BY GENEVIEVE QUINTAL JUNE 07 2016, 13:53
Deputy Public Works Minister Jeremy Cronin. Picture: TREVOR SAMSON,
ANC MPs with SACP membership will not allow the governing party to split on the issue of state capture by the politically connected Gupta family, Deputy Public Works Minister Jeremy Cronin said on Tuesday.
This followed a call by the DA for SACP members sitting on the ANC bench to "walk the talk" and vote with the opposition party, on a motion to have Parliament set up an ad hoc committee to investigate allegations of state capture.
Cronin, who is an ANC MP, is also the SACP's first deputy general secretary.
"First of all, the DA's call is not going to fly when it's directed at SACP members … because we are raising these issues out of concern for the ANC and for the ANC-led government and we are not doing it to grandstand in an opposition way, which we think is the DA's agenda," he said.
"They certainly are not going to split ANC MPs who happen to be SACP members from the ANC caucus."
Cronin said SACP members would work "loyally" within that caucus.
Last week the ANC announced that the probe into state capture by the office of its secretary general, Gwede Mantashe, had fallen flat after only eight people came forward and only one was prepared to give a written statement.
The politically connected Guptas are believed to have close ties with President Jacob Zuma and his family, along with other ANC heavyweights. There have been a number of allegations that the family was influencing the appointment of Cabinet members.
In a statement issued at the weekend, the SACP said it believed the ANC was "misguided" in shelving its investigation into the family's conduct "as if it were just a marginal issue".
The SACP is planning "mass action" against state capture, saying it will fight the practice both "legally and politically."
The party said it agreed that neither the ANC nor government was "corporately" captured in its entirety, but that the problem was widespread and could become endemic.
"It is also misguided to believe that raising this issue is a distraction from the ANC local election campaign," said the SACP.
Cronin said the SACP felt that the issue of what it called the corporate capture of the state, political formations and trade unions was important and a concerning issue and therefore the party supported any "genuine" efforts that aimed to get to the bottom of it.