August 8 will be remembered as the day the ANC won the battle but lost the war
Deep divisions have been exposed and the party will never be the same
The idea of victory in defeat sounds like an oxymoron. But this is what happened last week when opposition parties failed to remove President Jacob Zuma through a motion of no confidence.
When the Speaker of the National Assembly announced the results (177 “Yes” vs 198 “No” votes), the spirit of song immediately captured the souls of ANC parliamentarians.
We must go beyond the song to come face to face with the ANC’s actual defeat.
A day before the vote, the ANC was thrown into disarray by the decision to grant a secret ballot.
Mindful of the voices of rebellion within the ranks of its own parliamentary caucus – such as Makhosi Khoza, Pravin Gordhan, Derek Hanekom and others – the party did not know how many more silent rebels it harboured in parliament.
History will remember the evening of August 7 as the night of telephonic bombardment. ANC MPs were bombarded by calls from their party and the opposition. After each call the dilemma posed itself: “Do I listen to or ignore my conscience?”
The human soul expresses itself through the face. A smile tells us that the soul is brimming with nourishment. A grimace suggests a troubled person.
Before 2pm on August 8, the tormented souls of ANC and opposition leaders were masked by their attempts to show confident faces – even though none of them was certain of victory. Such was the disconnect between the soul and the face.
The rest is history. Zuma remains in office. How then could opposition parties interpret this as a victory?
It is a victory for the opposition as they have proved that party bosses in Luthuli House have lost control of a number of deployees in parliament.
We are in a situation where party bosses and ANC parliamentarians no longer trust each other. Given the secrecy of the ballot, it is impossible to flush them out.
‘‘ The party has made it clear the problem is the ANC, not just Zuma
It is also possible that those who voted with the opposition enjoy the support of some leaders at Luthuli House. The rebels are clearly part of an anti-Zuma campaign. It can be assumed that most of them support Cyril Ramaphosa, not Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma.
Four months before December, there is no time to waste in unnecessary disciplinary hearings. Factions are more interested in securing their own victory.
Before the vote, there was room for the party to sell the propaganda that the problem is Zuma, not the ANC. By defending him in parliament, the party has now made it clear that the problem is the whole ANC, not just Zuma.
The bitter and disdainful attitude of ANC leaders who spoke inside and outside parliament before and after the vote, including the drunk-looking Bathabile Dlamini, added fuel to already existing public anger.
South Africans are angry. They cannot believe what has happened to the ANC of Nelson Mandela. When asked what to do, people say “2019 is coming”.
Should Dlamini-Zuma win, the ANC will not believe what South Africans will do. She will be rejected overwhelmingly by citizens who are sick and tired of Zuma and the Gutpas.
Even Ramaphosa will not have an easy ride. Indications are that, should he win, the ANC will lose voters in KwaZulu-Natal.
Should he succeed Zuma, Ramaphosa will have to do a great deal of explaining. Where was he when Zuma and the Guptas were looting our resources?
It does not matter who takes over in December, the ANC will never be a united party again. After the vote of no confidence, the party (and all its factions) is injured. It will limp all the way to 2019.
Such is the oxymoron of the victory scored by the ANC on August the 8th.