In 2008, researcher Dr Dale McKinley wrote in the Mediations journal that the SACP and Cosatu’s choice to be part of a dominant ANC alliance following the end of apartheid, “effectively paralysed [their] ability to organise and mobilise on a genuinely practical, pro-working class and pro-poor political basis, where their programmes and critiques are actually put to the test in real struggles happening on the ground and in the arena of democratic contestation for power”.

This weekend, the SACP, joined by Cosatu and 12 other organisations, including Azapo, the EFF, MK Party, trade unions and civil society groups, met in Boksburg to rebuild working-class power and establish a permanent Council of the Left.

The main aim of the council would be to facilitate an anti-GNU campaign, which the left views as abandoning the working class in favour of neoliberal economic interests.

In this week’s Friday Briefing, analyst Ebrahim Fakir argued that while the conference offered a largely sound diagnosis of the country’s compounding crises, its credibility was hollowed out by the presence of the very architects of state failure, and a refusal to engage in honest political reckoning that any serious and durable left project demanded. Read that analysis here.

In his submission, News24 politics reporter Norman Masingwini writes that the true test will be whether this coalition can translate its momentum into grassroots ward-level organisation ahead of the November 2026 local government elections, posing a genuine electoral threat to the GNU where it is weakest. Click here to read the submission.

The SACP’s Solly Mapaila weighs in on the purpose of the conference. He details how the Council of the Left will co-ordinate the participating organisations and what its mandate will be. Read Mapiala’s views here.

We end this week’s Friday Briefing with a Q&A with the IEC’s Sy Mamabolo. He addresses the trust and credibility threats the IEC is facing with the 2026 local government elections just five months away. Read the interview here.