By Alex Mashilo

The Sunday Independent carried Sihle Zikalala`s attack on the SACP entitled "The SACP cannot dictate to the ANC" (23 July 2017). This response was submitted to the Sunday Independent immediately thereafter to allow its readers access to a fair debate based on both sides of the story rather than a one-sided view. The editor Steve Motale might not have liked the need to facilitate a balanced debate. He carried yet another attack on the SACP, with the Party General Secretary Cde Dr Blade Nzimande the entry target. The attack by Carl Niehaus entitled "Hypocritical attitudes won`t be allowed to prevail" carried by the Sunday Independent (30 July 2017) further isolated a number of ANC leaders, for example David Makhura and Paul Mashatile of Gauteng Province. It is unbelievable that the biasness, which appears to be embedded in factionalism, occurred by default rather than by design.

Just last week a political analyst Elvis Masoga publicly stated that he received an email from Motale effectively blacklisting him. This draconian measure was not denied. One may or may not always agree with Masoga`s views or those of any other political analyst, but taking such an apartheid-style banning of a political analyst is against both the letter and spirit of the freedoms of expression and media that our liberation struggle fought for. Facilitating a fair and balanced dialogue is always the best, and let the people judge which ideas are based on factionalism or any other arbitrary ground and which ideas are based on facts and science...More

Why was your CV broadcast to the Guptas?

Response to Justice Piitso`s "Demonstrating the origins of economic oppression"

By Isaac Luthuli

The New Age published Justice Piitso`s "Demonstrating the origins of economic oppression" (25 July 2017), which was essentially an attack directed at our SACP General Secretary Cde Dr Blade Nzimande. This response to Piitso was submitted to The New Age, but the newspaper did not carry it since then. This is not surprising. The New Age is part of the ideological apparatus of the Guptas. It is increasingly the voice of an anti-SACP sentiment and distortions.

From the onset Piitso should learn to separate a personal vendetta from a political posture. The decision some years ago in the past to dissolve an SACP Limpopo Provincial Executive Committee in which he served was not Nzimande`s decision. It was a decision of the SACP. Hence he is wrong to attribute the dissolution to Nzimande as a person. And that dissolution was correct. In fact Piitso`s liberal individual behaviour reinforces the correctness of that decision.

Piitso`s persistence on Nzimande being a former Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) member defies logic, particularly after so many comrades with good history and sharp memory in our movement have written so many articles and made interviews disputing such baseless allegations. At no stage did the IFP ever claim Nzimande was its member either. On the contrary, the IFP leader rejected any association or agreement on any ideological ground with Nzimande.  But Piitso, his discredited sources and his ilk still do not get it. A long standing stalwart of our struggle Cde Michael Sutcliff expressed disgust at such casting of aspersions directed at Nzimade`s participation in the struggle. Sutcliff`s article was ironically published by The New Age on 3 August 2015...More

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