a strategically complementary manner, there is potential for it to enhance the alliance and the ANC's electoral fortunes, rather than diminish them. Much of the public commentary on the issue overlooks the subtle and varied ways in which the SACP could participate in local government elections within the framework of a reconfigured Alliance.
In practice, a complementary SACP electoral contest, will require a Swiss-knife approach — adaptable, multifunctional, and context-sensitive — to the longstanding challenge of alliance electoral representation. This is not a one-size-fits-all problem. Therefore it cannot be solved with a single, mutually exclusive solutions. Rather, multiple electoral participation modalities that can coexist and applied selectively based on local and provincial dynamics.
First, the SACP could contest elections in areas where either the ANC or the SACP weak or support is poor. In such contexts, the SACP or ANC may be better positioned to help obtain votes within the broader progressive politics.
Second, the alliance could agree that any candidate from an alliance partner, selected through inclusive, community-based pre-election forums, becomes the unified Alliance candidate.
Third, the alliance could negotiate a formula for proportional representation (PR) lists, ensuring that Alliance partners — including the SACP, COSATU, and SANCO — are fairly represented with their distinct presence in representative state institutions.
Another option is an Alliance electoral pact with agreements on deployment, quotas, and separate lists for the ward and proportional council seats — aiming to form a post-election multi-party government. For example, the ANC could back the SACP on the proportional list, while the SACP supports ANC ward candidates, particularly in metros where the ANC has lost its majority due to the proportional representation formula.
All options have pitfalls, but whatever path the alliance chooses, will require political maturity and genuine compromise. Without these, no electoral strategy can restore alliance unity or secure future ANC-led alliance electoral recovery.
The SACP should avoid the electoralism pitfall that has weakened the ANC's organic connection to the working class, reducing it to elections campaigns and welfarist handouts to poor communities.
Cde David Masondo is the SACP 2nd Deputy General Secretary and Deputy Minister of Finance
*This article was first published in the Sunday Times, 20 July 2025.
A reply to David Masondo's Article: Preserving the Alliance Crucial for the ANC
Benson Ngqentsu
In his article Preserving the Alliance Crucial for the ANC, Cde David Masondo contributes a timely and noteworthy perspective on the future of the Alliance, constitutive of the ANC, SACP, Cosatu and Sanco. As the 2nd Deputy General Secretary of the SACP, an ANC NEC member and Deputy Minister of Finance, Cde Masondo holds a unique vantage point from which to speak on matters central to the revolutionary forces in South Africa.
His call for preserving the Alliance should be welcomed by all forces of the national liberation struggle. However, any sound and progressive discussion about the Alliance must go beyond preservation for preservation's sake; the form of the Alliance must be aligned with the Alliance's historic mission, rooted in the principles of our shared national democratic revolution – the SACP's direct route towards socialism.
Cde Masondo's analysis, while valuable in its acknowledgement of factionalism, internal fragmentation with the ANC and disillusionment among voters, fails to confront the source of the electoral decline of the ANC and other former liberation movements post-national independence. It is insufficient to attribute these setbacks primarily to internal fragmentation. In South Africa's realities, the real crisis lies in the post-1994 economic trajectory of neoliberal austerity that has undermined the very foundations of our shared national democratic revolution (NDR).
Post-liberation governments, including that of the ANC, adopted policies inspired by the discredited neoliberal agenda advanced by Western imperialist institutions, such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. These are underpinned by coercive economic strategies such as restrictive fiscal, monetary, and industrial neoliberal austerity through – trade liberalisation, deregulation, privatisation and budget austerity.
This trajectory, imposed and reinforced by international financial institutions as mentioned above, has led to de-industrialisation, mass unemployment, growing inequality, and poverty. Cde Masondo's reluctance to directly confront this economic orthodoxy is a glaring omission that weakens the strategic value of his analysis and contribution.
Cde Masondo's concerns regarding the SACP's decision to contest the 2026 local government elections independently of the ANC are noted and worth a public, as well as a discussion within the SACP. He warns that this could further complicate the political landscape for disillusioned voters. However, his concern inadvertently overlooks the deepening political and historic ideological divergences within the Alliance. What we are witnessing is not merely a tactical difference, but the outcome of years of sidelining the Alliance's working-class components in favour of technocratic and market-driven governance.
The targeting of SACP cadres within ANC structures, which Cde Masondo acknowledges, is not a new phenomenon. As far back as 1994, in then-President Thabo Mbeki's infamous “Unmandated Reflections,” he justified the ANC's relationship with international capital, and a clear hostility toward the Party was already visible. This anti-communist posture, sometimes explicit, often latent, remains a key feature of internal ANC politics and should not be underestimated. In response, the SACP must neither retreat nor become complicit in attempts to marginalise those who still operate within ANC structures under the banner of working-class politics given the SACP's decision to contest elections.
There is a clear recognition that discussions are ongoing about how to respond to the SACP's 2026 election decision. But the strategic question is no longer whether the SACP should contest, but how best to do so in a manner that advances the NDR. The Party faces a historic challenge: contesting independently in its current organisational form, the Party risks liquidation, but by backtracking the SACP risks perishing in the political domain. Let us face it, the stakes are high, and only a combination of grounded practical experience and sound revolutionary theory can guide the way forward.
Furthermore, while the debate is often framed around the ANC and SACP, it is crucial to remember that the Alliance is broader: Cosatu, Sanco, and the Progressive Youth Alliance are integral parts of this political front for the ongoing struggle for the total liberation of the black majority and the working class in particular. Their role in shaping the path forward cannot be ignored or minimised in favour of ANC-SACP political dialogue.
On the point of complementarity, I agree with Cde Masondo that if the SACP's contestation is executed strategically, it could strengthen the broader revolutionary movement. However, his bias weakens his argument by framing this potential only in terms of strengthening the ANC's electoral prospects. It must be clear to all that the SACP is not a support structure of the ANC, rather it is a working-class Party in its own right. The primary goal must not be to rescue the ANC, but to defend, deepen, and advance the NDR in a manner that centres working-class interests. This should be the bottom line for all revolutionary forces.
We must also acknowledge that the discussion about the SACP's role concerning state power has been ongoing since the early 2000s. Numerous SACP and COSATU discussion documents proposed the reconfiguration of the Alliance to ensure working-class hegemony, not just presence. The ANC's refusal to seriously engage in this debate, and its ridiculing of proposals, has now reached a tipping point. Let us set the record straight: the crisis is not merely about who holds office, but about the ideological trajectory of our revolution.
