tag:theconversation.com,2011:/fr/topics/nkosazana-dlamini-zuma-34830/articlesNkosazana Dlamini-Zuma – The Conversation2022-08-11T14:53:46Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1877052022-08-11T14:53:46Z2022-08-11T14:53:46ZNot yet uhuru: the African Union has had a few successes but remains weak<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/477122/original/file-20220802-19-k8vu9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Delegates at the African Union Summit held in Malabo, Capital of Equatorial Guinea, on 27 May 2022 to address worsening humanitarian crises in Africa. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The African Union (AU) was born in the South African port city of Durban <a href="https://www.un.org/africarenewal/magazine/september-2002/african-union-launched">in 2002</a>. Under its first chair,<a href="https://www.gov.za/about-government/contact-directory/thabo-mvuyelwa-mbeki-mr-0">Thabo Mbeki</a>, African leaders seemed determined to abandon the grandiose plans of its predecessor, the Organisation of African Unity (OAU). The OAU had been established <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/organisation-african-unity-oau">in 1963</a> to promote African unity and liberation. Other aims included: to protect the territorial integrity of its member states, promote non-alignment, and advance the <a href="https://au.int/sites/default/files/treaties/7759-file-oau_charter_1963.pdf">peaceful settlement of disputes</a>.</p>
<p>The African Union, for its part, <a href="https://au.int/sites/default/files/pages/34873-file-constitutiveact_en.pdf">was established</a> to achieve an integrated, prosperous and peaceful Africa which would be led by its own citizens and play a dynamic role in global politics. Unlike the <a href="https://au.int/sites/default/files/treaties/7759-file-oau_charter_1963.pdf">OAU Charter</a>, the <a href="https://au.int/sites/default/files/pages/34873-file-constitutiveact_en.pdf">AU’s Constitutive Act of 2000</a> allowed for interference in the internal affairs of its members to stem instability, halt egregious human rights abuses and sanction military coups d’état.</p>
<p>Military regimes in <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2005/2/25/togo-suspended-from-au">Togo</a>, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mauritania-coup-idUSL855802420080809">Mauritania</a>, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/mar/20/african-union-suspends-madagascar">Madagascar</a>, <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/20100219-african-union-suspends-niger-thousands-celebrate-coup">Niger</a>, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-protests-africa-idUSBRE9640EP20130705">Egypt</a>, <a href="https://au.int/en/articles/sudan-suspended-african-union#:%7E:text=On%20the%206th%20of%20June,exit%20from%20its%20current%20crisis.">Sudan</a>, <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/african-union-suspends-guinea-after-military-coup/a-59144311">Guinea</a>, <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2012/4/17/guinea-bissau-suspended-from-african-union">Guinea-Bissau</a>, <a href="https://au.int/en/articles/african-union-suspends-mali-participation-all-activities">Mali</a> and <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/african-union-suspends-burkina-faso-after-military-coup-2022-01-31/">Burkina Faso</a> were thus suspended from the AU. The continental body launched praiseworthy military stabilisation missions into <a href="https://issafrica.org/chapter-4-the-african-union-mission-in-burundi">Burundi</a> (2003), <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/africa/20201231-un-african-union-peacekeeping-mission-in-sudan-s-darfur-ends">Darfur</a> (2007) and <a href="https://effectivepeaceops.net/publication/amisom/">Somalia</a> (2007). However despite this progress, autocrats continued to rig electoral outcomes. </p>
<p>As the AU <a href="https://au.int/en/overview">turned 20 in July 2022</a>, it had achieved a few successes. But it remains a weak organisation embarking on sporadic bouts of illusory reforms. This is due to financial and capacity constraints. And too much decision-making power resides with its omnipotent heads of state which has denied the organisation the ability to take decisions, and act more effectively on behalf of its members.</p>
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<h2>Institutional sclerosis</h2>
