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Cape Town — The ANC Youth League has made some astonishing predictions in a discussion document that states that the ANC could one day lose power and be reduced to an opposition party. According to the Sunday Independent, the document released last week, ahead of its national congress next month, the league asks whether the party will “govern for eternity”.

In answer to its question, the league states . . . “we do not know”.
It asks itself that should the ANC lose power, what do we (the ANC) re-perceive as its role in post-apartheid SA and subsequently that of the ANCYL.
It goes on to ask: “Will the loss of political power be merely a result of the growing disapproval of our mismanagement of public trust or will it also translate into the rejection of our transformative and developmental ideology”.

In January however, President Jacob Zuma said during a campaign rally that the ANC would rule “forever and ever”. The league however, does not appear to believe this and paints a number of possible scenarios that differ from the ANC’s belief.

Also in the document is the league’s wish to renew the call for nationalisation of mines and for the ANC to bring in internal electoral reforms such as giving every member of the organisation a right to elect and be elected, reports the newspaper.

Meanwhile, in May, the ANCYL issued a statement following the release of election results and made it clear that the ANC’s victory was clearly due to the role young people played.

The league said: “The ANC Youth League profoundly appreciates the role young people have played in determining the positive outcome of the 2014 National and Provincial Elections. We believe that it is through a massive youth vote that the ANC has been returned into power, thus signifying a brighter future for South Africa’s Liberation Movement, the disciplined force of the left — the African National Congress (ANC).

“The youth has once more showed that they are the defenders of the National Democratic Revolution and the apparent inheritors of a better South Africa being created.”

The league went on to say that as the organisation of young people in the ANC, it remains steadfast in its commitment to inject new life and progressive thought into the ANC.

“We shall continue to mobilise young people of South Africa behind the ANC’s vision of a creation of a non-sexist, non-racial, democratic and economically prosperous country, Africa and the world — where in all people have equal access to various opportunities.

It said that the future of South Africa was only safe in the hands of the ANC, “thus it remains our conviction that true economic emancipation of the masses of our people can only take place under a responsible and careful guide of the ANC.

“All other voices can propose short-cuts and populist views but can put the very fragile democratic gains under threat and can collapse the South African economy”. — News24