Is ANC "family feud" behind the delay in tabling the Cape Town Declaration?

Could an ANC "family feud" offer the key to the delay in bringing the "Cape Town Declaration" on Israel before the Parliamentary International Relations and Cooperation Portfolio Committee to Parliament?

Those in the know in the ACDP certainly think so, and so, too, does the DA!

The "Cape Town Declaration" which was presented on 6 February at an unprecedented ‘Solidarity Conference in support of the people of Palestine, Cuba and Western Sahara' (which took place under the auspices of the International Relations Portfolio Committee), once again found it's tabling for ratification being postponed at the eleventh hour last Wednesday, for the second week in a row.

And, once again, Committee members were only told at the last moment.

This second one-week postponement, to 5 March, makes it increasingly unlikely that the ‘Declaration' will make it through this parliamentary session, say pundits. Parliament's last sitting before closing shop for the 7 May elections will be on Friday 14 March. ACDP MP and member of the Portfolio Committee Cheryllyn Dudley, suspects that the document can won't be tabled in the current session of Parliament.

The "Cape Town Declaration" called on government to action 15 anti-Israel policies that the ANC as a party had agreed to over several years, but that the government were none too keen to implement, says Dudley, as bilateral trade between the two countries is in excess of R11-bil a year.

Among the thorny issues that the ANC as a party feels that the government is dragging its heels on are:

Parliament and government should acknowledge that Israel is guilty of Apartheid and refer it's decision to international bodies including the ICC, the UN and the AU;

Stop all financial transactions with Israeli ‘settlement' companies and banks and companies involved in the Israeli settlements;

Entrance into SA for Palestinians must be made easier;

Support the policies of US-based NGO Boycott, Divest and Sanction (BDS);

Apply complete military, financial and political sanctions against Israel and campaign for Israel to be suspended from the SWIFT banking network;

All SA political parties must clearly communicate their stance on the plight of the Palestinian people and make it timeously known in the build-up to 2014 elections; and

The SA Government and Parliament must table the above at the AU, UN and IPU.

Dudley said last week that her party understands that this is a "huge issue for the ANC." Government "understands the benefits," she says, of doing business with Israel. But the ANC as a political party had made promises to uphold BDS policies.

"We are sympathetic with them," said Dudley, "it's a huge issue for the ANC - but it's a family matter."
ACDP head Rev Kenneth Meshoe also reiterated this point last week - saying that he believed the delay in tabling the Cape Town Declaration was due government "looking to soften the wording." The ANC "is right to insist that government put their money where their mouth is," said Meshoe, but adds that "politicians know that you cannot practically do (what the party has promised)."

The "family matter' angle explains a lot

Dudley feels that the delay may have a lot to do with differences of opinion between the ANC as a party and the government. Government understands the benefits of any arrangement that allows a relationship between Israel and SA to continue, says Dudley, who had been told that this week's postponement of the tabling of the Declaration was due to the document requiring "further editing."
The Portfolio Committee was to have discussed the Declaration at its weekly meeting on 19 February, which was postponed at the last moment. Committee members were told that Committee chair Tisetso Magama (MP, ANC) was still finalising the wording and that matter would come before the Committee today (26 Feb). This morning, members were informed that there would be another week's delay (to 5 March) due to the wording not being finalised.

Joburg DA City Councillor Darren Bergman, who has been earmarked by the DA for a seat in Parliament, said he too felt that discourse between the ANC as a party on the one hand, and the government's pragmatic position on wanting to continue doing business with the country, explained a lot of the confusing positions the ruling party had taken on the Middle East. "If you are so driven to back something, why delay it for weeks?" asked Bergman referring to the "Cape Town Declaration" and the fact that it was held back from the Portfolio Committee twice in two weeks.

The DA originally took flack from local Jewry for not standing against the Declaration at the Conference. In an Op-ed on the Jewish Report website last week, Bergman wrote: "Our MP (Bill Eloff, DA) went rogue!" and said the DA's response to the "Cape Town Declaration" was slow in coming because the DA first had to conclude their investigations into what had gone wrong: "Basically put," Bergman wrote, "our MP went rogue," wrote the seasoned politician.

Opposition parties and religious groups, including passionate Christian Zionists, are being made into made into pawns by the ANC, wrote Bergman.

The SA Jewish Board of Deputies' executive director, Wendy Kahn, and president, Zev Krengel, had flown to Cape Town to meet with DA leader Helen Zille on Tuesday and attend the Portfolio Committee meeting on Wednesday. They did meet with Portfolio Committee chair Tisetso Magama, MP, ANC "to discuss our concerns regarding the `Cape Town Declaration' and we are very encouraged that the adoption of this document has been postponed," said Kahn afterwards. The SAJBD also held a "constructive meeting with DA Leader Helen Zille," said Kahn, who had assured them that the DA's policy on Israel/Palestine "remains firmly in support of a two state solution."

"Regrettably," wrote SAJBD chair Mary Kluk and SA Zionist Federation chair Avrom Krengel in a joint statement to the Sa Jewish AND Israeli community after the 6 February Conference, "this proved to be little more than a stage managed show trial, one in which Israel was as usual tried, condemned and sentenced in absentia."

It now seems that those who sought the condemnation may have trouble in their own backyard - and one wonders whether the idealist party members and the pragmatic governing members will be able to agree on the wording of a statement before this Wednesday's Portfolio Committee meeting when the Declaration is set to be tabled.

Meshoe, whose ACDP represents Christian Zionists and holds strong pro-Israeli views, says: "We are going to be vigilant and ensure that we will not be steamrolled nor will we keep quiet" on the matter of Israel.

Anthony Katz is the online editor for the SA Jewish Report

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