GARETH VAN ONSELEN: 2017: The Year of Anything but OR Tambo
'Every day the ANC spits on Oliver Tambo; every day it mocks his legacy, in word and deed'
The ANC, which these days exudes the kind of perpetual contradictive sweat a paradox sauna would induce, is always two things at once. As it disintegrates, hypocrisy is a natural byproduct, and the party is fairly drenched in the stuff.
One of the things it is not, is anything remotely like the spirit of Oliver Tambo, who was many things but, of them all, an ever dignified and wholly considered man of conviction. Unlike Luthuli and Mandela, he never quite cracked the Nobel Peace Prize code but, had he ever won it, no one would have complained. He was an unassuming giant to whom SA owes a great deal.
So it makes sense that the ANC of today — a poisonous wreck of an institution — would choose 2017 to commemorate as The Year of OR Tambo. Because, when up is down and left is right, what better time to pretend you have something in common with an individual who would likely wretch at the sight of the grotesque contemporary aberration that is the ANC.And in this Twilight Zone it makes further sense still that the slogan the ANC should attach to the occasion is, Let Us Deepen Unity. Because when you literally have a sitting commission of inquiry into the extent to which your own members are cutting each other’s throats open, it’s a nice ironic touch to wrap the whole package up in nothing more than rhetorical garbage. How’s it going, this Year of OR Tambo? Let’s have a look-see. And let’s be generous too and exclude the omnishambles that is the ANC in government. In the spirit of Tambo, let’s focus exclusively on the condition of the party itself, his beloved ANC, and see how it is bu...
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