The SACP’s decision to contest elections under its own name presents political observers with a paradox that captures much of what has gone wrong with revolutionary politics in the post-apartheid era. Here is a party that claims to represent the working class, and invokes the legacy of Joe Slovo and the revolutionary martyrs of the struggle against white minority rule. And yet, after three decades of such rhetoric, the material conditions of the South African working class have deteriorated catastrophically. Unemployment stands at record levels. Poverty has become the defining experience of millions. The economy remains structured to extract wealth from the many for the benefit of a few. And the SACP, throughout all of this, has been a consistent supporter of the very government policies that produced these outcomes.
The SACP’s current electoral gambit, contesting elections under its own banner while maintaining its alliance commitments to the ruling ANC, does not represent a departure from this pattern. It is a continuation of the same duplicitous politics that have characterised the party since 1994. The language of “working-class independence” and “deepening democracy” serves not as a genuine challenge to the bourgeois nationalist order but as ideological cover for capitalist exploitation under the guise of revolutionary politics.
This article seeks to expose the fundamental contradiction at the heart of the SACP’s political project: the gap between its revolutionary rhetoric and its accommodationist practice. It argues that the SACP’s has continued to adhere to the National Democratic Revolution (NDR) theory and maintain alliance commitments to a party that has comprehensively betrayed working-class interests. Implementing neoliberal economics, while maintaining a rhetorical commitment to socialism does not constitute a coherent revolutionary strategy. It is a deliberate deception.
The Joe Slovo memorial: rhetoric versus reality
At the Joe Slovo Memorial commemoration, General Secretary Solly Mapaile’s speech showcased the party’s characteristic ability to deploy the language of revolutionary socialism while avoiding concrete commitment to socialist transformation. The theme was “Building People’s Power, Self-Reliance and a People’s Economy”, and it was presented as a strategic vision, supposedly representing a genuine alternative to monopoly capital.
According to Mapaile, building people’s power means “deepening democracy beyond the formal act of voting” through “organised communities, strong trade unions, active SACP branches and socially conscious youth and women’s movements.” These are stirring phrases, but they serve not as strategic objectives but as rhetorical devices justifying an indefinitely prolonged transition that never delivers on its promises.
The SACP’s conception of a “people’s economy” includes “democratic public ownership, worker and community control, expansion of socially useful public employment, township and rural industrialisation, co-operatives in agriculture and retail, and socialised systems of transport, water and energy.” But the SACP has spent thirty years talking about these things without taking any concrete action to achieve them, while defending ANC government policies that are the precise opposite of everything the party claims to stand for.
The most revealing aspect of this rhetoric is the SACP’s claim to reject “austerity, privatisation and corruption in all its forms.” This is particularly rich from a party that has remained participants in successive ANC/SACP governments that have implemented precisely the austerity measures and privatisation programmes that have devastated the South African working class.
The National Democratic Revolution: theory as ideological alibi
The NDR theory has served as the SACP’s primary ideological justification for its continued support of a bourgeois nationalist government long after the primary objectives of that theory had been achieved. Conceived by the Communist International as an intermediate stage between bourgeois democracy and people’s democracy, the NDR’s specific objective was to end white minority rule. This mission was achieved in 1994 when Nelson Mandela was inaugurated as President.
For any revolutionary organisation with a genuine commitment to socialist transformation, this should have marked the moment of transition to the People’s Democratic Revolution — the next stage that would carry forward the unfinished tasks of land reform and economic transformation. But the SACP has shown no interest in making this transition. Instead, it has clung to the NDR framework as if it were permanent rather than transitional, perpetually promising socialist transformation while preventing it from occurring.
The term “deepening democracy” has been central to this strategy of indefinite postponement. According to the SACP’s logic, the formal act of voting and the existence of a Black government are insufficient; true democracy must be “deepened” through organised communities and strong trade unions. The party has spent 30 years calling for “deeper” democracy while workers’ material conditions have deteriorated, all without articulating a mechanism for transitioning beyond the NDR stage to genuine socialist revolution.
The NDR framework provides ideological cover for the SACP’s accommodation with bourgeois nationalism. By insisting that South Africa remains in the NDR stage, the party justifies its continued support for an ANC government that has comprehensively betrayed working-class interests.
The united front strategy: betrayal of Marxist principles
The SACP’s tactical alliance with the ANC was originally conceived within the framework of the Comintern’s United Front policy. The 1928 Black Republic Thesis provided theoretical justification it, directing the SACP to form a United Front with other organisations of the oppressed. This was correct and necessary for achieving the limited objective of establishing a Black republic.
However, the united front has always been tactical rather than strategic. Once limited objectives have been achieved, the revolutionary party must break from its temporary allies and pursue its own programme independently. What the tactic does not justify is the indefinite subordination of the revolutionary party to a bourgeois nationalist formation.
The continued participation of the SACP in the alliance goes against the basic principles laid down by Marx and Engels in The Communist Manifesto:
In what relation do the Communists stand to the proletarians as a whole? The Communists do not form a separate party opposed to the other working-class parties. They have no interests separate and apart from those of the proletariat as a whole. They do not set up any sectarian principles of their own, by which to shape and mould the proletarian movement.
This principle is of fundamental importance. Rather than subordinating itself to one wing of the liberation movement, the ANC, Cosatu, and the SACP must be independent and lead the proletariat as a whole, including workers organised in Saftu, Nactu, and other independent formations. The SACP’s continuation of the alliance long after the primary objective had been achieved represents a fundamental betrayal of revolutionary principles. The party has become a left-wing ornament on a fundamentally right-wing government, providing the ANC with revolutionary credibility while ensuring that no genuinely socialist policies are ever implemented.