As Antonio Gramsci teaches us, political hegemony is not about formal representation alone; essentially, it is about the dominance of working-class ideas. Presently, the dominant ideas are not of the working class, but of neoliberalism, a developmental stage of capitalism. Given the inevitability of coalition governments, irrespective of their levels and forms, the ANC continues to align with class antagonistic forces. These are not only political realignments at a tactical level, but they also present a platform for the realignment of neoliberal and right-wing class forces in the state.
In the final analysis, in these uncharted political waters, all components of the national liberation movement, the ANC, SACP, Cosatu, Sanco must recommit to the historic mission of the NDR. But to do so, they must also be honest about the present state of the NDR and the trajectory it is taking. Therefore, the ANC, in its current form, cannot be given sole political responsibility for the revolution. The time has come for the SACP and Cosatu to assert their political independence as working-class organisations, or risk perishing under the weight of neoliberal complicity.
Essentially, the question is not just how to preserve the Alliance, but how to reconfigure it into a fighting force for a socialist-oriented NDR, one that speaks not to the international capitalist markets, but to the primary motive forces of our revolution, the millions who remain landless, unemployed, subjected to economic precarity, casualised and are Expanded Public Works Programme-ised.
Cde Benson Ngqentsu is the Provincial Secretary of the Western Cape SACP and an MP in the Western Cape Provincial Legislature
This article was first published in the Sunday Times, 27 July 2025
70 Years of the Freedom Charter
Ronnie Kasrils
The Freedom Charter was adopted in Kliptown on 26 June 1955, 70 years ago. Thousands of delegates had travelled from across South Africa – by train, by bus, on foot – to take part in the Congress of the People. They met under an open sky, gathered on the dusty field where a wooden stage had been erected. Armed police ringed the perimeter, their presence a reminder of the risks. But inside the fence, the atmosphere was determined and jubilant.
One by one, the clauses of the Charter – on land, work, education, housing, democracy, peace – were read aloud, and each was met with unanimous approval.
The Charter was the distilled expression of months of discussion and collective vision. Seventy years later, it remains one of the most transformative statements in our history.
Discussions of the Freedom Charter seldom place it in its full historical context. Yet to understand its true significance, we must see it as part of a wider global moment – an era in which oppressed peoples across the world were rising against colonialism.
After the defeat of fascism in 1945, there was a deep sense of possibility. The victory over fascism fuelled a new international moral order, embodied in the founding of the United Nations and its Charter, with its emphasis on human rights, self-determination, and peace. In the colonised world, this was accompanied by a wave of anti-colonial struggle, with growing demands for independence and equality. India gained independence in 1947. Ghana followed a decade later, in 1957.
In April 1955, two months before the Freedom Charter was adopted, 29 newly independent and colonised nations met in Bandung, Indonesia. The Bandung Conference gave voice to the aspirations of the global South – to end colonialism and racial domination, assert autonomy in world affairs and build cooperation among formerly colonised peoples. Bandung was a declaration of global non-alignment and post-colonial confidence. It thrilled anti-colonial forces around the world.
The Freedom Charter emerged amid this excitement. It, too, was a declaration by an oppressed majority that they would not accept colonial domination. It expressed the same spirit of decolonisation, the same insistence on democracy, equality, and national sovereignty. But it did not come from heads of state or official delegations – it came from the people themselves.
This period of hope was shadowed by a fierce imperialist backlash. In Iran, Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh's nationalisation of oil in 1951 was met with a CIA - and MI6 -backed coup in 1953, restoring the Shah and Western control over oil. In Guatemala, President Jacobo Árbenz's modest land reforms provoked a similar response. In 1954 the CIA orchestrated his removal to protect US corporate interests.
Across the world, moments of popular sovereignty were crushed to preserve imperial power. The Korean War (1950–53) marked the aggressive militarisation of the Cold War and signalled that the global North would not easily cede control. A decade later, these counterrevolutions continued. In 1961, Congo's first elected leader, Patrice Lumumba, was assassinated with the support of the CIA. In 1966, Kwame Nkrumah, who had declared that “the independence of Ghana is meaningless unless it is linked up with the total liberation of Africa,” was overthrown in a coup supported by Western powers.
In South Africa the vision set out in the Freedom Charter was swiftly met with state repression. Just months after its adoption, 156 leaders of the Congress Alliance were arrested and charged with treason in a trial that dragged on until 1961. Then came the Sharpeville Massacre in March 1960, when police opened fire on unarmed protesters, killing 69 people. Within days, the apartheid regime banned the ANC and the PAC, forcing the liberation movements underground. In response the ANC took the decision to turn to armed struggle.
Discussions of the Freedom Charter too often abstract it from the process that gave it life - a process that was profoundly democratic, consultative, and rooted in the daily lives of ordinary people. In 1953, the ANC, and its partners in the Congress Alliance issued a call for a national dialogue: to ask, plainly and urgently, “What kind of South Africa do we want to live in?”
The response was remarkable. Across the country, in townships, rural villages, workplaces, churches, and various kinds of gatherings, people came together to develop their demands. Submissions arrived handwritten on scraps of paper, carefully composed on typewriters, or dictated to organisers. It was one of the most significant exercises in participatory democracy ever undertaken in South Africa.
The Charter was a statement of popular will, arrived at through a process that gave it profound legitimacy. It called not only for political rights, but for the redistribution of land, the sharing of the country's wealth, and equality across race, gender, and class. It marked a decisive break with apartheid thinking and set out a radical vision for justice.
The Freedom Charter expressed a vision of South Africa grounded in equality, justice, and shared prosperity. It called instead for a radically democratic and redistributive order. “The People Shall Govern” was the opening clause - affirmed not only the right to vote, but the deeper principle that power must reside with the people. The declaration that “The Land Shall Be Shared Among Those Who Work It,” challenged the dispossession at the heart of colonial and apartheid rule. Crucially the Charter called for an economy based on public benefit rather than private profit: “The national wealth of our country, the heritage of South Africans, shall be restored to the people.”
Education, housing, and health care were to be universal and equal. The Charter demanded that “The Doors of Learning and of Culture Shall Be Opened,” insisting on access to knowledge and creative expression for all. It envisioned a South Africa without racism or sexism, where all would be “equal before the law,” with “peace and friendship” pursued abroad.
After the banning of the liberation movements in the 1960s and the brutal repression that followed, the Freedom Charter did not disappear - but it did recede from popular memory, its vision dimmed under the weight of censorship, exile, and political imprisonment. But in the 1980s, it surged back into public life with renewed force.
