MALAIKA MAHLATSI | How the mighty secretary-general position in the ANC has fallen

In 1912, when the South African National Native Congress (SANNC) that would later become the ANC was formed, its secretary-general (SG) was acclaimed intellectual and journalist Sol Plaatje, a man whose works we still revert to across many academic disciplines.

Since then the party has elected 16 SGs. Individuals who have held the position include James Calata, Walter Sisulu, Oliver Tambo, Duma Nokwe, Alfred Nzo, Cyril Ramaphosa, Kgalema Motlanthe and Gwede Mantashe.

Calata is one of the most impactful theologians of our time, the first black canon in the Anglican Church of Southern Africa, and a man who used his home as an underground library and who dedicated years of his life to raising funds for education bursaries for black youth.

Nokwe was the first black barrister to be admitted to the Transvaal supreme court and played a crucial role in strengthening international alliances for the anti-apartheid cause.

Tambo carried the ANC during the worst of times, as did Nzo, the longest-serving SG of the party and the first black health inspector in South Africa. He contributed significantly to our understanding of the social determinants of health, helping to shape global understanding of public health policy.

The Vrede Estina Dairy project scandal, for example, was not simply about money being funnelled to the Gupta family. It was, at its core, an assault on the lives of black people because its intention was to empower and support local black farmers

Ramaphosa was a prominent leader in the labour movement, having been the founding general secretary of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM). In 1987 he led 300,000 black miners in a historic three-week wage strike that shook the mining sector and challenged the apartheid economic machine. It was the largest mining strike in the country at the time.

I provide this brief background to illustrate the calibre of people who have been entrusted with the SG position in the ANC. For most of the organisation’s history, that office was highly respected and occupied by some of the finest intellectuals of our time.

The past decade has seen a complete departure from this, with individuals elected to the position being of seriously questionable character and, even more so, questionable intellectual capacity.

The race to the bottom no doubt began in 2017 with the election of Ace Magashule, who had previously served as the premier of the Free State. His leadership was characterised by a centralised system of provincial state capture, with some of the most notorious cases of state capture coming from the province.

These include the Vrede Estina Dairy project and the asbestos roof audit scandal. Where former SGs of the ANC were deeply invested in the well-being of black people and pioneered knowledge in areas such as law, public health, journalism, diplomacy and others, Magashule was invested in disenfranchising black communities.

The Vrede Estina Dairy project scandal, for example, was not simply about money being funnelled to the Gupta family. It was, at its core, an assault on the lives of black people because its intention was to empower and support local black farmers.

‘Abrasive’, ‘populist’, ‘ill-mannered’, ‘divisive’ and ‘philistine’ are some of the adjectives that describe [Mbalula]. It’s hard to imagine he sits on a chair once occupied by Plaatje, Nokwe, Sisulu and Tambo

The graft pertaining to asbestos roofs was not only about Edwin Sodi pocketing millions for work not done. It was, at its core, about putting the lives of millions of black people on the line. Inhaling microscopic asbestos fibres causes severe, long-term damage to the lungs and surrounding organ linings, leading to chronic scarring and aggressive cancers.

The roofs are literally killing black people. Magashule was suspended in 2021 and officially expelled from the party in 2023. He was succeeded by Fikile Mbalula, the face and epitome of rule-by-noise politics that have come to define the ANC.

Mbalula has been plagued by scandals since his days in government — from a public protector report that revealed that part of his family vacation to Dubai was funded by a service provider in his own ministry to the Nasrec grabber procurement plot that was allegedly intended to spy on rival political factions.

As SG of the ANC, he has been at the centre of the rot that is simmering in the party and now faces a backlash for the candidate list administrative catastrophe that will undoubtedly shape its local government elections outcome. But it’s not this that defines the collapse of the SG position; it is the character of Mbalula.

“Abrasive”, “populist”, “ill-mannered”, “divisive” and “philistine” are some of the adjectives that describe him. It’s hard to imagine he sits on a chair once occupied by Plaatje, Nokwe, Sisulu and Tambo.