The ANC Youth League conference will be an opportunity for it to revive itself ahead of the elections next year.
This is the view of analysts before the start of the long-awaited youth league conference at Nasrec on Friday.
Professor Bheki Mngomezulu of the Nelson Mandela University and Professor Dirk Kotzé from Unisa said for years the ANCYL had not been functioning.
However, they said that the conference will not be about policy matters, but an attempt to build the ANCYL.
Collen Maine was the last elected president of the youth league in 2015. He quit the position a few years later.
The ANCYL has not had an elected leader since the last conference.
Kotzé said the conference was almost a founding conference of the youth league.
“It is almost a type of a founding conference. It won’t be about policy matters, but an organisational conference,” said Kotzé.
He said in the past, ANCYL leaders have been co-opted into government to keep them quiet.
“They were co-opted into the government to keep them quiet so that they are not a critical voice.
“It's the same with the ANC Women’s League. They are a little voice,” he said.
The other problem was that members of the youth league become part of the factions in the ANC.
Kotzé said the youth league no longer resonates with the issues affecting the youth.
But this was not unique to the ANCYL, as other parties are struggling to attract the youth.
Mngomezulu said the youth league has lost a sense of direction after many years in limbo.
He also said the league had lost its place because it got involved in factional battles of the ANC.
But the conference, which starts on Friday and ends on Tuesday, was an opportunity for the ANCYL to rebuild itself.
“The ANCYL has lost a sense of direction because their priorities are wrong as they are co-opted by the ANC. They are also used in factional battles. For any party to have a future, it must have a strong youth league. It is important for the ANCYL to regroup because we are going into elections next year,” said Mngomezulu.
He said the conference this weekend will be used to regroup ahead of the elections.
In the last ANC conferences, in 2017 and 2022, the ANCYL was not well represented because it did not have a leadership that had been elected in a conference.
siyabonga.mkhwanazi@inl.co.za
Politics