COPE TO SPLIT INTO TWO?

I’m often saddened by news regarding the Congress of the People or COPE. Saddened not by what is happening because I expected it, but saddened because over 1.3 million people effectively wasted their votes on COPE a year-and-a-half ago. And most of them are surely feeling that way. Five years is a long time to wait to rectify a mistake. Before the elections I warned that we must all vote as best as we can, and not waste our votes. It turns out COPE supporters wasted their votes.

What are things looking like at COPEworld these days? There seems to be a lot of action. Court decisions have effectively cemented party president Mosiuoa “Terror” Lekota in his position, and cast aside his main challenger Mbazima Sam Shilowa. Until the rest of the week COPE has no elected leader, but this will have been rectified by next Monday. Hopefully.

I’ve always wondered how the party’s leaders, smart people no doubt, ever let a situation like this manifest itself. What situation you may ask? Well, the situation where you all come together, sing songs, spit at your former comrades, get together with other opposition parties, form something and not elect a leadership. This should have been the first thing on the agenda. Perhaps, since these leaders had split from the ruling ANC in protest of a) the election of Jabob Zuma as ANC president b) the deposition of Thabo Mbeki as country President, they did not want to be seen to be jockeying for positions in such a new movement.

Politics is all about position and anyone who denies/ tries to run from this is just plain delusional. Remember at the time popular belief, even from myself, was that these two gents and their leadership followers were only interested in keeping themselves in some kind of power pedestal, even if they knew their party would never overtake the ANC and the DA at first attempt. Therefore to avoid this crucial act within their midst was a grave mistake which has led us to what is happening today.

Ironically just as COPE was formed out of disgruntlement with changes in the ANC back in 2007, a new party could come out of COPE itself. Should either Shilowa or Lekota lose, it is highly possible one of them will be “persuaded” to break away and form something else. I don’t see either gent returning to the ANC regardless of calls by some ANC members for them to do so. I think we do need a viable, black opposition party to challenge the ANC, keep it accountable and eventually take it head on. None of the existing organisations can claim to even come close to that ideal.