Ronnie Kasril loves the ANC, he told a crowd in the Grahamstown City Hall on Thursday 1 May, but stuck to his guns about not voting for the party, warning that people are losing trust in voting and parliamentary democracy.
Ronnie Kasril loves the ANC, he told a crowd in the Grahamstown City Hall on Thursday 1 May, but stuck to his guns about not voting for the party, warning that people are losing trust in voting and parliamentary democracy.
The former Intelligence Minister spoke at a debate organised by Grahamstown NGO, Masifunde Education and Development Project Trust, Kasrils hit back at ANC leaders who had called him names after he led a campaign urging citizens to spoil their ballots.
He would not be out there encouraging people to spoil their vote if he thought the ANC was in danger of losing the election, he told the crowd.
"I love the ANC and our communist party. I'm not bitter or disgruntled because I lost a seat in Polokwane. I'm 76. I don't need a political home."
"We are just trying to encourage them tactically. Not for their whole voting life," Kasril said in an exclusive interview after the debate.
A 77-year-old man at the meeting had asked Kasrils why he encouraged people who had been denied the right to vote to waste their votes all over again.
"The happiest moment of my life was my vote in 1994," said Kasrils. "So you know, for someone like him who is totally disenfranchised it's quite a difficult concept."
Referring to the 'Vote No' campaign, Sidikiwe!, Kasrils said, "We are people who are very involved in social movements. And those of us who know the grass roots were shocked to hear that people were saying they were not even bothering to go and vote".
The struggle veteran made it clear that they are not political agents who are trying to get people to vote for one party or another.
The figures bore this out, he said.
Kasrils said the so-called born-frees – younger people they had spoken to – were fed up. This was how the name Sidikiwe! emerged.
He said they just wanted to find a way to make the ANC realise how angry they were.
"We know the spoilt ballot is a limited way of protest. It's done in many countries in the world," he said.
"In the last election of 2009 there were 230 000 spoilt papers and not all of them were people who did not understand how to vote."
In the last provincial election the number of spoiled votes rocketed to around 600 000, he claimed, indicating that it was a choice rather than a mistake.
This increase "sends a message not just to the ANC, but all the other parties, that people are losing trust in voting and parliamentary democracy."
This was a very serious development in a democratic society, he said.
Kasrils praised other leaders for their role in the country's democratic system, including Congress of the People leader Mosiuoa Lekota.
He acknowledged that the party had fizzled over the years, but said, "Lekota does get up in Parliament and make some serious speeches."
Of UDM leader Bantu Holomisa, he said, "I would say he was unfairly expelled by Mandela for exposing Stella Sigcau at the TRC. You can see how Madiba brought him back close to his family, so I have a sympathy for that man. I think there is something very good about him."
Kasrils criticised ANC leaders for calling him names, saying, "They take back all these people who went and joined Cope. It's very contradictory to then turn on Sidikiwe! and say we are foreign agents."
