Monumental Disaster: Mbalula slams SACP’s plan to contest 2026 elections

ANC secretary-general, Fikile Mbalula, has launched a scathing attack on the SA Communist Party (SACP), calling its decision to contest the 2026 local government elections outside of the ANC-led alliance a “monumental disaster” and a threat to the unity of the liberation movement.

Speaking to journalists on the sidelines of the ANC’s visit to the family of the late Dikgang Uhuru Moiloa, Mbalula described the SACP’s resolution to go it alone as not only ideologically flawed.

But also politically dangerous, warning that it would fracture the historic tripartite alliance between the ANC, SACP, and COSATU — a bedrock of South Africa’s democratic revolution.

“We have reflected at the theoretical level on the implications of this disastrous decision,” Mbalula said.

“It is clear to us that there is no ideological basis for the Communist Party to contest elections independently,” he said.

“This decision will weaken us. It will not strengthen us. It will not even advance socialism — it will derail the National Democratic Revolution (NDR).”

The SACP, which has long been considered the vanguard of the working class within the ANC-led alliance, resolved at its 2022 national congress to explore contesting elections directly.

In 2024, the party reaffirmed that it would indeed contest the 2026 local government elections, citing the need to deepen working-class power and provide a more direct socialist alternative to communities.

But Mbalula dismissed this rationale, accusing the SACP of abandoning its traditional role of infusing the ANC with ideological clarity and revolutionary discipline.

“The Communist Party to us, how we have understood it over the years, it has not been a Communist Party of numbers. Whether they get 70 votes elsewhere, the Communist Party to us has been a party as a vanguard working class.

“That function and operates with an acceptance of the ANC as a vanguard liberation movement.”

Mbalula warned that the move effectively collapsed the shared strategy and planning that once defined the alliance.

We will no longer share election strategies, we will no longer plan together. That era is over.

This decision has brought dual membership into question, Mbalula said, adding that the SACP cannot challenge the ANC and claim to be part of the revolutionary movement.

He further emphasised that the ANC is not prepared to be told how to respond.

Mbalula said they were engaging the matter but clarified that they did not support the decision.

Despite the fiery rebuke, Mbalula stopped short of announcing concrete consequences for SACP members holding dual membership.

“The ANC will examine that fully, (5:46) because now we can no longer share the same things we used to do.”

As the ANC braces for potentially its most fragmented electoral season yet, Mbalula’s message was clear: contesting power is no longer a matter of unity — it’s a battle for political survival.

kamogelo.moichela@iol.co.za

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