<p>The Addis Ababa-based <a href="https://au.int/en/commission">AU Commission</a> – its implementing arm – is led by an <a href="https://au.int/en/assembly">Assembly of Heads of State</a>, with an Executive Council of foreign ministers and a Permanent Representatives Committee of ambassadors. The ambassadors work with specialised development, governance, parliamentary and judicial organs. The AU Commission has, however, struggled to establish its independence to take initiatives on behalf of its 55 member states in fulfilment of its mandate. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.securitycouncilreport.org/atf/cf/%7B65BFCF9B-6D27-4E9C-8CD3-CF6E4FF96FF9%7D/RO%20Audit%20of%20the%20AU.pdf">2007 audit report</a> led by the Nigerian scholar-technocrat <a href="https://www.pambazuka.org/pan-africanism/tribute-my-mentor-professor-adebayo-adedeji">Adebayo Adedeji</a> revealed how the AU Commission headed by <a href="https://www.africaunionfoundation.org/professor-alpha-oumar-konare/">Malian Alpha Konaré</a> (2003-2008) misunderstood its mandates and authority levels, and failed to coordinate overlapping tasks. Some of these problems still persist.</p>
<p>Under the French-influenced Gabonese <a href="http://jeanping.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/CV-Jean-Ping-VGB.pdf">Jean Ping</a> (2008-2012), the commission’s annual budget had reached <a href="https://www.economist.com/middle-east-and-africa/2011/01/27/short-of-cash-and-teeth">$260 million by 2011</a>. Only 40% of this sum was actually paid by members. The European Union, China and the United States mostly funded the rest. This posed the risk that AU institutional priorities could be set by its donors.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://au.int/en/assembly">AU Assembly</a> of heads of state has often failed to adhere to the principle of subsidiarity: taking decisions at the lowest practical level, as the European Union – the world’s only genuinely supranational regional organisation – does. </p>
<p>The AU also conducts most of its business through unanimity, making it difficult to reach quick decisions.</p>
<p>While the AU Commission has some impressive staff, it also has much “dead wood” inherited from the OAU era. </p>
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<p>The AU’s 2003 plan to set up an <a href="https://www.peaceau.org/en/page/82-african-standby-force-asf-amani-africa-1">African Standby Force</a> by 2010 was <a href="https://www.defenceweb.co.za/joint/diplomacy-a-peace/african-union-says-progressing-to-military-force-by-end-2015/">postponed until 2015</a>. In December 2020, the organisation simply declared the force to be fully operational, despite the fantasy involved in such a statement. The deadline for “Silencing the Guns” (ending armed conflicts) <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/23311886.2021.1995222#:%7E:text=The%20Africa%20Union's%20Agenda%202063,all%20illegal%20weapons%20in%20Africa.">by 2020</a>“ was casually pushed back a decade.</p>
<h2>Illusory reforms</h2>
<p>As chair of the AU Commission (2012-2016), former South African foreign minister <a href="https://www.africaunionfoundation.org/dr-nkosazana-dlamini-zuma/">Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma </a> complained that over 97% of the continental body’s programmes were <a href="https://www.hiiraan.com/news4/2012/Dec/27467/budget_challenge_for_dlamini_zuma_at_au.aspx">funded by external donors</a>. In 2013, $155 million of the $278 million annual budget (56%) was still <a href="https://www.theafricareport.com/6158/african-union-its-never-too-late-to-avoid-war-dlamini-zuma/">provided by foreign partners</a>. But Dlamini-Zuma failed to reduce this dependence during her four-year tenure. AU leaders refused to back efforts to find alternative sources of funding, such as customs duties and <a href="https://archives.au.int/bitstream/handle/123456789/885/Assembly%20AU%2018%20%28XIX%29%20_E.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y">taxes on flights and hotel stays</a>. </p>
<p>Among the more quixotic ideas of the Dlamini-Zuma-driven 50-year development vision, <a href="https://au.int/en/agenda2063/overview">"Agenda 2063”</a> includes increasing intra-African trade from 12% to 50% by 2045, ending armed conflicts by 2020 ](https://au.int/en/flagships/silencing-guns-2020) and eradicating poverty in two decades.</p>
<p>Under the Francophile Chadian chair, <a href="https://au.int/en/biography-he-moussa-faki-mahamat">Moussa Faki Mahamat</a>, since 2017, the <a href="https://au.int/sites/default/files/pages/34915-file-report-20institutional20reform20of20the20au-2.pdf">report</a> chaired by <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Paul-Kagame">Rwandan president Paul Kagame</a> on reforming the AU seemed rushed and lacked substance, and its laundry list of recommendations on institutional reforms were on a level of vacuity as to be of no real utility. </p>
<p>These were physicians proposing half-baked cures to ills that had not been properly diagnosed. All the 2017 report’s “key findings” had been more coherently outlined in <a href="https://www.securitycouncilreport.org/atf/cf/%7B65BFCF9B-6D27-4E9C-8CD3-CF6E4FF96FF9%7D/RO%20Audit%20of%20the%20AU.pdf">Adedeji’s report</a> a decade earlier, the recommendations of which still have not been implemented. </p>
