New workers’ party could shake up elections

It is interesting that, on the eve of the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall – which presaged the end of the world’s biggest Communist system, the Soviet Union – we on the southern tip of Africa are still dabbling in the politics of socialism (effectively the polite term for Communism).

Even more interesting is the fact that the noise about socialism is not coming from the ANC, which has always been a socialist-leaning organisation.

The Freedom Charter, about which much lip service is paid by ANC cadres, is actually, on face value, a Communist manifesto.

Yet, in present-day South Africa, where politics is a sure-fire way to great wealth, the country is still very much a free market, albeit it is really one of undisciplined, “cowboy capitalism”.

At the bottom of the social pyramid, where life has not really changed much for millions of South Africans since the end of apartheid in 1994, there is definitely some appeal in a system which promises a better life… because capitalism hasn’t been that system for them.

So, we see many political opportunists – from the ANC to the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) – spouting the quasi-socialist rhetoric of Gucci revolutionaries. Even in the face of ample evidence of the collapse of socialist systems – such as that in the classic failed state, Venezuela – they still want to follow that road.

The emergence of the Socialist Revolutionary Workers’ Party (SRWP) should, however, not be cynically dismissed. Many workers in this country feel betrayed by the ANC and its alliance partner, Cosatu, whom they believed have “sold out” the struggle for socialism.

So, the party could become a powerful political home for workers and a worry for both the ANC and the EFF at next year’s polls.

And a blast from the ideological past might just enliven our bitter, race-based politics.

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