By: Kenneth Moeng Mokgatlhe
Next year is the 80th anniversary of the ANC Youth League (ANCYL), and in anticipation of this milestone, the youth wing of the ANC would do well to elect Cebolenkosi Khumalo.
A former student representative council leader at Wits University, Khumalo is best remembered for the innovative ways he went about addressing inadequate funding for needy students. Unlike those who came before him, he and his peers did not resort to burning the property of the university or clashing with law enforcement agencies. Khumalo’s passionate belief in education saw him raising more than R12 million to help those who could not afford to study at Wits, to do so.
The ANCYL was formed 79 years ago, mainly by students and graduates from Fort Hare University, among them Muziwakhe Lembede, Mangaliso Sobukwe and Solomzi Mda. They later became prominent leaders in politics, business and elsewhere. Above all, they were educated, which made it easier to comprehend the problems and solutions of their constituency.
The need to form a league of this nature was to energise the ANC, which was becoming passive and silent, and push it in a more militant direction. The young leaders were able to put pressure on the mother body to accelerate the Struggle against colonialism and apartheid. When he was the youth wing’s secretary, Mangaliso Sobukwe penned a programme of action that sought to recast the Struggle in the radical terms of self-determination and fast-tracking the restoration and return of dispossessed land.
Like Sobukwe’s generation, Khumalo will help revive the ANCYL to its former glory and, together with his peers, place the necessary pressure on the ANC. The youth league does not need leaders who will be in a cosy relationship with the ANC; it needs to act as the tough-talking lobby group that it had been. The reason why many of us remember Julius Malema is because of his boldness in putting pressure on the ANC, regarding the economic policies of the party. Something of that spirit is needed if the ANCYL of today is to become an effective agent for change.
We are not so fortunate as to easily identify anyone from the interim structures of the youth wing who is suitable to be a leader. Rather, we are seeing a group of up-and-coming young leaders who are hungry to be deployed into powerful government positions, without any other purpose. They do not have the aspirations of young South Africans in either their hearts or heads.
Having thoroughly scrutinised all those who have ambitions to lead the ANC’s youth wing, I am convinced that Cebolenkosi Khumalo is the right man to help restore the former militancy and relevance of the ANCYL. He has demonstrated a deep commitment to student advocacy and social transformation in recent years, and his ability to bring about innovative ways to help solve problems is just what the ANCYL needs. He is credible and if given the chance, would help extend the culture of accountability within the parent organisation.
It is surely time for the youth within the ANC to do something good, for themselves and for this country, by electing an appropriate person able to restore some credibility in their party. This does not, however, mean yielding to the temptation to vote for loose cannons who will end up being the puppets of their senior leaders. Although the ANCYL is the component structure of the ANC, it does not get to be told what to say or do by the ANC. Its leaders should do and say what its constituency, the youth, want it to do and say, so long as it is within the ambit of the party’s constitution.
We have seen, in all political parties across the country, that candidates who get voted into office are not always the best we have, with those who win against others often being those who have deep pockets, enabling them to buy their way into political offices. It is time we change that by voting for credible and suitable leaders who will be able to bring about the solutions we need in our country.
The ANCYL may be the best bet for us as we continue to experience the deterioration of the state. While opposition parties and the media have been trying to stop the ANC from collapsing the country, it makes sense to have a stronger ANCYL that would not be singing for its supper to its senior leaders.
A stronger ANCYL would help produce quality, ethical leadership of Cebolenkosi Khumalo’s calibre. Whatever their decisions in a few days, the youth in the ANC should remember that whoever they elect as their preferred candidate will have serious implications in next year’s elections in which they could either lose power or have a chance to start to turn things around. It is up to them.
*Mokgatlhe is a freelance reporter and thought leader based in the North West province. He possesses BA Honours (political science) from the University of Limpopo and studying towards teaching, in third year with Unisa.
The Star