The formation of the United Democratic Front (UDF) in 1983 in Cape Town, and the emergence of Cosatu) in 1985 in Durban, gave new organisational life to the Charter. These new and powerful social forces, drawing on community structures, civic associations, church groups, and trade unions, took the Charter out of the archives and into the streets. For both the UDF and the trade union movement the Charter promised a future grounded in radical democracy and the redistribution of land and wealth.
As apartheid crumbled under the pressure of mass struggle, the Freedom Charter provided an essential reference point for the negotiations that began after the unbanning of the liberation movements in 1990. It had become a moral compass and a unifying framework for the liberation movement. Its language and principles profoundly shaped elements of the 1996 Constitution.
The Charter's insistence that “South Africa belongs to all who live in it” and that “the people shall govern” was carried through into the constitutional affirmation of non-racialism and universal suffrage. The guarantees of equality, dignity, and freedom of association all echo the Charter's vision. Its influence is also evident in the recognition of socio-economic rights—such as the rights to housing, education, and healthcare—which were once radical demands shouted at rallies and are now enshrined in law.
But the transition also involved compromise. In the 1980s, the Charter had been taken up not just as a legal or symbolic document, but as a call for deep structural transformation, especially in the economy and land ownership. These demands were rooted in a mass politics of resistance - workplace occupations, street committees, and civic forums that embodied popular power.
At the settlement, however, key clauses - particularly those calling for the redistribution of land and the sharing of national wealth - were softened or deferred. The commitment to a unitary, non-racial state was defended. But economic clauses became points of contention. The final settlement preserved existing patterns of private property, including land ownership, and accepted a macroeconomic framework shaped in part by global neoliberal pressures. While the vote was won, the deeper transformations envisioned in the Charter were postponed.
The result is that today, thirty years after the end of apartheid, the structural inequalities remain. In 1998, Cde Thabo Mbeki described South Africa as a country of “two nations”, one rich and white, the other poor and black. That characterisation remains disturbingly accurate. While a black middle class and elite has now emerged, the vast majority of South Africans still live with the daily consequences of poverty, unemployment, and exclusion. The economic promises of the Freedom Charter – its commitment to sharing the wealth of the country – have not been fulfilled.
The 2024 general election marked a historic turning point. Taken together, the two dominant parties garnered support from less than a quarter of the eligible population. Nearly 60% of eligible voters did not participate at all, while a growing number remain unregistered. This reflects not apathy, but deep disillusionment with formal politics. The Charter's promise that “the people shall govern” demands more than a vote – it requires active, sustained participation.
This means rebuilding mass democratic participation from below. It means rekindling the culture of popular meetings, community mandates, and worker-led initiatives that shaped political life in the 1980s and grounded the Freedom Charter in lived experience. It means going beyond elections and restoring a sense of everyday democratic agency – in schools, workplaces, neighbourhoods, and unions. It means making good on the promise to redistribute land and wealth.
It also means rebuilding solidarity across the Global South. The formation of the Hague Group in January this year to build an alliance in support of Palestine was a major breakthrough, and the meeting it will hold in Bogota in July promises to expand its reach and power.
But we must recognise the scale of resistance to such transformation. Powerful forces – both local and global – are deeply invested in the status quo. Economic elites and a set of NGOs, think tanks and media projects funded by Western donors work to frame redistributive politics as illegitimate, reckless, or authoritarian. These networks have grown increasingly bold as support for the ANC has declined.
In June 2023, the Brenthurst Foundation – funded by the Oppenheimer family – convened a conference in Gdańsk in Poland. Branded as a summit to “promote democracy”, the conference issued a “Gdańsk Declaration” that was an attempt to legitimise Western-backed opposition to progressive forces in Africa and Global South. Present were the leaders of the Democratic Alliance John Steenhuisen, IFP leader Velenkosini Hlabisa, former Daily Maverick editor Branko Brkic, and representatives of Renamo (Front for the Liberation of Mozambique) UNITA (National Union for the Total Independence of Angola) and Unita-Renovada (Angola)—all organisations with historical ties to Western-backed counter-revolutionary forces.
The event marked the open emergence of a transnational alliance aimed at neutralising any attempt to challenge elite power in the name of justice or equality. It is a reminder that the struggle to realise the Charter's vision will not be won on moral terms alone – it will require effective political organisation, ideological clarity, and courage. The Freedom Charter was born of struggle. It must now be defended and renewed through struggle.
Cde Ronnie Kasrils is an SACP, ANC and MK veteran, a former Minister and an author
Groundwork of the People's Red Caravan
The global relevance of the People's Red Caravan
Thulile Kumalo
This is a positive critique of the SACP People's Red Caravan that highlights its significance as a bold and historic move that revitalises the Party's connection with grassroots communities and the working class. The campaign marks a rebirth of purpose of the SACP, moving beyond Alliance politics and symbolic influence to directly engage with people on the ground
It is tackling a thorny issue, especially in the SADC (Southern African Development Community) countries, where there is poverty and inequality
It highlighted the persistent inequalities and socio-economic challenges in rural areas, which are a common issue worldwide
Many nations face similar rural underdevelopment: poverty, lack of infrastructure, limited education, health and access to clean water. By highlighting these struggles and proposing grassroots solutions, the initiative offers a model for regions grappling with rural marginalisation.
The campaign represents a direct challenge to global neoliberal economic policies, pushing for community self-determination and local economic sovereignty over externally imposed, market-driven solutions.
This approach seeks to demonstrate “building socialism at a local level” as a practical rather than purely ideological pursuit. This is relevant to leftist movements across the world seeking new forms of community organisations and bottom-up governance instead of purely state-driven models. In Zulu, we say Vuka Uzenzele (“get up and do it yourself”), meaning that you must be self-sufficient because no one else will provide you with food. Our communities must learn to be self-sufficient and sustainable. This is what the Red Caravan aims to do: to show people that they can do it themselves.
The SACP's Red Caravan is globally relevant as it binds together local-level initiatives addressing poverty, food insecurity, political disengagement and a neoliberal policy critique that are universal themes relevant across continents. Its novel approach of community empowerment and sustained engagement makes it a possible blueprint or point of reference for similar movements in other parts of the world
What parallels exist in other countries or regions? Central American Migrant Caravans: these caravans are organised movements of migrants (often from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala) who travel collectively through Central America towards Mexico and the US. They include strong elements of collective action, mutual aid and assertion of rights, drawing international attention to migrants 'struggles and forming networks of solidarity, legal support and humanitarian aid.
