WARNING: This is Version 1 of my old archive, so Photos will NOT work and many links will NOT work. But you can find articles by searching on the Titles. There is a lot of information in this archive. Use the SEARCH BAR at the top right. Prior to December 2012; I was a pro-Christian type of Conservative. I was unaware of the mass of Jewish lies in history, especially the lies regarding WW2 and Hitler. So in here you will find pro-Jewish and pro-Israel material. I was definitely WRONG about the Boeremag and Janusz Walus. They were for real.
Original Post Date: 2004-05-28 Time: 14:49:55 Posted By: Jan
[Again… Mbeki said we’re not a One Party State… yet, look at the way this country is run. Consider what Tony Leon recently wrote about the attitude of the ANC… There is no OPEN DEBATE/DISCUSSION in this country. The ANC rams its socialist laws through parliament and local government and stuff everyone else… Of course Tony Leon and the DA are wasting their time with our ANC Dictatorship!!! Jan]
Cape Town – Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon has lamented the way African National Congress MPs took part in this week’s debate on President Thabo Mbeki’s State of the Nation address.
Writing in his weekly newsletter on Friday, Leon said the quality of discussion was an improvement on previous debates, “yet we did not have a full and open discussion about the important questions of where South Africa is going and how we are to get there”.
Mbeki had set forth a list of goals for South Africa to reach in the next several years.
“In my response, I noted the DA shared many of these goals, although we would have added critical targets on economic growth, HIV and Zimbabwe.
“I also noted the DA disagreed with some of the ANC’s policies on how to reach these goals. In other words, I said, we agree on the ends, but not the means.”
‘Host of misleading and stale accusations’
However, the ANC disagreed with this formulation, and ANC deputy chief whip Andries Nel, for example, had given a speech in which he declared, “we disagree on more than just means”.
Nel did not elaborate, but went on to resurrect a host of misleading and stale accusations about the DA.
Leon said: “He accused me of ‘suggesting that we should perpetuate apartheid’.
“He alleged the DA believes the people should have ‘no access to state support’ – and this in spite of the fact that it is the DA, and not the ANC, that favours a basic-income grant,” said Leon.
“Yet, at the conclusion of the debate, the president endorsed Mr Nel’s speech.
“The president could have responded directly to the substantive issues raised by the DA and other parties, but did not.”
Mbeki had insisted on “the notions of national consensus, national unity and united national action”.
“But we cannot make these notions a reality until we have had a full and proper debate,” he said.
The truth might be that the DA and the ANC had different ideas about what debate meant.
“The most important goal of parliamentary debate is to create choices, examine choices and defend choices. Choice is the essence of liberal democracy.”
The ANC’s response to that idea was predictable. The people had already chosen, the ruling party would say. And 70% of them chose the ANC. What other choices needed to be made?
30% of seats represent different views
“This was a consistent ANC argument throughout the week,” said Leon.
Yet, South Africans also chose to fill 30% of the seats in parliament with representatives who would present different views.
“The ruling party has the power to enact its will. But when its ideas and policies are tested by alternative views, there is hope that the ruling party’s choices will be better informed.”
It was remarkable that, 10 years into democracy, senior members of the ANC thought it better to de-legitimise and exclude their political opponents than to deal with their arguments in a straightforward manner, said Leon.
Edited by Iaine Harper
Source: News24.Com
URL: http://www.news24.com/News24/South_Africa/Pol…/p>