The party’s claim that its independent electoral participation represents “working-class political independence within a principled Alliance” is linguistic sleight of hand. The SACP cannot claim working-class independence while maintaining commitment to an alliance that has systematically implemented anti-working-class policies.
The Red October campaign: deception of socialist rhetoric
The SACP’s Red October campaigns and repeated declarations of commitment to building socialism constitute perhaps the most egregious example of its deceptive political practices. These campaigns create the impression of a party actively working toward socialist transformation, while simultaneously endorsing policies that are the antithesis of socialist economics.
By invoking the Red October tradition, the SACP positions itself as the inheritor of a revolutionary legacy that overthrew capitalism and established a society based on workers’ control. The message is clear: this is a party serious about socialism.
But the SACP’s socialist rhetoric is not matched by socialist practice. While the party speaks of social ownership and workers’ control, it has defended ANC government policies that have deepened privatisation, expanded the role of the market, and created conditions devastating for the working class. The disconnect is not an accident; it is the deliberate strategy of a party that has abandoned revolutionary politics for political accommodation.
In his Address of the Central Committee to the Communist League, Marx articulated a principle striking at the heart of the SACP’s current trajectory:
While the democratic petty bourgeois want to bring the revolution to an end as quickly as possible, it is our interest and our task to make the revolution permanent until all the more or less propertied classes have been driven from their ruling positions, until the proletariat has conquered state power.
This passage contains a fundamental truth that the SACP has utterly abandoned. The party’s continued participation in the bourgeois nationalist government and its endless deferral of socialist transformation represent precisely the kind of “bringing the revolution to an end” that Marx warned against. The SACP has accepted the limited achievements of 1994 as the final destination, rather than as a staging post on the road to working-class power.
The election gambit: continuity under a new banner
The SACP’s decision to contest elections under its own banner does not represent a departure from this pattern of deception. The election banner may now read “SACP” rather than “ANC,” but the programme remains firmly within the framework of capitalism.
The SACP’s election platform does not challenge the fundamental structures of capitalist exploitation. It does not call for the abolition of private property in the means of production. It does not demand workers’ control of production. Instead, the party puts forward a programme of reforms entirely compatible with the continued functioning of a capitalist economy. This is not independence from capitalism; it is the management of capitalism under a different banner.
The SACP’s claim that independent electoral participation is necessary for “defending working-class interests” is misleading. Working-class interests cannot be defended through the ballot box alone, and certainly not through participation in a bourgeois electoral process structured to reproduce capitalist relations of production. The defence of working-class interests requires building independent working-class organisations outside and against the state, developing working-class consciousness and political independence, and constructing a revolutionary movement capable of overthrowing the capitalist order.
The SACP’s electoral strategy serves not to defend working-class interests but to channel working-class political energy into safe channels that do not threaten the fundamental interests of capital.
The need for a People’s Democratic Revolution
What the South African working class needs is a genuine commitment to the People’s Democratic Revolution, the next and necessary stage following the completion of the National Democratic Revolution.
The outstanding objectives of land reform and economic transformation cannot be achieved within the framework of the NDR, which was designed to create the conditions for capitalist development rather than socialist transformation. These objectives require a fundamental break with capitalism, not reforms within the capitalist system.
The People’s Democratic Revolution must be based on a complete break with bourgeois nationalism and the construction of independent working-class political power. It must involve the socialisation of the major means of production and the establishment of workers’ control over the economy. It must include the radical transformation of property relations through land reform and the democratisation of economic decision-making. And it must be driven by the independent organisation and political mobilisation of the working class.
The SACP’s continued adherence to the NDR framework, its maintenance of alliance commitments to the ANC, and its rhetorical commitment to socialism while implementing capitalist policies represent a fundamental obstacle to these objectives.
Beyond revolutionary theatre
The SACP’s election gambit must be understood as part of a broader pattern of political deception since 1994. Here is an organisation that speaks the language of revolution while implementing the policies of reaction, that claims to represent the working class while defending a government that has devastated working-class communities. This is not revolutionary politics; it is counter-revolutionary politics dressed in revolutionary clothing.
As Marx and Engels made clear in The Communist Manifesto, Communists must not form a separate party opposed to other working-class parties. The SACP’s subordination to the ANC and Cosatu, to the exclusion of other components of the working-class movement, and its neglect of workers in Saftu, Nactu, and other independent formations constitute a fundamental violation of this principle.
And as Marx articulated in his Address to the Communist League, the task of revolutionaries is to make the revolution permanent until the proletariat has conquered state power. The SACP’s acceptance of the 1994 settlement as the final achievement, its participation in governments that have defended capitalist relations of production and implemented a fundamentally neoliberal strategy, and its endless deferral of socialist transformation represent a complete abandonment of this revolutionary perspective.
The SACP’s current trajectory serves the interests of the bourgeois nationalist elite and perpetuates the suffering of the working class. Workers continue to face unemployment, poverty, inadequate housing, and failing public services. The SACP claims to represent these workers while defending a government that implements the very policies creating their misery. This is not merely political failure; it is political treachery.
True liberation will come not from the SACP’s electoral theatre but from the independent organisation and struggle of the working class. Until that struggle begins in earnest, the revolution will remain deferred and the suffering will continue.
Vuyisile Oliphant ka Maki is a retired civil servant and former Secretary General of the Port Elizabeth Black Civic Organisation in the 1980s.
Author’s Note: This article was developed with the assistance of an AI writing tool for drafting and editing purposes. The political analysis, arguments, and conclusions presented reflect the author’s own perspectives and positions on the SACP’s political trajectory and the need for genuine working-class revolutionary politics in South Africa.
