Pandor: Shope would be dismayed by ANC corruption and decline

By Johnathan Paoli

Former International Relations Minister and ANC veteran Naledi Pandor has called on the ANC Women’s League (ANCWL) to honour struggle stalwart Gertrude Shope by urgently tackling the party’s internal challenges and restoring its glory.

Delivering the Gertrude Shope Memorial Lecture in Pretoria under the theme “Bearing the Burdens of History with Dignity and Courage,” Pandor said Shope would have been dismayed by corruption, dysfunction and the erosion of ANC values.

Using Shope’s life as a mirror for the movement’s present struggles, Pandor acknowledged the ANC’s decline in cohesion and credibility, but stressed that renewal must be rooted in service to the people.

“We have lost our glory, the people are looking at us with horror and shame. We need the copper-wire scourer, not the sponge, to clean the pot. Renewal must be practical, not rhetorical,” she said.

Paying homage to Shope as a multifaceted leader of resilience