Trans Europa Caravans in Europe: these caravans were organised in 2019 by civil society groups travelling through 15 European countries to promote democratic participation, citizens' rights and social engagement ahead of the European Parliament elections. It brought activist and local populations together at grassroots levels, advocating for issues such as freedom of movement, civic participation, environmental sustainability and minority rights.
Native People's Caravans and Indigenous Movements Canada: this was a protest journey by Indigenous activists travelling across the country to raise awareness about indigenous rights, government injustices and social exclusion. This is parallel to the SACP Red Caravan because it uses travelling as a method for direct engagement, resistance and community–building among marginalised groups.
Cde Thulile Kumalo is a National Education Officer who has been recently appointed as the National Gender Officer in Nehawu. She is a gender activist serving in the women's structure in Cosatu. She is currently in her last year of the Bachelor of Commerce in Project Management, which is her second degree.
People's Red Caravan – The revolution will not be publicised
Hlengiwe Nkonyane
The revolution never waits for an appointment date with an established media house interviewer or an invite to the studios of broadcasting house. Instead, the mainstream news outlets will have no option but to follow the revolution.
This stands true not only as a catch phrase but a fact born out of the realities that the mainstream media has no desire to showcase the tides of the revolution as they unfold, rather when they fail to wield and drive a narrative that is mostly by the ruling class agenda, evident as the mainstream media they turn to what is termed ‘citizen journalism' and doing post-analysis reporting.
The socialist agenda must take ownership in driving its programmes and campaigns and not sit and wait for mainstream media to be activated to drive its updates and have its stories known. With the advances of the fourth industrial revolution (4IR) and accessibility of the content that gets directly to the audience without the filter of gate-keeping by mainstream media establishments.
The power of having direct access to the audience means that the socialist agenda does not need to beg for coverage. However, the programmes and campaigns with a massive impact on the ground will force the media houses to cover the turning of the tables and the tides of the revolution.
The SACP People's Red Caravan is a movement in which the people take charge of their own socio-economic development, particularly in the impoverished rural communities. Rather than solving problems for people, the initiative is about giving people the power to drive the change they envision.
This is done with an approach of working side by side with the community to map out solutions, garner communal resources and have everybody putting in an effort through utilising each one's skills, expert knowledge and potential labour. Through the People's Red Caravan, the community builds unity and cohesion, being at the helm of them being their own liberators on the socio-economic crises that are faced by them.
This involves tackling hunger, through farming and communal bakeries, greenhouses and a home-based seedlings initiative, as well as housing.
The latter involves working with the local tribal authority to ensure that issues of land allocation or zoning land either for food production or shelter provision, as per need, are handled with transparency and the people's needs being put forward. Lastly, the People's Red Caravan promotes health through healthy living. This is done by encouraging the community to participate in physical exercise (a healthy nation is a growing nation).
The People's Red Caravan also helps with refurbishing the local clinics through the community fixing broken windows and roofs, painting buildings and carrying out the ground maintenance. This ensures that the community understands that they need to take care of their own facilities and not have the culture of waiting for the government to fix them. Any community building in need of attention, such as early childhood development centres and community halls, should be fixed collectively.
This breaks the chains of dependency on the government as the solution machine. Here, the people make the decisions on the plans that suit their specific community, thereby enhancing unity among the people. In simple terms, the People's Red Caravan is socialism on the ground.
China managed to eradicate poverty and close the economic gap through grassroots movements and change from the ground upwards.
According to the World Bank, China managed to lift 800 million people out of poverty by 2020. This is a benchmark that the SACP aims to achieve in the South African context.
The message of the People's Red Caravan is that while socio-economic crises are multifaceted, this should not hinder the people from starting to solve the issues themselves, nor from waiting on a saviour to rescue them from poverty. The emphasis is on the “people are their own liberators”.
The lack of attention from the mainstream media is not an indication of a failure of the programme; rather, the SACP should intensify its own media output and publicise its own campaigns. The 4IR has given people the power to take charge of their narratives and how their stories must be told, without any filter or gatekeeping of the audience.
The escalation of the 4IR, especially during the Covid-19 pandemic, moved the media space from traditional forms of seeking information and news updates from the established media to self-production and financial barrier-cutting means to get information across to the masses.
This saw a rise in publications, firstly moving to online newspapers and developments of apps to access and consume the news updates. The people who were being sidelined in the coverage and their alternative voice outside the ruling class narratives sought to get their message and updates through podcasting and electronic platforms such as social media.
This phenomenal shift in the power dynamics meant that the traditional media establishments had to adapt to giving space to the opinion makers and citizen journalism. This can be seen with many podcasts now being given space in media houses such as Multichoice and the like.
Platforms such as Facebook and X (formerly twitter) are the main platforms where this shift in ownership takes place. It's on these social media platforms that one gets such terms as (Facebook / X investigators). When a report on the mainstream news appears to be curated, the people take it upon themselves to dig up the news behind the news, the people connect the dots themselves and publicise their findings instantly on these platforms.
However, one must warn about the authenticity of what is presented by these social media investigators. The issue is that these investigators cannot be verified; even the names they use on social media are fake. Despite its drawbacks, this shift highlights that people no longer accept being spoon-fed news or information.
The 4IR has broken the walls that the mainstream media, which had exercised power to access the people and shape opinions, being challenged on their bias and selectiveness on coverage. The people have taken it upon themselves to ensure that their stories that affect their daily lives are self-publicised. The people have taken their power back by taking charge of what they consume in news updates and opinion-making.
The SACP must invest in its own media production, because only then can we tell our own news and participate in shaping the opinions of the people. Nowadays, one cannot complain about not getting publicity. You have to drive your own narrative, and push the mainstream to come camp at their electronic media pages for updates and news making.
The 4IR has crushed the barriers and shifted the power back to the people, enabling them to champion their own stories. The story of the People's Red Caravan will be told by the people themselves. Urban legends will emerge from those who saw power returned to them as their own liberators. In the end, the revolution will be publicised on handheld gadgets and portable devices such as laptops.
The People's Red Caravan is on the move, on the ground. The mainstream media will be busy catching up while the people reap the benefits of solving their own socio-economic problems and participating in the solutions. Socialism is indeed the future, and the SACP is building it on the ground, one community at a time.
