ANC making a jumbo mistake with Zuma

Fear of the unknown is directing the ANC as it navigates its way through its most turbulent time post democracy. This is particularly so in the way it is dealing with President Jacob Zuma, under whose leadership it has lost the moral authority it enjoyed in the early days of democracy.

ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe recounted during a roundtable discussion this week that he had once asked party stalwart Andrew Mlangeni, who joined in 1945 and had witnessed many a party president come and go, what lessons could be drawn from serving under all those presidents to help deal with the current one.

He was told the ANC had never had an experience such as this — implying it had never had a president similar to Zuma. The ANC is therefore learning on the run, but Mantashe made it clear the party was chary of removing Zuma because it feared this would split the party. This is a shockingly myopic view of a stark reality. Zuma remains the ANC president, not just president of the country, and two attempts to remove him by members of the national executive committee have failed.

What the party seems unable to recognise is that Zuma has already split the ANC twice — when the Congress of the People (COPE) was formed and six years later, when the EFF was born.

He has also destroyed the tripartite alliance — the split in Cosatu was rooted in Zuma’s conflict with its axed general secretary, Zwelinzima Vavi, and his alleged ambitions.

The ANC Youth League was split with the formation of the EFF, and the ANC’s veterans league and the military veterans have divided during his tenure. It is odd that Mantashe and company did not seem too concerned about the party splitting when they were complicit in driving out the league leadership and then disbanding it.

Now, the EFF has become the biggest thorn in the party’s side — apart from the president’s friends and family benefactors, the Guptas.

Mantashe said the party leadership was in constant contact with its regions and provinces and its view on the potential for a split within its ranks was informed by those interactions.

But the ANC’s national working committee report after the 2016 local elections indicated that many ANC members felt the party’s entire leadership ought to resign. The truth, then, is that the leadership has protected itself along with Zuma by taking “collective responsibility” and deciding to stay put.

There is a strong indication that if the Zuma faction is not dismantled, the ANC will split. This stems mainly from Mantashe’s own political home, the South African Communist Party, which appears ready to jump ship in the event of an Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma presidency.

Who knows how many ANC members and MPs would follow the party and form part of its broad front.

The fact that at least 34 ANC MPs voted for Zuma’s removal despite attempts by Zuma, Mantashe and chief whip Jackson Mthembu to pull them into line, indicates the party is deeply divided and many are ready to do what was unthinkable before.

However, the main fear for Mantashe and the ANC remains that Zuma’s allies, the most vocal of whom are in the ANC Women’s League, the ANC Youth League and an organisation that is not even a structure of the ANC, the Umkhonto We Sizwe Military Veterans Association, would resist any move against Zuma and split the party.

It is invariably the losing faction that splits away from the ANC — COPE members were Thabo Mbeki backers, while the EFF supported Kgalema Motlanthe.

Mantashe intimates that the formation of the EFF was due to unhappiness over the outcome of the election in Mangaung. But Malema and company were expelled from the ANC before the conference due to their outward opposition to Zuma and his intolerance of dissent.

A similar scenario is playing out now. For an organisation “learning from experience”, the ANC seems to have a very selective take on its own experiences.

Months before the elective conference, Zuma and his backers have rounded on dissenting voices such as MPs Makhosi Khoza, Derek Hanekom and Pravin Gordhan. Khoza was removed from her post as chair of the portfolio committee on public administration on Thursday. Hanekom and Gordhan will be “spoken to” and could face disciplinary charges.

So, it is clear that little has been learnt from past experiences. Malema said after last week’s motion of no confidence that the opposition was “eating the elephant, bit by bit”.

Mantashe and Zuma have repeatedly likened the ANC to an elephant, which acts slowly but eventually ferociously. To extend the metaphor, this elephant is doing a pretty good job of eating itself.

WHAT THE PARTY FAILS TO RECOGNISE IS THAT ZUMA HAS ALREADY SPLIT THE ANC TWICE — WHEN COPE AND THE EFF WERE FORMED

FOR AN ORGANISATION ‘LEARNING FROM EXPERIENCE’, THE ANC SEEMS TO HAVE A VERY SELECTIVE TAKE ON ITS OWN EXPERIENCES