This Month
This month we remember an outstanding freedom fighter and lodestar of our revolution, President Oliver Reginald Tambo; a man whose contribution towards the entrenching of human rights cannot be erased from South Africa’s fabric of liberation.
President OR Tambo was the most distinguished cadre of our movement; head and shoulder above any other leader of the ANC, and unequaled in history. He remains the greatest embodiment of the values and character of the African National Congress.
In remembrance of President Oliver Tambo, the ANC Regional Treasurer, Comrade Mpho Moerane, reminds us that as OR always warned us, whatever and however daunting our internal challenges may be, they can never be above those of the people; even as the renewal process might prove to be difficult, we must not lose hope but stay the course.
Phapano Phasha reflects on ethos President OR embodied; the ethos of selflessness and commitment to the principles and value system necessary for the advancement of the democratic revolution and unity of the ANC; core values which were also personified in the passion that OR Tambo had in ‘education for liberation’ and the youth as custodians of the future necessary for the victory of the democratic revolution.
Further, Comrade Phapano argues that It is under the ANC of Oliver Tambo that we have produced a dual economic and education system with extremely opposing results which “socialises the elite of the next generation” whilst on another hand producing a populace which cannot do for itself but characterised by a culture of entitlement and rendered redundant and dependent on RDP houses and social grants.
The ANC Regional Deputy Secretary, Comrade Loyiso Masuku, cautions against reminiscing about OR Tambo, and puts us to the task to awaken our conscience in remembrance of Oliver Tambo; to say to ourselves, I joined the ANC to make a contribution to the full liberation of our people, to continue with the struggle to create an equal and free society for all.
ANC REC Member, Comrade Chris Vondo, speaks of Local Government as a site of the cumulative effect of transformation choosing the people and humanity as praxis.
He argues that deconstructing a social system means all the divergent actors need to act in unison through cumulative effect in transforming society. Further, that the ANC should frown upon anything to the contrary of cumulative effect. He cements that no local leadership should be allowed to put their ambitions for personal legacy above that of the cumulative effect of ANC strategy.
To this end, we feature Zonal Leadership under “Know Your Leaders” and Ward Cllr Candidates of the ANC from the five (5) wards partaking in By-Elections across Johannesburg, who are tasked by the ANC to defend the gains of democracy in their respective Wards.
The task of reclaiming hegemony in society remains mammoth. Communicating the work done by the ANC in the Government of Local Unity in a quest to counter misinformation propelled by the media remains our foremost task, too.
To borrow from President OR Tambo, on the occasion of comrade Joe Gqabi’s funeral, who left a record in our struggle surpassed by few, he asserts; “The future is bright. The end is glorious; it is peaceful. But the intervening period is dark, bitter, and finds its glory in the act of struggle.”
Malibongwe