The South African Communist Party in the Free State says despite limitations and challenges, the public health sector has contributed successfully in the country’s ongoing fight against the novel coronavirus (Covid-19).
The party said this relative success has practically invalidated the incorrect private sector led narrative about a collapsed public health case sector.
It further resolved that all its party structures must intensify practical activism in the health sector and strengthen links with community health workers and extend cooperation and assistance to health facilities from local clinics upward.
The party said this will include the Party linking with the National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union (Nehawu) and the Democratic Nursing Organisation of South Africa (Denosa) to coordinate efforts in defence of the frontline workers who serve communities, including joining the Nehawu planned action in defence of the exploited Community Health Workers.
This was part of the resolution of the party’s provincial leadership during the 12th Provincial Executive Committee ordinary plenary session of its 7th Provincial Congress.
The Provincial Executive Committee (PEC) welcomed the 2020 Red October Campaign pioneered by the SACP Central Committee.
The theme of this year’s Red October was Hunger Eradication, Health, Human Settlement and Water (HHH&W).
The Party said the thematic areas of the Red October campaigns were people-centred and ensured that the Party reconnects and vibrates primarily within working class and poor communities.
The PEC agreed that in the Free State province, the Red October must help catalyse and intensify campaigning and accordingly worked out campaign focus areas which include the following:
On Health
According the Party’s Provincial Secretary, Bheke Stofile, the PEC emphasised that the two-tier health system in the country remains responsible for the huge disparities in infrastructure and capacity existing between the public and private health sectors.
“The PEC reaffirmed the need to intensify campaigns for the introduction of the National Health Insurance (NHI) for universal quality healthcare coverage for all. Covid-19 has sharply revealed the urgent need for an integrated health care system that is adequately capacitated to serve society based on need rather than financial ability to pay,”he said.
On Human Settlements
The PEC noted that the Free State Department of Human Settlements has been paralysed by rampant corruption and maladministration that has victimised poor people and left them without shelter.
“The revelations at the Zondo Commission of Inquiry into Allegations of State Capture and the recent arrests of current and former senior political and administrative leadership of the department bears testimony to this reality,”said Stofile.
The SACP Free State PEC reaffirmed its support to law enforcement agencies in effecting arrests and calls for speedy prosecution, harsh sentences and immediate retrieval of lost public resources by all legal means from anyone found guilty.
“It is true that the Zondo Commission has not yet concluded its work, however the total silence of the leader of the Alliance in the province and inaction of the provincial integrity committee, even when law enforcement agencies effected arrests, are alarming and worrying,”added Stofile.
The PEC agreed that the Red October campaign for habitable human settlements must be integrated with the active campaigning against corruption in the province.
Stofile said in this regard, SACP Districts in the Free State will collate relevant information and initiate campaigns, working with communities, on various housing projects across the province that were left incomplete or are unjustifiably on hold.
This will include following up on evidence encountered during campaigning where houses were reportedly marked as built, completed and paid on government records whereas no structure exists physically on the ground.
On Hunger Eradication
The party acknowledged that the economic crisis in the country, made worse by the outbreak of Covid-19 and its associated lockdown restrictions, has deepened the crisis of poverty and hunger, primarily amongst working class and poor communities.
With many companies engaged in mass retrenchments, the socioeconomic distress is not expected to improve. In light of these, the PEC reiterated the Party’s Central Committee’s call for the social relief of distress grant to be extended and for government to move speedily to implement universal income grant for the poor.
The PEC agreed that at a micro-level, families and communities must be encouraged to engage in food gardening, including engaging Government to provide the necessary support.
The Party emphasised that the growing practice in the Free State of the conversion of productive land into private estates and golf facilities or game farming needs to be confronted because they also affect food security and food pricing.
On Water
“The crisis of provision of portable water has existed for a while in the Free State. The SACP led various campaigns, especially in Qwaqwa and Jaggersfontein for provision of sustainable quality drinking water.
“Whilst the rate of government response has been very slow, we have seen the government provide integrated temporary water supply 3 at lightning speed with the outbreak of Covid-19, demonstrating that there is capacity to deliver where spheres of government work collaboratively,”said Stofile.
The PEC agreed that most of the water supply challenges are associated with internal weaknesses within municipalities, particularly infrastructure decay.
It stressed that there appears to be an associated unwillingness to resolve the actual water supply challenges in favour of temporary tender-based water tankers.
The PEC agreed to intensify the community campaigns for sustainable piped supply of quality drinking water to all on taps, such as the ongoing campaign in Qwaqwa termed Metsi Pompong.
“Understanding the economics of water and exposing any possible corruption is an integral part of this water campaign. The PEC also noted that whereas areas such as Qwaqwa are struggling with water, a greater percentage of water supply to Gauteng includes water passing through Qwaqwa from Dams located within the Free State, such as Sterkfontein Dam.
“The PEC agreed that part of sustainably resolving water supply challenges to areas such as Qwaqwa must include tapping into the national infrastructure funds for purposes of building infrastructure to intercept water from available water resources, in the interest of equitable distribution,” said Stofile.
On Provincial Alliance Summit
The PEC welcomed the commitment of the Alliance and endorsed the work of the Alliance Secretariat to convene a Provincial Alliance Summit.
“This is an important organisational platform of the Alliance for democratic consensus-seeking consultation, decision making, collective leadership and accountability.
“The PEC adopted the framework worked out by the Alliance Secretariat, which is intended to place the interests of the people at the centre of the agenda of the summit.
“The SACP will submit several key issues to the summit and actively participate to shape an Allianceled programmatic response to the various issues, challenges and opportunities across the province,”said Stofile
