Dalai Lama row puts ANC on collision course with history

Most people would be reluctant to pick a fight with a revered Buddhist holy man and 14 other Nobel peace prize winners, but that's just what South African President Jacob Zuma has done.
When the Dalai Lama asked for a visa to attend next week's first ever summit of Nobel laureates in Africa, Zuma's government demurred and the Tibetan cancelled his trip.
It's the third time Zuma's government dragged its feet on a visa for the bespectacled monk, so the president knew exactly what to expect: public opprobrium and a pat on the head from Beijing, which calls the Dalai Lama a terrorist.

But this time the backlash was tougher and more damaging.
Zuma's decision resulted in the embarrassing cancellation of the Cape Town Nobel event, which -- as if to underscore the contrast of the ANC's idealistic past and its hard-nosed present -- had been scheduled to mark the 20th anniversary of apartheid's collapse and the election of Nelson Mandela.
South Africans of all stripes who remember the pain of being the "polecat of the world" accused Zuma of rubbishing the image of Nelson Mandela's "Rainbow Nation."

The party of Nobel prizewinner Mandela, of the anti-apartheid struggle and the moral high ground had become a party in hock to dictatorships and authoritarians in Beijing and Moscow.

It's true that Mandela also wanted better relations with China.
Beijing aided the ANC while it was fighting apartheid and they still enjoy close ties. Many leading members of the ANC are communists, including powerful secretary general Gwede Mantashe.
But since taking office in 2009 Zuma -- a former communist who once received leadership and military training in the Soviet Union -- has gone further than Mandela, who after all allowed the Dalai Lama to visit on numerous occasions.
Zuma has made relations with Brazil, Russia, India and China (the so-called BRICS) the bedrock of his foreign policy.
His policy is founded in a "hostility to western democracies," according to Frans Cronje, head of the South African Institute of Race Relations.

"Government is making a statement here that it stands with the China-Russia nexus."
ANC members frequently travel to Beijing for exchanges reportedly covering subjects such as how to build a political school and prevent party divisions.
Cronje also wonders "to what extent is China bankrolling ANC and individual ANC leaders? That gives it a grip over the party.