Will Ramphele strengthen DA’s election position?

DESPITE the fact that the announcement that Agang leader Mamphela Ramphele would be the DA’s presidential candidate in this year’s election was only made on Tuesday, it has already produced volumes of comment, a substantial amount of it decidedly unfavourable.

Much of the commentary has focused on the motivation for Ramphele’s decision and whether this amounts to a betrayal of the people who joined Agang, the effect that this will have on Agang ahead of the elections, the possible internal squabbles that may emerge in the DA as a result, and differences in policy between Ramphele and the DA in areas such as broad-based black economic empowerment.

The differences in the policies between the two parties are not that great and they are joined by far stronger glue – opposition to the ANC of President Jacob Zuma.

(There is a certainly far more in common as far as policies are concerned than there were when the DA under Tony Leon sought to amalgamate the then Democratic Party with the New National Party, although once again the glue of opposition to the ANC was the critical factor.)

In many cases what has been overlooked is the fact that this is an election year and the real issue is therefore the effect Ramphele’s nomination as the DA’s presidential candidate will have on the party’s showing at the polls.

Bluntly, will Ramphele’s decision strengthen the DA’s campaign and broaden its appeal or not?

The choice of Ramphele as the DA’s presidential candidate rather than as a name on the party’s lists is obviously well considered and deliberate because the DA wants a comparison to be drawn between Ramphele and the ANC’s candidate for president, Jacob Zuma.

Given the litany of controversy surrounding the Zuma presidency on the one hand, and Ramphele’s track record on the other, the DA will be bent on juxtaposing one against the other and raising the question as to which is most suited and best qual- ified to be South Africa’s head of state.

What the DA will be asking voters to do, in other words, is answer the question: “which of these two candidates would you prefer to have as president of South Africa?”

That will fit nicely with the inevitable attacks that will be launched on Zuma personally during the election campaign with regard to Nkandla, for example, as well as the rationale behind the decision to drop charges against him relating to corruption in connection with the arms deal.

A second point is that since 1990 one of the constant laments within the ranks of the DA and its predecessors was the party’s failure to find what was described as a “credible black leader” – a person who in his or her own right deserved to be at the helm of the party or in a prominent leadership position.

The contention, quite correctly, was that until the party managed to

We need to create a service delivery war room and we need reports on [work] taking place in Uitenhage and Despatch at every meeting.

Nelson Mandela Bay mayor Ben Fihla

shrug off its tag of being the political home of generally affluent whites and later, following the Fight Back campaign, political domicile of the minorities, its growth prospects would almost by definition be limited.

This is not to say that Joe Seremane or Lindiwe Mazibuko, for example, were, and are, not credible leaders but rather to argue that neither are of the stature of Ramphele, who is not only a national figure but is known and respected internationally.

The third point that needs to be made concerns the manner in which Ramphele accepted the DA’s offer to be its presidential candidate as well as the timing.

It is common cause that DA leader Helen Zille and Ramphele have been engaged in discussions for a considerable period of time, in fact long before Agang was formed, and Zille has made every effort to persuade Ramphele to join the ranks of the DA.

It should therefore not come as a particular surprise that she has finally done so. It was a personal decision that in no way committed Agang as a party, although one imagines that the DA as an omnivorous political entity would be perfectly happy to swallow the fledgling party.

In fact a statement issued by the DA on Friday said a technical team would meet over the next few days “to finalise arrangements to integrate our two parties”.

The primary motivation was not to destroy Agang or even forge some kind of alliance but to enhance the DA’s chances of a obtaining a substantial increase in support at the polls and possibly even capturing Gauteng.

One suspects that much of the opposition to Ramphele’s decision is grounded in the fact that it will make the DA stronger, especially as it would not be totally unreasonable to believe that when Zille decides to step down that Ramphele would be a natural successor.

Further, one suspects that there is understandable anger that someone so closely associated with the leader of the black consciousness movement should align herself with a party that was until recently associated with the more affluent white community or minorities.

ý Patrick Cull wrote this article before the announcement last night that the deal had collapsed.