ANC needs Cyril the saviour

‘Party forfeited its right to be re-elected. It knows it, and is running very scared.’

Party forfeited its right to be re-elected. It knows it, and is running very scared.

It is common cause that the government, led by the ANC, has been worse than abysmal. Under former president Jacob Zuma, ANC functionaries pillaged numerous institutions of state. They enabled state-owned institutions to be looted, mismanaged the provision of basic services and presided over an alarming downward spiral of the economy.

Evidence keeps mounting of dishonesty and profligacy. The unfolding scandal around VBS Bank has shone a spotlight on the ANC as a nest of thieves.

In addition, a commission of inquiry is relentlessly exposing how Zuma’s henchmen amassed huge riches from state capture.

And another inquiry into the South African Revenue Service is revealing how the state’s capacity to raise revenue from the politically powerful and influential was systematically undermined.

All in all, the ANC has completely forfeited its right to be re-elected in 2019. It knows it, and is running very scared.

But the odds are that it will still win, even though with its smallest majority yet.

What the party does have going for it is its president Cyril Ramaphosa. He is the ANC’s one big pull. And much to the chagrin of the Zuma faction, the party is going to have to build its election campaign around him – because he is far more popular than the party. Indeed, SA can expect the 2019 elections to bring the most presidential-style campaign yet.

The irony is that Ramaphosa will privately welcome a smaller ANC majority. A thumping reduction in the ANC’s vote will serve as a popular rebuff of the Zuma faction, and erode its base in the party.

An ANC which knows it may have lost its majority had it not been for Ramaphosa’s personal popularity will be an ANC in which he will, at last, be able to assert his authority.

Ramaphosa sits atop a party which has long been in a state of internal factional turmoil. He defeated his rival for the presidency, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, at the ANC’s five yearly congress with an excruciatingly narrow vote. He lacks control over the party’s national executive (its highest decision-making body) where Zuma’s supporters remain strong. And, he is facing a robust fight-back campaign by Zuma’s acolytes in the provinces.

Zuma himself, like Banquo’s ghost, remains an ambiguous and dangerous presence. He professes innocence of all crimes, as well as continuing loyalty to the party. But behind the scenes he’s seemingly still pulling the strings of his puppets.

With the party in a state of continuing internal war, the scramble for positions on both its national and provincial electoral lists will be overt – in some places violent.

Nonetheless, come the election campaign, it is more than likely its competing factions will forge something of a truce, and preach a new-found unity.

The ANC may be divided over policies, positions and spoils, but one thing it is united about is the necessity of retaining power. It will prove ruthless in doing

so.

One of the few things it knows how to do well is how to induce or scare its popular constituency into voting for it.

Even so, it is uncomfortably aware that its base is eroding. The loyalty of its traditional supporters is declining; it is failing to attract support among “born-frees” (those born after Mandela’s release in 1990); its narrative of having liberated the country from apartheid is wearing tired and thin.

So, what is the party going to be doing to win back the vote of the disillusioned?

ANC elections head Fikile Mbalula recently acknowledged the party has allowed itself to become distanced from its base, arrogant and unaccountable. Under Ramaphosa, therefore, it will be making fulsome promises of renewal. The ANC will claim that the establishment of the various commissions of inquiry signal a determined assault on corruption.

Meanwhile, in all humility, the ANC is promising to renew its bonds with the people. This will involve a countrywide process of consultation with what Mbalula has referred to as “strategic sectors of society” in a bid to “broaden and deepen participation”.

Amid all this, the party will be promising to build on Ramaphosa’s various reform initiatives to return the economy to growth.

But the gospel of the party’s commitment to virtue and renewal is going to be a hard sell to a corruption-weary electorate.

Its base divided, the ANC knows that it is going to have to look for support beyond its normal boundaries. It knows it is likely to lose ground to the radical Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF). It knows it may have a hard time in getting the voters out in KwaZulu-Natal, where support for Zuma remains strong.

Given all this, the ANC knows that it will have to play to Ramaphosa as its one major asset.

The main opposition Democratic Alliance will again go unchallenged in the Western Cape, based upon its “better-than-theANC” record in local government. But at the same time it may well suffer at national level because its conservative constituency fear the prospect of the ANC losing its majority and being forced into a coalition with Julius Malema and the EFF. In short, some will hold their noses, and vote for Ramaphosa and the ANC.

Republished from

Roger Southall is Professor of Sociology, University of the Witwatersrand

Some will hold their noses, and vote for Ramaphosa

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