The deepening rift within South Africa’s ruling alliance took centre stage this weekend, as the South African Communist Party (SACP) used its platform at the African National Congress’s 114th anniversary celebrations to publicly defend its decision to contest the upcoming local government elections alone.
The historic partners, bound together in the Tripartite Alliance for decades, are now poised for an unprecedented electoral clash. The SACP’s Deputy General Secretary, Madala Masuku, delivered a message of support at the ANC’s January 8 event in Rustenburg but followed it with a firm justification for the split. He stated the party is contesting independently to “help the state deal with the issues of property relations and economic transformation.”
In a subsequent television interview, SACP General Secretary Solly Mapaila provided a detailed and pointed explanation, revealing the decision was taken by the SACP’s Congress in 2022 and formally communicated to ANC leadership last year. He described a lengthy, ultimately fruitless process of negotiation.
“We backed the ANC several years, several months… we put an option we called flexible option which would have allowed some joint work,” Mapaila said. “They rejected it and in their rejection they were then saying we must also reject our own Congress resolution… which was not possible.”
Mapaila framed the split as a fundamental ideological divergence, accusing the ANC of adopting a “neoliberal program” crafted by foreign interests—a reference to a Harvard University policy framework—without consulting its alliance partners. He argued this shift has created an “existential threat” not just to the ANC, but to the broader National Democratic Revolution (NDR) project.
“The government now is following the neoliberal program,” Mapaila asserted. “ANC’s literally in the last congress also adopted this kind of a framework… So the existential threat comes on the basis.”
The move sets the stage for complex practical and political consequences. Mapaila confirmed the SACP had already instructed its members who are also ANC members to recuse themselves from ANC electoral structures to avoid conflict, a directive he says was taken independently in May 2023. This pre-empts recent ANC signals that SACP members would be excluded from its election machinery.
When pressed on whether the SACP’s strategy was to ultimately realign with the ANC post-election to keep it in power, Mapaila drew a sharp distinction. He stated the goal was to rescue the NDR, not necessarily the ANC in its current form.
“Your theory is not farfetched… but it’s not for the ANC,” he said. “We seek to rectify the direction of the national democratic revolution.”
Mapaila also dismissed concerns about his recent absence from key ANC events, including the party’s National General Council in December and the January 8 celebrations, calling it a deliberate delegation of duties to other senior officials like Masuku. He denied it was due to security threats, though he acknowledged, “My life has been under threat for some time. Everybody knows that.”
The interview concluded with Mapaila expressing “unflinching solidarity” with Venezuela, condemning the United States’ actions there and the reported abduction of President Nicolás Maduro. He hailed Venezuela’s socialist model as “the most significant, intertwined, ingrained and strongest socialist base you can ever find.”
The SACP’s firm stance signals a turbulent period ahead for the ANC, which faces the prospect of fighting a local election while managing a historic fracture with a key ally on its left flank.