SACP snubs coalition with the DA and MK Party

The South African Communist Party General Secretary, Solly Mapaila, addressed the media on the outcomes of the May 2024 elections, with a focus on coalition arrangements. Picture: Itumeleng English/Independent Newspapers

The South African Communist Party General Secretary, Solly Mapaila, addressed the media on the outcomes of the May 2024 elections, with a focus on coalition arrangements. Picture: Itumeleng English/Independent Newspapers

Published Jun 6, 2024

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The South African Communist Party (SACP) General Secretary, Solly Mapaila, said the party was against the ANC seeking a coalition with the DA and MK Party.

Mapaila said this was to maintain strategic consistency.

“We have campaigned against the anti-worker, neoliberal and corrupt state capture networks.

“The core of the DA-led neoliberal forces, highly supported by dominant sections of capital, mainly the white bourgeoisie whose roots can be traced to the era of colonial and apartheid oppression of the Black majority, organised itself into the so-called Multi-Party Charter. This grouping also received support from Western foundations,” he said.

The vanguard of the working class further said the party was not in favour of its alliance partner going into a coalition arrangement with the MKP.

According to Mapaila, the MK Party’s origin can be associated with factionalism, the corruption of state capture and resistance to accountability, as outlined in the report of the Commission of Inquiry into State Capture and related Constitutional Court judgments.

“The MK Party ‘of Jacob Zuma’ is a counter-revolutionary party that has sought to destroy the liberation forces in this country, so it is important that we distinguish that there’s the MK Party and MK. I still have the right to belong to MK, the liberation army of the ANC and its allies that liberated this country.

“If the MK Party engaging with the ANC comes to the conclusion to support them in this framework, the ANC has the right to do so, but we have characterised them as a counter-revolutionary organisation” Mapaila emphasised.

The party’s spokesperson, Alex Mashilo, said the DA was anti-government progressive policies, adding that the party’s neoliberal economic restructuring was a disaster that sought to retrench workers in the mining and other sectors, including opposing the national minimum wage.

“The DA attacks on our collective bargaining framework and resistance to National Health Insurance, among others, has severely impacted the workers and impoverished populations of our country. These forces remain arrogant and anti-working class as evidenced in the DA’s reckless utterances.

“The votes and number of seats from the May 2024 national and provincial government elections offer coalition permutations, with the features of a developmental and transformation purpose-driven ANC-led government of national unity, excluding both the DA and the MKP.

“The SACP will actively pursue this to become the outcome of the ANC-headed alliance coalition engagement process – both within the alliance and publicly through campaigning and mobilisation of the working class.”

However, MK Party’s spokesperson, Nhlamulo Ndhlela, said it was disingenuous of Mapaila to characterise the MK Party as “counter-revolutionary”, while the SACP once contested the elections in Metsimaholo, Free State, against the ANC.

“In 2016, they went and contested the elections in Metsimaholo for local elections. Who called them names then? Who initiated disciplinary action against them? Why are they now wanting to use this angle ‘counter-revolutionary’?” asked Ndhlela.