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If s
ocial transformation is to succeed in South Africa, it cannot
allow itself to be a prisoner to "neo-liberal market ideology",
President Thabo Mbeki said yesterday.
In his weekly newsletter, published on the African National
Congress' website, the president said calls within the country and
on the continent to oppose this ideology were "practical and
rational".
A defining feature of South Africa was it had two economies, one
belonging to the developed world, and the other to the
underdeveloped.
"This second economy includes millions of people who are
poor.
These are ordinary working people whose problems cannot be solved
by reliance on 'the market'," he said.
These were people who did not have the skills required by a modern
economy and society.
"They do not generate large enough savings to make a significant
impact on the rate of investment".
The critically important task to end the poverty and
underdevelopment - in which millions of Africans were trapped,
inside and outside the country - could not be accomplished by the
market.
"If we were to follow the prescriptions of neo-liberal market
ideology, we would abandon the masses of our people to permanent
poverty and underdevelopment.
"This would be a betrayal of everything for which the masses of our
people have engaged in struggle for nine decades, under the
leadership of the ANC".
Referring to the recent 22nd congress of the Socialist
International, held in Sao Paolo, Brazil, he said its call for
progressive forces to oppose neo-liberal market ideology was, "for
us in South Africa and Africa, not a matter merely of
ideology".
"It is a practical and rational response to what we have to do to
achieve the goals of the national democratic revolution, the
objectives being pursued by the African Union directly and through
the New Partnership for Africa's Development.
"We have a responsibility to engage all progressive forces in our
country, in Africa and the rest of the world, to come together in
the global coalition for which the SI called".
This coalition had to confront what the SI called "the unacceptable
cost of globalisation".
"We cannot but be part of the global coalition that must work to
create the global society in which the people will govern the
process of globalisation," Mbeki said. – Sapa.
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