Cde Hlengiwe Nkonyane serves in the SACP's Communications and Media Department
Palestine: time to sharpen militant solidarity action targeting all links with Israel
Barry Mitchell
The history of the colonised global South has hitherto been a history of old, white men staking their claim of ownership to land, natural wealth and human beings. The real-time genocide taking place in Palestine and the abundance of socio-economic and political challenges faced by former colonies all stem from these old, white men.
Perhaps our readers have heard of the Berlin Conference of 1884. This saw the carving up of Africa into areas of imperialist control and influence. Or, the Balfour Declaration of 1917. This led to the mass ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from their land and homes in 1948.
These were both agreements established by imperial powers to embark on an industrial-scale death, dispossession displacement expedition that would last for centuries. These agreements aimed to crush resistance, establish authority and obedience from the conquered people, and super-exploit and extract every natural and human benefit derived from the stolen land.
What we are witnessing in Gaza in Palestine and in Goma in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in 2025 is a direct result of massive contemporary political shifts. Such momentous geopolitical changes have not been seen since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the ascension of the US as the unipolar master of the world – what Fukuyama incorrectly characterised as “The end of history and the last man”.
The unilateral decisions made by the old, white men all those years back are now manifesting in a desperate, deadly and barbarous attempt at maintaining control over the unipolar socio-economic and geopolitical stranglehold on the global south and former colonies.
As Lenin suggested, imperialism is the highest form of capitalism, so the continued death, dispossession and displacement faced by our ancestors and parents during colonialism and apartheid continue today. As it stands, at least 60 0000 Palestinians have been killed as a result of the imperialist-sponsored, funded, planned and encouraged genocide taking place, with nearly 2 million left homeless.
The majority of these acts of murder have been directed at women, children, the elderly, and those waiting in lines for food aid and provisions. In the DRC, huge numbers of people have been displaced and many have lost their lives as a result of the ongoing imperialist-sponsored conflict.
The struggle of the Palestinian people and all those in the global South who continue to bear the brunt of imperial campaigns of death, dispossession and displacement is indeed our struggle. The anti-apartheid movement, which focused on raising awareness, boycotting the economy of the racist regime and calling for the release of political prisoners, was an impactful international solidarity campaign against apartheid.
In the contemporary setting, groupings such as Boycott, Divest and Sanction (BDS) and Palestine 4 Africa have also made some substantive inroads in raising awareness, and condemning the ongoing displacement of Palestinians and violation of their rights.
In 2014 boycotts managed to reduce foreign direct investment to Israel by 46%. South Africa, stemming from our own experiences of three centuries of colonialism and six decades of apartheid, took Israel to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and presented comprehensive evidence by a sterling South African legal team of the continued acts of genocide in Palestine.
On 16 July 2025, 12 countries met in Colombia to form a broad coalition that will continue to pursue accountability of Israel's acts of genocide in Gaza, including the prevention of the transfer of weapons to Israel.
We have also seen many brave unionised workers in Europe and Latin America refuse to load or unload materials used to fuel the genocide in Palestine. These militant workers have fully appreciated the role that their governments and businesses operating in their country are playing in sponsoring the mass murder of Palestinians.
The Mass Democratic Movement (MDM) in South Africa has also been consistent in formulating and adopting resolutions in support of the Palestinian people, including campaigning against Israel, in the form of the closure of its Embassy in Tshwane and for a complete boycott of genocidal Israel's economy.
Some components within the MDM are mobilising their constituencies outside the embassies of Israel, the US and other genocidal-sponsoring states in Europe. These are important acts of solidarity that ought to be strengthened. However, unbeknownst to many, South Africa continues to export coal to Israel, ostensibly aiding in this real-time murderous campaign by the Israeli Defence Force (IDF).
Whilst we must continue to support the case we have presented to the ICJ and welcome the broad coalition in Colombia, and, while the resolutions adopted in congress or conference are still relevant, a consolidated, united and militant approach to our solidarity campaign is urgently required.
Trade unions in South Africa must ensure that workers located at points of production (coal mines and ports) are conscientised and mobilised to follow the militant approach of workers in Greece, Latin America and other countries that downed tools, refusing to touch the murderous cargo.
The South African Transport and Allied Workers' Union (SATAWU) and the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) are two key protagonists that should take a lead in activating this campaign of direct, militant and impactful Palestinian solidarity action.
A more substantive effort must also be made in uniting and better coordinating the various Palestinian solidarity groupings in South Africa. Our planning and campaigning in different and separate silos is superfluous in the context of ensuring our solidarity campaigns are effective. Next year, we will commemorate the 76th anniversary of the Nakba of 1948, and it will also be the third year in which a modern-day genocide is being perpetuated on live television.
This is a call, therefore, to mobilise a broadly coordinated and united campaign to stop the genocide in Palestine and bring Israel to book through more militant and practical programmes.
Cde Barry Mitchell is an SACP Central Committee member and Nehawu Parliamentary Officer
Digital Empire: technowar, imperialism and the assault on Iran
Thabile Lenkwane
In the shadow of missiles and media headlines, a quieter, more insidious war is being waged through satellites, servers, and screens. The recent escalation of hostilities between the United States, Israel and Iran is not merely a contest of territorial or ideological power. It is a war of systems, of surveillance, of software. It is the war of digital imperialism.
The aggressive posture taken by the US and Israel towards Iran, manifested through assassinations, cyberattacks, disinformation, and economic sabotage, reflects a deeper logic of imperialism in the 21st century.
As Lenin outlined in Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism, imperialism is not only the export of finance capital or the military occupation of foreign lands, but it is also the violent enforcement of global dominance through every available tool of power. Today, that includes technology, cyberspace, artificial intelligence, drones, and surveillance systems, all weaponised to maintain Western hegemony.
Iran, since the 1979 revolution, has stood outside the orbit of US-led imperialism. Its refusal to become a client state of the West, its support for regional anti-imperialist movements, and its sovereign development trajectory have made it a consistent target of aggression.
From the CIA-engineered 1953 coup that overthrew Prime Minister Mossadegh, to the decades of economic sanctions and diplomatic sabotage, the United States and its Israeli partner have never ceased in their attempts to subdue the Iranian state and its people.
Beyond weapons and warfare, imperialism secures its dominance through control of the global media. The United States and its allies do not only shape events, they shape how those events are seen. Through concentrated media ownership and Western-centric news networks, they craft narratives that legitimise aggression and criminalise resistance. By deciding what stories are told, whose voices are heard, and whose pain is ignored, the media becomes a subtle but powerful weapon disciplining global public opinion and reinforcing imperial logic as common sense.
