Unmasked- Why the ANC Failed to Govern

• A first- hand account of what has gone wrong within the ANC by one of its own • Very well researched book and the author bases his arguments on actual ANC documents some of which have not been used in the past. • Written in a very accessible manner which increase its market. In a contemplative yet hard-hitting book, Khulu Mbatha reflects on the failure of the the ANC, in its 22 years of governing South Africa, to honour the principles and values of the Freedom Charter and to come to terms with the Charter’s precepts for running the economy. The negotiations at Codesa, and the compromises the ANC had to make, set the scene. Yet things did not turn out as expected. Mbatha asks: Were the expectations and hopes vested in the ANC un- realistic? What has given rise to such widespread feelings of disappointment? How do we account for this failure to deliver long-lasting, meaningful and tangible results? With a series of penetrating questions Mbatha probes the motives of the ANC. How prepared was this liberation movement to become a democratic government? Did the ANC understand the economy and how to manage it? Did the speed of the transition wrong-foot the ANC? Is there still a role for the Tripartite Alliance? He muses about the course of events before and since the transition to democracy that should have told us then, and certainly tells us now, where the ANC is going so terribly wrong. Throughout the text, aptly-chosen observations from the main players – from the ANC itself and from its detractors – point to the thinking behind the decisions (or lack of decisions), about the economy in particular, that have brought South Africa to where it is today.