Adios to the NNP!

Adios to the NNP!

• The Musekiwa I knew

• We must be soldiers of revolution

THE history of the country of my refuge took a very important turn during the past week, at least from a political point of view.

While the world was busy watching the non-event that the UN World Summit meeting was, a key chapter of the South African political history was being written off. This happened during the last week of the political parties floor crossing process at the nation’s Parliament in Cape Town.

In terms of the South African political system, each individual Member of Parliament has a right to change political parties during the window period. As such during the past two weeks, some of them used that opportunity to cross the floor and joined other political parties in terms of the political law.
As it so happens in politics, some parties emerged weaker whilst others benefited from the process and derived strength from it. On the face of it, it seems the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) suffered the worst losses. On the other hand, the African National Congress (ANC) appears to have emerged as by far the biggest winner from the entire floor crossing process.

However to all practical purposes and intents, it is fair to suggest that both the IFP and the ANC did not hog the largest share of the limelight associated with the whole drama. Apparently, it seems the spotlight eventually fell on the demise of the New National Party. (NNP) it so happened that this past week, the very last of the NNP MPs also decided that it was time he also jumped off the sinking ship and crossed over to the ANC. The net effect of that was to leave the NNP without a single representative in the national legislature.

As one of the Sunday papers reported in its editorial, for the first time since 1915, the NNP will not have any single representation in the South African national Parliament. In fact all that will be left of the anachronistic party will be its 80 forlorn and ineffective local government councilors scattered all over the country. Fortunately, this will not be for a long time. The bell will also toll louder for them as soon as the dates of the next local government elections are announced. There after it is likely that the NNP will be completely eradicated from the country’s political landscape once and for all.

"The day is coming when Zanu-PF will have no representative in any of the nation’s structures of governance"

DANIEL MOLOKELE

For the uninitiated, it is trite to give a more profound elucidation on the critical nature of the implications of this development. The NNP has been by far the most influential and most dominant political party in the entire modern political history of South Africa. This in fact is the party that gave the world of politics the notorious concept of apartheid. This was in essence a very sophisticated political system that thrived on the basis of racial discrimination and segregation. In its simplest forms, it simply meant the political domination of the Afrikaner people as a white race of the black indigenous majorities of the country.

These latest development come against the backdrop of the recent resolution of most of the party’s hierarchy to dissolve the party and assimilate it to the ANC. As such, it is now quite safe that the NNP has now been confined to the archive files of South African political history.

The demise of the NNP will surely be a source of comfort and solace to many Zimbabweans now based in South Africa. Many are likely to draw inspiration from the fact that the party was once viewed as so invincible to such an extent that it could have assumed some immortality status. The party’s overwhelming dominance of South Africa was more than evident especially after the 1948 national elections when it stormed to political power.

The party’s powerful grip on South Africa’s destiny was to last for about four more decades. During the period from 1948 to 1990, the party asserted itself so much that it invaded every aspect of South African life. It was so much of a powerful movement that it delayed the independence of South Africa for all those decades. It also showed its gargantuan muscles by introducing the apartheid racist system at a time when the USA was giving in to reforms as demanded by the black civil rights movement.

While the world was taking notice of Dr Martin Luther King, the apartheid regime was busy ignoring his positive influence on the dignity of the black race. On the other hand the regime was celebrating the rise of such racist leaders as Hendrik Verwoerd, John Vorster and Pieter W. Botha. The regime was so strong in its racist aspirations that it took the whole world to launch an aggressive anti-apartheid campaign for it to open up the political space in 1990 when Frederick de Klerk took over.

But today as I write, the party has been proven by time to be an accident of history. In spite of its glory, it has now collapsed to infamy and ignominy. Many South Africans woke up today to the reality of its total collapse and mortality. Whichever way one may look at it, the great party that introduced apartheid to the world is no more at last.

Many South African based pro-democracy activists should thus derive confidence from the fall of the NNP and hope that sooner than later, an equally diabolical party will follow suite. By that I mean Zanu-PF. Many should now hope and trust that Zanu will also suffer the same fate as the NNP and be relegated to the confines of Zimbabwean political history. Many will now be encouraged that just like the NNP; Zanu-PF will also come to a very welcome end one day.

So let us keep on knocking because it is in essence, a matter of time. The day is coming when Zanu-PF will have no representative in any of the nation’s structures of governance. The day is coming when the great party that was a terror to millions of Zimbabweans, a party that had a ‘life or death’ influence on the nation, will become no more. Indeed, all evil and tyrannical regimes like Zanu-PF must come to an end one day.

In the mean time, let us join the rest of the South African people in proudly saying ‘adios’ to the NNP! May its wicked political soul not rest in peace!
CONTACT DANIEL: danielmolokela@yahoo.com
Daniel Molokele is a human rights lawyer based in Johannesburg. He has been elected as the Interim Chairperson of the Zimbabwe CSO Forum (South African chapter) National Committee. His column appears here every Monday
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