What we are witnessing is not the fight against a nuclear threat; it is the enforcement of a digital empire.
Yet, beyond economic and military aggression lies another battlefield in the cyber realm. In 2010, the Stuxnet virus, jointly developed by the US and Israel, was deployed against Iran's nuclear facilities. This marked the first known cyberattack designed to cause physical destruction.
It was a watershed moment: cyberwarfare had matured into a new form of imperialist sabotage. Since then, Iran has faced constant digital incursions, targeting its infrastructure, media and internal political dynamics. These attacks, often unclaimed but widely acknowledged, signal that cyberwarfare is now a permanent feature of Western foreign policy.
Alongside these attacks is the deepening use of surveillance technologies to destabilise and monitor sovereign nations. The Pegasus spyware, developed by the Israeli firm NSO Group, has been deployed against political leaders, activists, and journalists across the Global South.
This high-tech imperialist warfare did not emerge overnight; it was tested. The genocide of Palestinians in Gaza and the ongoing repression in the West Bank have served as a laboratory for Israel's technowar. Drones, predictive surveillance systems, AI-powered targeting, and biometric control have all been trialled on Palestinian bodies and communities before being exported to global markets or deployed against regional adversaries like Iran. Gaza and the West Bank are not only the sites of brutal occupation, they are where the tools of digital repression and genocide are being perfected and normalised under the guise of security.
Iran, too, has been a target. Western intelligence agencies and tech platforms operate with little restraint, capturing data, tracking communications, and shaping narratives to weaken independent governments. Surveillance, once the domain of secret police, has merged with Big Tech, creating a digital panopticon that serves imperial interests.
More terrifying is the role of drones and artificial intelligence. The assassination of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani in 2020 by a US drone strike was not just an act of war, it was a demonstration of how AI and precision technology can be used to kill without accountability.
Israel's ongoing use of drones to strike alleged Iranian targets in Syria, Iraq, and beyond reinforces this trend. AI-driven warfare removes human conscience from decision-making, replacing it with algorithmic death. These weapons do not discriminate, and their deployment often bypasses international law and public oversight. They are designed for domination, not justice.
Imperialism is also fought on the front of public consciousness. The battle over digital narratives is fierce and ongoing. Disinformation campaigns, social media manipulation, algorithmic censorship, and cyber-influencing operations have been used to stoke dissent, distort facts, and justify war.
During various protests in Iran, Western platforms and governments have amplified selective narratives while silencing others. Iranian state media outlets are often censored or demonised, while voices aligned with imperial interests are elevated. The result is a digital landscape where the oppressed are shouted down and the aggressors appear as liberators.
What is being done to Iran today should concern every nation of the Global South. The technological tools of imperialism perfected against Iran will be turned on others. Venezuela, Cuba, Russia, China, and even states in Africa are increasingly targets of similar strategies.
As governance, infrastructure, and daily life become increasingly digital, the capacity of imperial powers to interfere, manipulate, and attack grows exponentially. The digital divide is no longer just an issue of development it is a matter of sovereignty.
In the face of this aggression, Iran and its allies have begun building cyber-defence capacities and forming new alliances, such as through the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation and BRICS. These efforts point towards the need for a new digital internationalism, one grounded in South-South cooperation, technological self-reliance, and collective resistance to the new forms of domination.
But far more is needed. The global working class must recognise that technology under capitalism does not exist to liberate, it exists to control. As Marx warned, machinery in the hands of capital does not serve the workers but enslaves them. Today, that machinery is embedded in fibre-optic cables, in drones, in smartphones, and in clouds owned by billionaires.
We are entering a new phase of struggle. The empire may no longer wear red coats or send in soldiers. Instead, it sends software updates, hacks elections, triggers proxy wars, and watches us through our screens.
This is not science fiction, it is the brutal reality of imperialism in our time. The resistance must evolve, not only to fight tanks and sanctions, but to confront spyware, drones, and propaganda bots. If we do not build technological sovereignty and fight for a people's internet, we will be forever under digital occupation.
Imperialism has updated its tactics. So must we.
Cde Thabile Lenkwane a National Committee member of the YCLSA
South Africa's cumbersome bureaucracy of bereavement
Reneva Fourie
Cde Reneva tragically lost her son, Sebastian, 33, in an accident recently
Losing a loved one is among the most heart-wrenching experiences a person can endure. What is almost as painful as the death itself is the cumbersome, costly, and unrelenting bureaucracy that accompanies it.
In the case of an unnatural death, there is a maze of procedures, formalities, and legalities that only deepen the anguish. Among others, you have to deal with the police, the identification of the body at the mortuary, the autopsy, the registration of the death, the logistics of the memorial service and funeral, the winding up of the deceased's estate, and the court process.
Devastatingly, some of the activities involve endless repetition. While the people working within these various systems are often kind and understanding, their compassion is diluted when the bureaucracy of bereavement is not streamlined and integrated. When the impact of death leaves you with little ability to think, eat, sleep or get out of bed, and you are further burdened with limited time and resources, the last thing you need is to visit the same institutions over and over. It breaks you almost as much as the loss.
Dealing with an undertaker can remove some of the weight. Undertakers help register the death and organise the funeral. This support can feel like a lifeline. If the family had a funeral policy, some of the financial pressure would be lifted. But if not, families often find themselves taking loans, borrowing from neighbours, or begging for contributions just to bury their loved one with dignity.
A memorial service held before the funeral provides a platform for those who knew the deceased to share their memories and experiences. While sad, it is a reflection and wonderful celebration of and tribute to the life of the deceased. In the long term, it is comforting to rewatch when you are feeling lost and helpless. The funeral, too, while it cannot constitute closure, represents an essential ritual for family, friends, associates and acquaintances to collectively support each other in a period when it is so strongly needed.
The wrapping of the estate, no matter how modest, while a necessary evil, is, however, a reinforcement of trauma. No one should have to visit the same institutions repeatedly. There is absolutely no system integration between the departments of Home Affairs and Justice. Each department has its own plethora of forms, all of which require certification by the police. None of the state departments, including Home Affairs, Justice, or the relevant police station, is located near the others. For those who earn little or nothing, this process is not only traumatic. It is cruel.
There is an urgent need for reform. Government departments must speak to each other. There must be systems in place that make things easier for grieving families, especially those with limited financial means. Death already tears people apart. Bureaucracy should not be allowed to finish the job.
