/* Written 8:27 AM Dec 24, 1997 by [EMAIL PROTECTED] in labr.party */ New ANC Leader Predicts Split With South African Communist Party JOHANNESBURG (December 19, 1997 Agence France-Presse) - South African Deputy President Thabo Mbeki, who took the helm of the ruling ANC earlier this week, predicted Friday a future split between the governing party and its Communist and labor union allies. In a half-hour interview with state-owned SABC television, Mbeki said he could "foresee a day" when the ANC's main allies, the Marxist-based South African Communist Party and the powerful COSATU labor federation, end their cooperative links with the governing party. The so-called tripartite alliance between the three former liberation movements was formed to fight the former white-minority regime, which gave way to Mandela's ANC-led government in the historic 1994 all-race elections. "The fundamental thing that brought everyone into the ANC was the goal that we must end the system of racial domination in the country, and we must fight for a non-racial democracy," Mbeki said. He added that when that goal has been achieved, the movement will probably be disbanded. "When this racial issue ceases to be such a dominant feature of South African life ... yes, indeed I would imagine that people might very well say that what brought us all together into this broad (movement) has been achieved," Mbeki said. He declined, however, to speculate when that split would occur. "When would it be that as South Africans this great dominant issue of racial disparity... has gone?" Mbeki said. "It will come, it has to come. But when, I cannot be in a position to tell." The ANC fought its liberation struggle against the former apartheid regime with the aid of the socialist-leaning COSATU, (Congress of South African Trade Union), movement and the Communist Party. Many top members of the current ANC government, including Posts and Telecommunications Minister Jay Naidoo (COSATU) and Transport Minister Mac Maharaj (Communist Party), Trade Minister Alec Erwin (Communist Party) were, or still are, linked to the ANC's allies. Many observers say Mbeki, who is seen as a politically-conservative market capitalist, is faced with the daunting challenge of appeasing a broad range supporters from across the political spectrum. --- ANC Homepage: http://www.anc.org.za/ SACP Homepage: http://www.sacp.org/za/