VANDERBIJLPARK – When it rains, it pours for the Pan-Africanist Congress of Azania (PAC).
While the party recently made headlines over claims of being sidelined by the governing party in Sedibeng, a far deeper turmoil for the soul of the organisation is now playing out on the national stage.
There seems to be a division, with each side claiming to be the only “true” PAC.
The move has left members divided and the organisation’s future uncertain ahead of the upcoming local government elections.
Since breaking away from the ANC decades ago, the PAC has seen its political influence steadily fade, a decline many attribute to these ongoing internal power struggles.
Speaking to Ster, Raymond Nkrumah Kgagudi, who identifies himself as the Secretary General of the “Revolutionary PAC,” said the split stems from ideological differences.
“There is one PAC, which is the true, authentic PAC of Sobukwe. We reject collaboration with settlers. The so-called Government of National Unity (GNU) is a betrayal of the PAC’s founding principles.”
Kgagudi argued that participation in the GNU contradicts the party’s long-standing stance of non-collaboration.
“There are no grounds to justify being part of the GNU. It undermines the core values of the PAC, particularly on issues of land dispossession and the exploitation of African people,” he added.
The severity of the divide was on full display during this year’s Sharpeville Massacre commemorations on 21 March.
While one group gathered at the historic police station, another held its own service at the Sharpeville precinct.
“We stand as the revolutionary PAC, as founded by Robert Mangaliso Sobukwe in 1959,” Kgagudi said.
“Those aligned with the GNU have abandoned the organisation’s core policies and programmes.”
He further revealed plans to convene a national consultative conference to reassess the party’s participation in elections.
“For the past 30 years, the PAC has taken part in elections without meaningful progress. We must ask what these elections have changed in the material conditions of African people,” Kgagudi said.
Meanwhile, PAC Secretary General Apa Pooe said the people in question have not been members of the PAC for the past two years.
“There are about five or seven disgruntled former members. They said they are forming their own organisation, but of course, IEC won’t agree to them using the name PAC or anything of that sort,” he said.
“They have adopted for African Progressive Organisation. They are not an internal faction of the PAC because they are not PAC members. They are former members who have decided to form another organisation. Hence, my stance that we do not have internal problems,” he added.
“They are entitled to their opinion on how they see us. In December, we held a national conference where we gave reasons why we are partaking in the GNU, and the party adopted that. They were not there because they are not members,” he said.