Cde Fourie is an SACP and Politburo member
The Emfuleni water crisis – a class betrayal
Nhlanhlivele Ngubane
The collapse of water and sanitation services in Emfuleni is not merely a consequence of poor governance or mismanagement; it is an act of class betrayal. The working-class communities of Emfuleni and beyond are facing raw sewage in their streets, toxic water and collapsed infrastructure, while elites, politicians and private interests continue to insulate themselves from the crisis.
Class betrayal means the abandonment or active undermining of the working class's material and political interests by those who claim to represent them, particularly in contexts where the working class relies on the state as a mechanism of social transformation. .1 This betrayal may be manifest in policy choices, governance failures or the privileging of elite interests over the needs of the proletariat.
In 2018, Emfuleni Local Municipality, situated on the banks of the Vaal River, failed to fulfil its obligation to provide water and sanitation services to its predominantly working-class population. The service delivery collapsed entirely, water purification plants failed, sewage spills polluted the river, and residents suffered from consistent water shortages. 2
This was an environmental disaster as sewage ended up degrading a key national water resource, the Vaal River, which resulted in residents being deprived of a constitutional right and a basic need in life.
Emfuleni's crisis is often reduced to accusations of corruption and incompetence, but as Marius Pieterse argues, deeper structural factors lie at the heart of this collapse, like misaligned municipal demarcation, poor intergovernmental relations, dysfunctional governance structures and an unsustainable municipal financing model.
Legacy of racial capitalism
Emfuleni is a product of apartheid's spatial planning. Racial capitalism's industrial towns were designed and built to extract cheap Black labour while withholding services and infrastructure from Black communities.
After 1994, these historical injustices were supposed to be addressed, but instead, governance failures and elite factionalism entrenched inequality. The economic stagnation of the Vaal Triangle after 1994, worsened by global steel market shocks, hit working-class communities hardest while elites privatised and profited from the tenders and other industrial assets.
Post-apartheid governance failure is class betrayal
The transition to democracy imposed a governance model that sought to integrate historically divided communities, but the mismatch between economic decline and rapid urbanisation left infrastructure overwhelmed and badly maintained. 3
The governance architecture itself has failed the working class. Emfuleni was structured as a local municipality within the Sedibeng District, despite qualifying for metropolitan status.
This inappropriate structuring weakened its capacity, created duplication of governance functions, and trapped it in dysfunctional inter-municipal relations for example, Emfuleni must treat sewage from neighbouring municipalities like Midvaal and Johannesburg while receiving no additional compensation.
At the political level, the executive mayoral system handed enormous power to a single individual and their close circle, marginalising ward councillors the very people meant to represent communities. Pieterse shows how executive mayors in Emfuleni operated with near impunity, accountable not to residents but to political party structures, factional networks and patronage interests.
Administrative vacancies at senior levels, skills shortages, lack of managerial competence and political interference played a huge role in collapsing the municipality. Factionalism within the governing political party further destabilised leadership, contributing to institutional paralysis. 4 This politicisation of municipal administration mirrored a national pattern where accountability shifted away from residents toward party structures. 5
The working class pays the price
The consequences for working-class communities have been devastating. Water services collapsed because of years of neglected maintenance, yet residents were still billed for unusable water. The Vaal River, a national water source, became heavily polluted, threatening livelihoods, health and dignity, while elites lived securely with access to bottled water and private sanitation alternatives.
While national and provincial governments eventually intervened under Section 139 of the Constitution, their interventions were delayed, top-down, and ineffective. They failed to empower communities, sidelined local accountability, and entrenched a top down governance culture that excluded those most affected from decision-making.
A political economy of betrayal
Despite Emfuleni being governed by representatives of a liberation movement-turned-ruling party, this collapse was not an accident of nature nor merely a managerial oversight. It reflected deep governance failures rooted in elite-driven political factionalism, corruption and self-enrichment that displaced the working-class mandate. 6 The commodification of water and sanitation provision and the 20rbanization20n of elite interests meant that the working class of Emfuleni were left vulnerable to systemic neglect.
This is the essence of class betrayal: the deliberate failure of governance structures to protect and serve the working class while preserving opportunities for enrichment, patronage and elite political control. Emfuleni exemplifies the broader structural crisis of local government under neoliberal capitalism, where municipalities must rely heavily on property rates and service charges from economically distressed communities and industries.
When those sources collapse, as they have in Emfuleni, the state abandons the poor rather than transforming the financing model.
Global relevance and lessons
Emfuleni's crisis resonates globally, especially in contexts where weak intergovernmental coordination, legacy inequalities, and rapid 21urbanization collide. Its experience reinforces the need for governance structures to align with economic and social realities. Emfuleni's fragmented jurisdiction weakened its ability to plan and provide services for its functional metropolitan area.7
Executive mayoral systems demand robust checks and balances. Without these, power can become concentrated without accountability, particularly where party loyalty supersedes public service. 8 Sanitation solutions must be systemic, context-sensitive and integrated. Technical fixes alone fail where governance, financing, infrastructure and community legitimacy are not working together to achieve the same goal. 9
Reclaiming local governance for the working class
The struggle over water and sanitation in Emfuleni is not simply about fixing pipes and sewerage plants. It is about reclaiming democratic, accountable local government from the grip of elites and factional networks.
Pieterse's calls for institutional reforms, professionalisation of administrations and greater community involvement. This means the working-class must organise themselves so they can be able to demand accountability, transparency, and genuine governance.
The betrayal of Emfuleni's working class is the betrayal of the promise of a democratic developmental state. But it can also be the spark for a renewed, militant working-class politics that insists that water is a right, not a privilege, and that municipal governance must serve the people, not the elites.
The Emfuleni water crisis is not merely a municipal governance failure; it is an emblematic case of class betrayal that must inform future policies and activism.
Cde Nhlanhlivele Ngubane is a YCLSA activist and is currently doing his Master's in Law at Wits University
Evil doesn't wait for language: why we must name xenophobia
Nigel Branken
A friend of mine recently commented on my post about the counter-protest we held against Operation Dudula. She referred to something Thabo Mbeki once said to a group of African congregants: “What is xenophobia in our African languages?”
Apparently, the room went quiet. She was suggesting that maybe, if we don't have a word for xenophobia in our languages, the concept itself is foreign—or maybe not real in the way it's being described.
