Despite some flaws in the National Development Plan, some of it needed to be implemented as part of the country’s second phase of its democratic revolution, the SA Communist Party said on Tuesday.

“There are many positive things in the NDP, but there are also shortcomings,” SACP deputy general secretary Jeremy Cronin told reporters on Tuesday.

“It’s not about not implementing, it’s more about implementing what has to be done with reference to the appropriate parts where it’s useful.”

This comes a week after the tripartite alliance summit where partners – the ANC, SACP and Cosatu – failed to agree on aspects of the NDP, namely the section dealing with the transformation of the economy.

Cronin said less people were absolutely poor, but many were still poor.

He warned that if the crisis of inequality, poverty and unemployment persisted or were left unattended, it could undermine the country’s democracy and Constitution.

He was addressing reporters ahead of the start of the SACP’s special national congress in Soweto on Wednesday.

Delegates started arriving for the congress on Tuesday.

About 700 SACP members will be attending the congress. The radical second phase and the NDP would form part of the discussions, as well as the party’s relevance and problems in Cosatu.

The SACP has been accused of no longer being in touch with the working class and being lapdog of the ANC.

There have been repeated calls by some within the SACP for the party to break away from the tripartite alliance.

Cronin on Tuesday said those calls were coming from an aggrieved Mpumalanga branch which was experiencing strained relations with its ANC counterparts.

“The ANC is best placed to lead the elections,” he said.

Earlier this year, ANC and SACP members clashed in Mpumalanga during a meeting where former ANC treasurer general Mathews Phosa was expected to address people.

SACP members arrived in their numbers at the University of Johannesburg’s Soweto campus on Tuesday morning dressed in their red and black SACP regalia.

Dozens of stalls had been set up selling ANC and SACP hats, scarves, shirts, jackets and blankets.

More delegates were expected to arrive and register throughout the night before the official start of congress on Wednesday. News24