Before I deal with this lack of understanding of who or what animal the ANC is, I first want to address the issue of what a state agency is.

Eskom is a state agency, which operates for limited (sustaining) profit as a business. Its shareholders are the people of South Africa, via the state, represented by the government as elected by the people. Policy orientation for Eskom is that of the shareholder; day-to-day management is passed onto civil servants who act and operate in semi civil service due to the law under which they operate.

The shareholder appoints top decision makers of Eskom, and operational management is appointed in the normal course of business by responsible divisional structures.

Eskom has made the Afrikaner community extremely wealthy, and they have used this wealth to diversify into retail, banking and other sectors.

Coal is a serious money-maker. During the beginning of mining sector transformation, black business paid little interest and was blinded against coal. Most aspirant miners focused on diamonds and metals. As BEE deals occurred in the gold and platinum sector, white business was ring-fencing coal and establishing strong links with Eskom. By the time the commodity boom faded, blacks realised that coal was money, but it was too late. Multi-nationals have secured more coal interests, with just three black companies of note coming up on coal.

Eskom is a major direct employer, and a major indirect employer. Eskom is also a life maker; a quality of life and civilisation barometer. To South Africa, Eskom is an equality measurement.

Lately much has been written about whether there was 34 percent or 50 percent population coverage of supply by Eskom before 1994. The debate is centred on whether President Zuma and his Cabinet have solid data or not. What is interesting in this debate is the unsaid – was Apartheid bad or good? – and if bad, how bad; 34 or 50 percent? Ludicrous. Apartheid statistics were terribly unreliable and generally political. They were political for a number of reasons, including international propaganda on Apartheid, and unreliable for thumb-sucking extrapolations from Bantustan information.

It always puzzles me when many start quoting numbers pre-Apartheid authoritatively, be they unemployment figures or HIV infections. The Apartheid government had better numbers on people who uttered Mandela’s name than social progress statistics.

Why would the ANC arrange a march to voice dissatisfaction against (the ANC’s) Eskom’s handling of the new metering system? In fact, why would blacks march and have all these service delivery strikes and immediately vote the same ANC back to office the very next morning?

The ANC is complex. The ANC itself is a living organism. It’s a being with or without individuals. The so-called broad church comprises of social, societal, communal and political structure of the people. These structures have learnt to organise themselves well, and the best organiser wins the debate; the majority rallies around the winning viewpoint.

Eskom is made up of the same people. Their sons and daughters work at Eskom.

We have past witnessed the ANC Gauteng Province protesting against e-tolls, against SANRAL. One might say SANRAL and the ANC are one and the same, by virtue of SANRAL’s status as a state agency; are they not driving ANC policy? Cosatu is still very much against e-tolls, et cetera.

I find the narrative of the ANC marching against itself weak, lazy and intellectually corrupt. What is needed is an analysis of what the ANC is and how this is manifest in the body politik of South African society. The richness and complexity of this could develop into a body of knowledge; stand-alone higher education political science study for future generations to understand and learn something of the uniqueness of the anthropology and social study of blacks in South Africa. The ANC’s electoral successes re-rooted in the collectivism theory – Ubuntu. Of course, this sharply shuns the DA’s doctrine of individualism. Ubuntu and individualism do not meet, although Mmusi Maimane may try to make the connection.

Here is the rub: it’s not the ANC marching against the ANC, but the ANC marching against a particular set of grievances – defined grievances.

The criticism we are hearing now is the same noise you hear when a Cosatu-affiliated union marches against the government for better wages. It confuses people. The same occurs when ANCWL marches to police stations against gender violence. The ANCYL marched to the JSE and ended in Union Buildings, where the ANC government sits. Still, pundits refuse to get it. They rather write scornful words or claim stupity on the part of the marchers. But the truth is far from it. These are complex thinkers.

Ideologically the complex thought is: Eskom (or the municipality) has a bureaucracy within it, which makes decisions that the marches are against. As such, the march is by the people against the bureaucratic machinery, and not their beloved ANC, for the ANC is a part of themselves, and they did not take the bureaucratic decision; or such a decision is not in keeping with the ANC DNA. The marches or protests are never against the ANC, but rather the decision of the bureaucracy. A march against the ANC will be seen the day the ANC, the real ANC, marches to Luthuli House, and not Eskom or Telkom or Tshwane Municipality.

Mass mobilisation of communities instilled a sharp sense of the ANC DNA amongst the majority of the people. It is second nature for communities to know immediately, even before announcement, what the ANC’s attitude on a particular issue will be. This makes people like Julius Malema very competitive, as he is well versed in how the ANC feels, thinks and channels. He is thus able to say things that will be totally opposed by the ANC to differentiate himself.

If this eludes you, you will scratch your head as election after election, people flirt with giving the ANC a two-thirds majority.

As they say inside the ANC, “Individuals come and go, the ANC stays.” DM