Nxesi delivers SACP’s message to ANC at 113th birthday bash: ‘Our ally is the ANC, not the DA’

11 Jan 2025

The ongoing fallout from the decision by the SACP to contest the 2026 municipal elections alone reached the stage of the ANC’s 113th birthday bash, with the SACP’s Thulas Nxesi claiming what was needed was ‘cool heads’ for upcoming discussions between the two-thirds of the Tripartite Alliance.

‘We are all going to vote for the African National Congress (ANC),” said Richard Mkhungo, the president of the South African National Civics Organisation (Sanco), as he gave a message at the ANC’s 113th birthday celebration on Saturday.

But not everyone present at the Mandela Park Stadium in Khayelitsha felt the same way.

As parties look towards the upcoming 2026 local elections, the ANC’s Tripartite Alliance faces a dilemma: one key member, the South African Communist Party (SACP), has announced it intends to contest elections on its own.

At the birthday bash on Saturday, Sanco and the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) made it clear that they are falling into line: they would vote for the ANC in 2026.

Read more: Green and gold in the Mother City: ANC’s birthday rally highlights inequality and 2026 hopes

Read more: Ramaphosa, Robben Island visit dominate cake-cutting ceremony to celebrate ANC’s 113th anniversary

Sanco has representation in the national executive, with Mkhungo serving as a deputy minister for Defence and Military Veterans and treasurer Judith Nemadzinga-Tshabalala serving as a deputy minister for Employment and Labour.

Mkhungo said Sanco would start mobilising “for the victory of the ANC, come local government elections. We are all going to vote for the African National Congress, no doubt about that.”

He added: “We are very happy with the programme of the ANC.”

Cosatu president Zingiswa Losi, meanwhile, gave a ringing endorsement of the ANC, stating: “We want to say to the NEC of the ANC: Treat well the people of South Africa … Get closer to the people who have nothing so that next year, in 2026, you can be able to win local government elections.”

‘Cool heads’ - Thulas Nxesi

There was notably more ambivalence on the side of the SACP.

When it came time for the SACP to speak, deputy national chair Thulas Nxesi called for a moment of “cool heads” as the two parties prepared for talks around the SACP’s decision to contest elections on its own.

Daily Maverick has reported that during the special congress of the SACP held in December 2024, the party confirmed its decision - with ANC deputy president Paul Mashatile stating that the bonds between the parties cannot be broken.

Starting off, Nxesi said the country’s democratic breakthrough in April 1994 “cannot be told without recognising the ANC’s outstanding leadership. The SACP acknowledges the ANC’s leadership in achieving massive social progress in the field of education, housing, water and sanitation, electrification, health, social security, and gender equity which has happened since 1994.”

Nxesi affirmed the SACP’s affiliation to the ANC, saying: “We, the SACP, remain in the alliance and committed to strengthening the alliance.”

But he made it clear that this allegiance does not extend to the other parties in the Government of National Unity (GNU), about which the SACP has been outspoken in criticism.

“Our ally is the ANC, not the DA,” Nxesi told the stadium.

Speaking on the decision to contest the elections, Nxesi presented it as the inevitable outcome of the ANC’s failure to hear the SACP’s concerns over the years.

“A strong alliance needs reconfiguration, which has not materialised despite our efforts over 17 years to achieve it through the engagement, even when we had reached an agreement as the four alliance partners on this topic,” said Nxesi.

He stressed that the election contestation was “the SACP’s decision” and “not a [SACP general secretary Solly] Mapaila decision”.

Mapaila was not present at the ANC’s celebrations as he is currently in Venezuela.

Nxesi said the party looked forward to talks on the election matter with the ANC in the upcoming weeks.

He said the SACP believed the ANC’s response to the debate “will not be dismissive and insulting. We need cool heads and deep discussions.”

The date for the meeting has not yet publicly been revealed. DM

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‘Cool heads’ - Thulas Nxesi