So what is Zuma up to with this Zoom thing? Here’s what I would have said if I wasn’t muzzled by a mask

One of the upsides of the social distancing rules that we now have to abide by in public places is not having someone suddenly breathing down your neck in a queue at a supermarket as they try to peep over your shoulder to read the front-page headline of a newspaper in your trolley.

But one has to admit that the wearing the mask part — although crucial in curbing the spread of Covid-19 — can have its challenges. I, for one, have been finding it hard to climb up the devilish Munro Drive during my morning jog with a piece of cloth suffocating me. Good thing then that this year’s edition of the Comrades Marathon has been cancelled because, at the slow rate I currently go under my Mzekezeke mask, I was never going to qualify for the starting line in the land of my forefathers — Pietermaritzburg.

We were discussing this very issue with a running mate I bumped into at a shopping complex the other day when he suddenly changed the subject and asked me: “What is Zuma up to?” He was muffled, so I wasn’t sure if I had heard the question right.

“Jacob Zuma, what is he up to with those Zoom meetings with Duduzani, which they then post on social media? What do they aim to gain?”

He was of course referring to the former president’s much publicised online chats with his favourite son, whose name is often misspelt as Duduzane but among Zulu speakers from modern-day KwaZulu-Natal is always spelt with an “i” at the end.

The former head of state has been almost as busy as John Steenhuisen on digital platforms during lockdown. While it is obvious that the DA interim leader has had to turn himself into an online evangelist, delivering regular sermons on how the central government is mishandling the coronavirus crisis, in order to keep himself and his party in the news (when last did anyone hear of the EFF commander-in-chief?), it is not immediately clear why Zuma is doing the same. It can’t be because he is mobilising mass support for his upcoming corruption case at the Pietermaritzburg high court — lockdown rules mean that no crowds will be allowed to gather near the court when the case is heard in late June.

It also can’t be an attempt to reactivate his support base within the ANC ahead of the party’s national general council (NGC), which was initially scheduled for July but is now indefinitely postponed because of Covid-19.

Indeed, many Zuma loyalists saw the NGC — which is sort of a midterm gathering assessing the party’s progress in implementing policies adopted at its last national conference

— as a perfect opportunity to start a campaign that would eventually topple President Cyril Ramaphosa. It is a strategy they used to good effect in 2005 when that year’s NGC was turned into a launching pad for the Zuma campaign against then president Thabo Mbeki.

But even if the NGC were to take place this year, which is seriously doubtful, it is unlikely the Zuma camp will get there with a clear candidate they would back against Ramaphosa. Co-operative governance minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, whom they unsuccessfully pushed for in 2012, and Ramaphosa get along like zol and saliva. So she is not likely to be a candidate endorsed by Baba’s faction. Recent ANC history suggests that you stand a greater chance of launching a successful ANC presidential campaign if you are already a deputy president. Examples? Zuma and Ramaphosa.

However, given the things Zuma allowed Duduzani to say in episode one of their Zoom meeting about current Deputy President David Mabuza, no chance of the Zumas backing that horse.

So what is the Zooming with Zumas fuss all about? One can only speculate.

But one thing is clear to me. Post his ousting from office on Valentine’s Day in 2018, Zuma’s usefulness in politics has been that of saving Ramaphosa’s bacon.

Just when you feel that the president is dozing off at the wheel, Zuma appears from nowhere to make you almost grateful for Ramaphosa as you remember that you once had a head of state who drove the nation’s bus blindfolded, his hands tied to his back and the keys to the handcuffs kept safely at an alleged shebeen down by the Johannesburg Zoo.

I wanted to tell my running mate that Zuma was the past, that we should forget about him and his attention-seeking stunts, that the focus of our nation should be on the man currently in office. I wanted to say Ramaphosa is a very popular president and would probably easily win a second term if he decided to run for office again. But that, maybe because he wants a second term, he is too cautious in exercising his power — too concerned with not offending anyone — that he sometimes seems ineffective.

I would have added that the president should stop thinking about his political future right now and focus on the job at hand. Right now it is the fight against Covid-19 — it is what will define his presidency during this term. While consultation is important and getting counsel from his cabinet is useful, he is not a co-leader with anyone, but our country’s president. He did not show that in his televised address the other day, I would have added.

But my mask would have made it hard for him to hear my muffled sentences. Besides, social distancing or not, it is just antisocial to talk politics in a supermarket queue.

So I changed the subject back to running: next year is a down run, right? I can’t wait to be there.