Who’ll get the fed-up voters’ vote?
Trust in big political parties is dwindling but that’s not necessarily a win for everybody else
Apalpable sense of change rested over South Africa at the beginning of August 2016. The ANC — long considered an immovable political constant — had just endured a bruising election. At the zenith of what would come to be known as the “Zuma years”, the party’s popularity tumbled by 8.04%.
The Democratic Alliance and Economic Freedom Fighters were well positioned to capitalise on the loosened grip of the ruling party. Their relative successes altered the landscape of the country’s metros and set up their future effect on local government.
Five years later, the picture has once again changed. In the eyes of many, the DA and EFF are no longer seen as alternatives to the hegemony but as guilty as the ANC in preserving it — all bickering parts of a system that has failed too many of us.
What may be the leading narrative these elections is where the apathetic, the dissenters and the gatvol can make their mark — if they decide to pitch up at all.
To some, the solution lies with independent candidates. The media consensus has been that this may be the year in which their effect is felt; that party fatigue will drive the electorate to individuals who are grounded in their neighbourhoods and not beholden to an overseer.
Or, as Mmusi Maimane articulates it: “If you keep it to the political elite you’re going to end up with another political party, a revolving door of politicians and then it becomes, to use a footballing analogy, this premier league where players move from one club to the next but inherently they are the ones getting paid and everyone else are spectators.”
Maimane, the leader of the One South Africa Movement and the former leader of the DA, has beaten the drum loudest for the independent option, spending considerable time and resources asking South Africans to sidestep political booby traps on the ward ballot.
This would have been hard to imagine five years ago. Back then he was the promised prince of the opposition. The face of a party that sold itself as the vessel that would return liberal values to a stolen state. In the time since he has been unable to quell the ever-present, never-fullylatent conservative voices that forced their way into the spotlight and ultimately saw him ejected from the DA.
Instead of leading a party into the polls, Maimane and his One South Africa organisation have acted as an umbrella and welcomed and promoted independent candidates and smaller associations.
“If we’re going to build a new political alternative, it must be born out of citizens, South Africans from a variety of sectors of society,” he says. “It can’t just be politicians moving and then forming a new political vehicle. It’s not helpful. You need business, you need civic society, you need blue-collar workers, you need trade unionists, you need a broad sector of society who can agree on the correct values and then mobilise.”
It is those values of racial equality, justice and ubuntu, he says, that provide a common base for all who have signed on under the banner of One South Africa. One may speculate about “chief activist” Maimane’s long-term game, but there is little doubt that the initiative has enriched the landscape for independents.
“They are in a better position to contest than they have ever been in the past,” says Mcebisi Ndletyana of the University of Johannesburg’s department of politics and international relations.
“Previously independents had to contest using their own meagre resources. Working with Mmusi’s movement has meant that they have access to resources. They are being offered some kind of training about how to package their messages, how to place their campaigns; you know, injecting a bit of structure and discipline into their campaigns. He’s capitalising on the widespread distrust there is in public against parties. Political parties have been extremely discredited.”
A record 1 718 independent candidates have signed the electoral code of conduct this year. It’s a trend that has been on the rise since 2006 but smashes 2016’s figure of 855.
Traditional democratic wisdom says increased competition can only be a good thing. This is especially true in wards in party strongholds that are perceived to be governed by leaders who are under no pressure to uphold service delivery standards.
Independent candidates are also riding on the momentum of last year’s historic ruling rendering the Electoral Act unconstitutional and allowing them to contest at provincial and national level. Although they have long held the right to contest local government elections, their potential involvement in future national polls has helped change the narrative on what is possible outside the party paradigm.
Still, there is no guarantee that former party loyalists will choose to place their X next to an independent … or anyone else.
“We’ve seen a lot of ANC voters disinclined to turn out at all because they aren’t able to find credible alternatives to the ANC,” says Collette Schulz-herzenberg, a senior lecturer in Stellenbosch University’s department of political science and an expert in voter behaviour.
“They just don’t vote. We saw this quite dramatically in 2019 but also in the 2016 election. That disproportionate turnout drop for the ANC vis-à-vis the other opposition parties actually gave the DA its strength in 2016,” she says. “There is a trust deficit that runs through the major political parties and we see it in the public opinion data. The interesting question is: does it impact all parties, or are voters going to decide to chance their luck and put it with smaller parties or independent candidates?”
The evidence, as Schulzherzenberg points out, suggests that South Africans are not wont to switch allegiances. We have no way of knowing whether the latest generation of fed-up voters will register their dissatisfaction at the polls or abscond. Should most do the latter, it is likely there will be little change in the power dynamics in the country.
Assuming supporters of the big political parties stay home in equal proportion, attendance will decrease but the share of the pie remain constant.
How that question is answered will determine the fortunes of fringe parties such as Herman Mashaba’s Actionsa. Mashaba was a key figure in the DA’S 2016 push and was subsequently Johannesburg’s mayor. He will bank on the support he held then migrating to his new party, as well as luring new voters with conservative stances.
He is an example of a known politician who may be able to leverage his base to achieve “kingmaker” status. Outside of Gauteng, however, Actionsa, will probably struggle to change the national spectrum.
“I’m just using the example of the ANC because that’s your biggest proportion and that’s your potential floating voters of most interest,” Schulz-herzenberg says.
“What we’re really ultimately interested in, to put it crudely, is where will ANC voters go when they are disillusioned and it’s clear that they’re not going anywhere. But why do people perceive that there’s no choice? We need to turn the spotlight away from the ANC and onto the opposition.”