She went on to say that people who do have the words—shaped by other histories—sometimes use those words not to understand others, but to control them or to feel morally superior. And that those who are being labelled often have every reason to reject the labels, because they weren't part of shaping the words in the first place. She said if we really took the time to listen, we might discover that there's no hate at all—just frustration and disillusionment.
I've been thinking about that. And I want to respond not just in the comments but more publicly here.
The fact that a word doesn't exist in a language doesn't mean the thing it describes doesn't exist. Patriarchy, racism, apartheid—all of these systems existed long before we had names for them. Evil doesn't wait for language. It just acts.
And this argument—that something doesn't exist because there's no word for it—has been used before. Hendrik Verwoerd said apartheid wasn't oppression, it was just “separate development.” They tried to rename injustice to make it sound benign. But we all know renaming it didn't make it any less violent. If anything, it made it harder to fight.
The same is true of xenophobia.
I've stood face-to-face with Operation Dudula in the streets—at Hilbrow Clinic, where people were being chased away from medical care simply because they were foreign nationals. I was there at Yeoville Market when they were protesting to get rid of long-time traders, and that market ended up burned down. I've stood toe-to-toe with them on many occasions.
And I've also sat down with their leaders. I've had proper sit-down meetings with them—some of them former branch leaders. I've spent hours listening to them. I've brought documented evidence to show that what they were saying wasn't true. I've tried to have real conversations. I've listened to stories from leaders in KwaZulu-Natal. I've listened. I've negotiated. I've tried to understand.
But I've also heard the scapegoating. The blaming. I've seen the twisting of truth to justify violence. And that's what we have to call it—violence.
I've also walked with the people who've suffered because of this movement. I've taken people to police stations to lay charges. I've sat with community members from across the country who've been threatened, beaten, chased, and traumatised.
Let me tell you about Dido.
He was a refugee from the DRC. One day, he was chased down the street in Johannesburg with people shouting, “foreigner!” A dog was set on him. It mauled him for four hours before someone finally intervened. He was taken to Baragwanath Hospital and lay in a coma for three months. After he was discharged, I took him into my home in Orange Grove to help him recover. Later, we arranged for him to move in with a fellow Congolese man who could support him more long-term. But during another wave of xenophobic attacks, Dido was chased again. The stress triggered a fragment from his original injury to dislodge. He suffered a stroke and died. I mourned him as a friend and a brother. What do we call that, if not hatred?
Then there's my friend Nthombi. She was eight months pregnant, selling mielies on the pavement in Orange Grove. A leader from Operation Dudula from the Free State approached her, shouted at her, and violently overturned her mielie stand. I was there. I helped her pick up the pieces. Later, I sat down with that very man for three hours in a church-mediated conversation. I listened to him. And I didn't hear justice. I heard fear, I heard blame, and I heard an unwillingness to see her humanity.
And then there's Elvis Nyathi. He was a 43-year-old Zimbabwean man living in Diepsloot. During a door-to-door “inspection,” he couldn't produce ID. He was dragged from his home, beaten, doused in petrol, and necklaced—burned alive. I stood with his mother while his body was loaded into the hearse. I held her. I said, “I'm so sorry.” What words are enough to describe that kind of horror?
This isn't just frustration. This isn't just disillusionment. This is fear and anger weaponised against the vulnerable. It is xenophobia. And if we don't name it, we're complicit in it.
But there's something else I've seen—something that gives me hope.
At the counter-protest this past week against Operation Dudula, we weren't alone. Abahlali baseMjondolo came. Informal Traders Associations. The recyclers. The Inner City Federation. Civil society allies. It's no exaggeration to say that more than 90% of the people on our side of that protest were poor South Africans—people living in shacks, in inner-city slums, in difficult, often horrific, conditions. These were not the elite. These were the people Dudula claims to speak for.
And yet, these are the people who stood up and said: “No. The problem isn't that we have foreign nationals living here. The problem is the unhealed legacy of apartheid. The problem is inequality. The problem is corruption, and neoliberalism, and capitalism. The problem is a government that has failed to deliver justice.”
These are people who know hardship. And they know that turning on their neighbours is not the answer.
These are the people who reflect the heart of Africa. Who embody Ubuntu. They believe that South Africa—and Africa—belongs to all who live in it. They believe the Freedom Charter wasn't just words. That we must give it meaning. That we must fight for land, for justice, for economic transformation. That we must build real solidarity, not deepen division.
Abahlali baseMjondolo is a co-applicant in the court case against Operation Dudula (http://bit.ly/3TIu0lm). They represent far more people than Dudula ever has. They speak with the authority of lived experience and moral clarity. The Socio-Economic Rights Institute (SERI), whose lawyers are representing many of these grassroots organisations, continues to stand with them and with all who are defending the rights of the most marginalised.
We also need to name something else. Operation Dudula isn't just some organic grassroots uprising. It is deeply influenced by the thinking and structure of colonialism. It upholds borders that were drawn by colonial powers—borders that split families and communities and turned African neighbours into strangers. It promotes a nationalism rooted not in Pan-African unity but in division and exclusion. And if we're honest, the language and tactics being used carry disturbing echoes of fascism—of movements in history that mobilised poor people's pain to justify violence against scapegoated groups.
So no, we may not have always had the word “xenophobia” in indigenous African languages. But we've known the pain and lived the trauma.
Let's not be distracted by whether or not we have the perfect word. Let's ask whether there is harm. And if there is, let's name it and deal with it.
Cde Nigel Branken is a South African social worker, pastor, and activist with a long history of community organising and public advocacy. He is also a member of the SACP
M Pieterse ‘Anatomy of a Crisis: Structural Factors Contributing to the Collapse of Urban Municipal Governance in Emfuleni, South Africa' (2021) 32 Urban Forum 1.
Umsebenzi Online is an online voice of the South African working class
ISSUED BY THE SOUTH AFRICAN COMMUNIST PARTY | SACP
EST. 1921 AS THE COMMUNIST PARTY OF SOUTH AFRICA | CPSA
Mbulelo Mandlana, Head of Media, Communications and Information
+27(0) 76 316 9816
FOR MEDIA LIAISON & CIRCULATION SERVICES
Hlengiwe Nkonyane
Communications Officer:
Media Liaison, Social & Multi-Media Digital Platforms Co-ordinator
Mobile: +27 (0) 79 384 6550
OFFICE, WEBSITE, SOCIAL & MULTI-MEDIA DIGITAL PLATFORMS
Office: +27 (0) 11 339 3621/2
Website: www.sacp.org.za
Twitter: SACP1921
Facebook Page: South African Communist Party
