A MOVEMENT ADRIFT
Conference shows ANC unable to chart a way forward for itself or the country
The national policy conference offered the ANC an opportunity to redeem itself from accusations of state capture and bitter infighting. Instead, it showed a party at a loss to offer any kind of leadership
The ANC was hopeful that its national policy conference would provide the perfect platform to address some of the pressing issues that have led the party to the precarious state it is in. But the writing was on the wall almost from the start, as different provinces aligned their policy imperatives with the longer game of succession, which will be decided at the ANC’s elective conference in December. For the populace, the interest lay in what critical changes the party would make to its policies to lift the country from the rut it is in. However, the debates taking place behind closed doors at Johannesburg’s Nasrec Expo Centre offered little hope. Instead, they showed a party unable to chart a way forward for either itself or the country. The ANC went into the conference aware that it could be so hamstrung by internal squabbles that thorough conversation about policies and the party’s failure to implement them would be hijacked by rhetoric, as delegates pushed the line dictated by th...
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