SA Communist Party (SACP) members holding public office on the ticket of their alliance partner, the ANC, should not be hounded out of office because of their choice to contest the upcoming municipal elections outside the ANC.
These party members should, instead, be judged by their capabilities in the positions they occupy, and not because they had opted to desert the ANC and for the first time contest state power under the banner of their own party.
This was said by ANC provincial chair and premier Oscar Mabuyane while addressing the SACP's Red October national launch held in Great Kei at the weekend.
Mabuyane also hinted at possible post-election co-operation between these longtime allies, which will go separate ways in the November 4 municipal elections for the first time in their history,.
Many SACP party members hold dual membership of the two parties.
Giving the ANC's message of support during the launch attended by SACP provincial and national leaders, including secretary-general Solly Mapaila, Mabuyane said the "fragmentation of progressive forces, at precisely the moment when conservative and reactionary forces are reorganising themselves, would carry profound historical consequences".
"I think as the ANC we should not hound SACP members out of positions they occupy across the state merely because the SACP has decided to contest elections independently, as some are also members of the ANC in the own right," he said.
"It would also be misrepresentation of the historical character of the alliance.
"People occupying positions of public responsibility must be assessed according to their competence, integrity, performance and commitment to the transformation of society.
"We must resist transforming contradictions among allies into antagonisms among enemies."
He urged for political discipline between members of the two alliance partners ahead of elections, saying this was because the two parties would need each other, even after the elections.
Mabuyane added that both parties must not let their first electoral contest destroy their longstanding relationship.
"Yes, between now and November 4, the ANC and SACP will compete for votes in particular communities.
"There will be political differences. There will be criticism. There will probably be moments of tension.
"But comrades must exercise political discipline, exercise restraint and avoid deepened contradictions as we will need each other soon.
"We must never allow electoral competition to degenerate into political hostility that destroys relationships built through generations of struggle.
"We have buried comrades together. We went to prison together. We went into exile together.
"We organised underground together. We fought apartheid together, and we constructed the democratic state together.
"An election must therefore not suddenly persuade us that we have become historical enemies."
After the November 4 elections, Mabuyane said the two parties should have a serious political conversation.
"That conversation cannot merely concern positions. It cannot simply become, who becomes mayor, speaker, chief whip or who receives which portfolio," he said.
"That would reduce revolutionary politics to the arithmetic of office.
"Where electoral outcomes create circumstances in which progressive forces can co-operate in exercising municipal state power, we must first ask whether there is a programme around which we can govern together, what do we intend to do with state power, and how do we rebuild municipalities, and how do we ensure that local government becomes genuinely developmental."
Addressing the gathering, Mapaila warned members against corruption, saying a council seat was not a career ladder.
He said elected SACP councillors should rather be servants of the people they represent.
"Corruption steals directly from the working class," Mapaila said.
"A contractor is paid, but the road remains broken. Money is allocated, but the clinic is unfinished.
"Consultants are paid while public technical capacity disappears.
"Tender corruption takes water from taps, electricity from homes, books from libraries and work from the unemployed.
"We demand maximum transparency, community monitoring, protection of whistleblowers, consequence management and recovery of stolen public funds and assets.
"Every rand must be traceable. Chris Hani warned of the danger that 'the liberators emerge as elitists' and use the resources of the country to gather riches.
"That warning must live inside the Communist Party itself. A red T-shirt is not immunity from corruption.
"A party card is not a licence to tender. A council seat is not a career ladder.
"A communist councillor must be a servant, organiser and fighter of the people.
"Public representatives must remain subject to democratic accountability, including recall.
"We are not fighting to replace one political elite with another. We are fighting to shift power towards organised working people."
A party that cannot criticise itself, Mapaila said, becomes bureaucratic.
"A party that cannot learn becomes ritualistic. A party that loses contact with workers and communities loses its revolutionary purpose.
"Our 105-year history gives us pride, but history does not give us immunity from error.
"The future of the SACP will be secured by ideological clarity, disciplined organisation, ethical conduct, rootedness among the people and the courage to act."
Daily Dispatch