South African Communist Party  

Statement of the SACP Politburo

Saturday, 28 June 2025: - The South African Communist Party (SACP) held its Politburo meeting on Friday, June 27, 2025, in Johannesburg at Moses Kotane House. The Politburo discussed and took decisions to take forward the work of the National Congress, the special National Congress and the last Central Committee meeting.

International Situation 

The Politburo reviewed the significant developments in the international political landscape, particularly the intensification of military conflict in the Middle East. The ongoing attacks on Iran serve as a manifestation of this persistent imperialist advance to further encroach upon the region, while simultaneously suppressing the potential of Iran to assert its independence as a sovereign state with a distinctly anti-imperialist orientation that is deeply rooted in its own national identity and sovereignty.  

The Communist Party recognises the current war in Iran and the ongoing occupation of Palestine, which is accompanied by remarkable violence, as the highest expression of the actions of the United States of America in the Middle East. These events are viewed as a representation of the American and Israeli agendas to achieve their objectives through violence and war. The geopolitical power dynamics in the Middle East region are also being exploited and engineered to bolster their imperial interests and ensure the sustainability of the Zionist Israel project as a satellite state of Western Imperialism.  

The assertions by Israel and the United States that these attacks are connected to the alleged nuclear power capabilities of Iran have been repeatedly debunked and effectively dismissed in the recent past by competent and relevant institutions and experts. No novel evidence has been presented to support any contrary information. To that extent, the attacks on Iran are unprovoked, unjustified and blatantly illegal and are aimed as a political punishment towards Iran for their autonomy and non-compliance with Israel’s regional political agenda and its imperialist policies and ambitions. As the South African Communist Party, we pledge our solidarity with the people of Iran and people of Palestine and call on the international community to rebuke and act against these illegal activities of the USA and Israel.  

Sudan war 

The Politburo acknowledged the ongoing war in Sudan and its severity. The

Communist Party is deeply concerned about the escalation of the war, which has surpassed the Palestine war in deaths, with 150,000 fatalities. As the Communist Party we believe that it is time to build a solidarity movement among the people of global south and Africa to prevent the worsening of the war, which could lead to a genocide. 

The South African Communist Party offers its solidarity to the Sudanese people and commits to working with various social forces in the country and continent to find a solution for Sudan. 

70^th Anniversary of the Freedom Charter  

The Politburo recognised the 70th anniversary of the People’s Congress in 1955 and its adoption of the Freedom Charter as one of most important events in the political history of South Africa. The Politburo recognised the profound and indeed foundational role that was played by Communist cadres and leaders in the organisation of the Congress of the People, the compilation of the people’s demands that constituted the content of the Freedom Charter and the final authorship of the Charter itself. The Freedom Charter however, at the present time, stands as an unfulfilled promise and a betrayed vision whose radical and transcendent aims have been undermined by a policy perspective and state policy aligned to conservative and liberal principles which has given us results of an unchanged economic ownership, continued land ownership patterns that excludes workers, increased unemployment, stagnant wages as well as stagnant economy, a weakening state unable to intervene in the economy and an education system that is unable to respond to national developmental needs, among other challenges. 

This inability and indeed unpreparedness of the leadership of the liberation movement to fulfil the objectives of the freedom charter as their leadership responsibility, occurs alongside the proliferation of a national monopolistic economy whose structure and functioning stands as a stumbling block to prevent and water down thoroughgoing economic transformation. This presents a crisis for us as Communists. At the heart of this crisis lies neoliberal economics as an organising principle that hinders transformation. As the South African Communist Party, we steadfastly maintain our opposition to neoliberal economic policies that disproportionately favour affluent corporations and influential entities of the bourgeoisie at the expense of the working class and impoverished segments of society. This approach fervently contradicts the vision of the freedom charter.  

National Treasury World Bank loan  

The Politburo noted and discussed the June World Bank loan sought and received by the National Treasury. The SACP denounces the National Treasury’s decision, announced on 9 June 2025, to contract a new US$1.5 billion (approximately R28 billion) foreign-currency loan from the World Bank. This decision deepens our country’s subordination to imperialist-controlled global finance capital, reinforcing a neo-colonial debt regime that erodes national sovereignty, undermines democratic development and threatens the interests of the working class. The Politburo is concerned about the fact that money from this loan will not be used by the state for developmental objectives under its management and control and in the public interest, but that this money will be made available to fund private sector companies in the energy sector. On the one hand, this is the state acting directly to prop up economic interests of private capital while on the other hand actively disarming its own apparatus of capabilities needed to act in service of the people. This classical neoliberal approach amounts to a new form of capture of the state by economic interests of monopoly capital. 

National Dialogue

The Politburo discussed the impending national dialogue as announced by the President of the Republic. The SACP believes that the new process of the national dialogue as announced waters down its initial intent and limits the potential scope as originally conceived. The SACP is concerned that the changing of the former President Thabo Mbeki as the leading figure in the national dialogue preparations risks putting the process in jeopardy in as far as credibility and legitimacy is concerned given the amount of work done in his presence together with other earlier contributors to the process. The SACP believes that the national dialogue must take on a popular format rather than an engagement of the elite and that the dialogue must involve the key constituencies that are key to building a national consensus on the key matters of development and transformation. To that end, the SACP will embark on its own mobilisation of the working class to play a critical role in the national dialogue processes. Part of this said mobilisation will be the SACPs convening in the “Conference of The Left” in September this year. The Conference of The Left intends to organise all left forces to chart a way forward for national development. The Communist Party calls for left organisations to participate in the Conference in the interests of defending national democracy and our national transformation project.  

People’s Red Caravan  

The Politburo received and deliberated on a report of the People’s Red Caravan event in Motlhabe village in the North West province. The Politburo received the positive feedback that shows that our campaign to reconnect with our communities as a measure to mobilise the working class towards self-reliance has started to a great aplomb. The People’s Red Caravan programme is our programme to activate the capabilities of our communities to build self-reliance, community solidarity, fight hunger and poverty while building local economies. The Red Communist Caravan will next be stationed in Matibidi in Mpumalanga province where we will be stationed for a full week working with the communities to build sustainable development managed by, and beneficial to, the said communities. We call on the communities to join us in our effort to build socialism from the ground up; to build socialism, community by community.

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ISSUED BY THE SOUTH AFRICAN COMMUNIST PARTY,
FOUNDED IN 1921 AS THE COMMUNIST PARTY OF SOUTH AFRICA.