South Africa inherited a “corrupt and a wrong value system”, which it was currently managing, ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe said on Friday.
“… What we inherited actually corrupted us and therefore we are actually managing a corrupt system and a wrong value system.
“… The new order [after 1994] … inherited a well-entrenched value system that placed individual acquisition of wealth at the very centre of the value system of our society as a whole,” he said, delivering the inaugural Violet Seboni memorial lecture at the Johannesburg City Hall.
Quoting former president Thabo Mbeki, Mantashe said: “Within the context of the development of capitalism in our country, individual acquisition and material wealth produced through oppression and exploitation of the black majority became the defining social value in the organisation of white society.”
This was historic he said.
“Now, because the white minority was the dominant social force in our country, it entrenched in our society as a whole, including among the oppressed, the deep-seated understanding that personal wealth constituted the only true measure of individual and social success.”
Societal values had shifted from “revolutionary morality to material ownership”.
The country needed reminding that life was not about “being in business”, he said.
“Youth must be informed about participation in academia, in politics, in trade unions, in NGOs and other structures and sectors that serve society if we dream of saving our society.
“Serving our people, not monetary accrual, is the definition of success.”
Mantashe told the hall, packed with Congress of South African Trade Union (Cosatu) members, that “prudence, modesty and hard work” should be the image projected by role models in society.
Similar stance
His stance against materialism was similar to that of Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi, who said “crass materialism” was endangering the ruling party.
Seboni was second deputy president of Cosatu and she died in a car crash in April 2009 on her way to campaign for the ANC.
Mantashe turned to the Freedom Charter, saying it should be upheld in its entirety.
“Any revolutionary may have reservations about particular clauses, but a cadre of the movement remains an upholder of the Freedom Charter in its entirety.
“We don’t say I don’t like this clause.”
A clause in the Freedom Charter is at the centre of the current debate on nationalisation of the mines, which both the ANC Youth League and Cosatu are pushing for.
The clause says mineral wealth beneath the surface of the soil would “revert to the ownership of the people”.
Mantashe said some may not agree with this, but those in the movement were upholders of the Freedom Charter as a whole, not only sections that are suitable to them.
Caution
Echoing the ANC in Gauteng, Mantashe cautioned against the apparent “rise of the right wing”.
He charged that the right wing was becoming more “confident and willing to take chances”.
The ANC in Gauteng said this was evidenced in organisations like AfriForum using the courts to reverse progress.
“It is our responsibility to pay attention to that issue because, where I am seated, I think that is the most clear and glaring challenge facing our movement today, as we sit here,” Mantashe said.
He said the right wing had used ANCYL president Julius Malema as a “trigger” to push its own agenda.
“All comrades must actually move out of that space so that the true intentions of the right wing can be discovered,” he said.
Brandishing the “Vierkleur” and apartheid-era flags should not be dismissed as a “small issue”.
“It is an express defiance of progress and the intention to reverse progress … their intention is going to be exposed without any scapegoat from ourselves.”
He urged unity going forward, saying it was important to build a strong alliance and that members had an “obligation and duty” to do so.
This followed months of bickering between the ruling tripartite alliance and a heated bilateral meeting between the ANC and Cosatu. — Sapa