<p>Another disappointment has been the 2018 <a href="https://au.int/en/cfta">African Continental Free Trade Area</a> which seeks to facilitate trade, build infrastructure, establish a common market and ensure the free movement of people. But outside West and Eastern Africa, the free movement of people <a href="https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/africa-intracontinental-free-movement">remains a pipe dream</a>.</p>
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<p>Most African governments are security-obsessed and hostile to intra-African migration. There is also a lack of convergence of African economies. Many compete to export raw materials rather than exchange diverse goods.</p>
<p>Road, rail, and port infrastructure remains poor. Rules of origin – which define where goods are made – are often restrictive, and non-tariff barriers are widespread. If integration has not worked at the national and sub-regional levels, transferring all these problems to the continental level will certainly not integrate Africa. </p>
<h2>Need for realism</h2>
<p>The 15-member <a href="https://au.int/en/psc">AU Peace and Security Council</a> has contributed substantively to peacemaking efforts across Africa, and coordinated closely with the United Nations.</p>
<p>But other AU organs have performed less well. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.nepad.org/publication/nepad-brief">New Partnership for Africa’s Development</a> clearly lacks the resources and capacity as a development agency to uplift the continent. The <a href="https://au.int/en/aprm#:%7E:text=APRM%20is%20a%20voluntary%20arrangement,economic%20growth%20and%20sustainable%20development">African Peer Review Mechanism</a>, which identifies governance challenges in 41 countries, is toothless.</p>
<p>The Pan-African Parliament remains a <a href="https://theconversation.com/toothless-pan-african-parliament-could-have-meaningful-powers-heres-how-87449">“talking shop”</a>. The <a href="https://au.int/en/about/ecosocc">Economic, Social and Cultural Council</a> has failed to provide genuine civil society participation in the AU’s institutions. The idea of the African Diaspora in the Americas, the Caribbean and Europe as a <a href="http://www.west-africa-brief.org/content/en/six-regions-african-union">sixth African sub-region</a>, along with the five continental ones, is largely devoid of substance.</p>
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<p>The AU must thus adopt more realistic and less illusory mandates. Its approach should be based on an accurate assessment of financial and logistical realities. </p>
<p>More positively, AU members had contributed <a href="https://au.int/en/pressreleases/20220630/african-union-peace-fund-board-trustees-convene-meeting-review-progress">$295 million</a> to their <a href="https://issafrica.org/pscreport/psc-insights/peace-fund-lies-dormant-as-member-states-discuss-its-use">revised Peace Fund</a> by June 2022, complementing a <a href="https://africacenter.org/spotlight/african-union-20-much-accomplished-more-challenges-ahead/">$650 million 2022 budget </a>. African leaders must now strengthen the institutions they have created.</p>
<p>They must also establish one effective economic body in each sub-region that can promote socio-economic development and provide jobs for the continent’s youthful population.</p>
<p>The AU’s first two decades have largely represented a magical, mystical world of unfulfilled expectations. This is not yet uhuru (freedom).</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/187705/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Adekeye Adebajo does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The AU’s first two decades have largely represented a magical, mystical world of unfulfilled expectations.Adekeye Adebajo, Professor and Senior research fellow, Centre for the Advancement of Scholarship, University of PretoriaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1727812021-12-10T11:44:55Z2021-12-10T11:44:55ZWhat South Africa needs to do to exit the pandemic state of disaster<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/436916/original/file-20211210-17-1ijrukx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Successive lockdowns under South Africa's state of emergency law have caused tremendous hardship.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photo by Phill Magakoe/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The global COVID pandemic not only heightened interest in the field of disaster risk management, but in several <a href="https://www.icnl.org/covid19tracker/?issue=5">instances</a> required the use and implementation of emergency laws. South Africa was no exception.</p>
<p>It became clear early in the pandemic that normal laws and regulations were insufficient to deal with the disaster. For the first time since the promulgation of the <a href="https://www.gov.za/documents/disaster-management-act-declaration-national-state-disaster-covid-19-coronavirus-16-mar">Disaster Management Act in 2002</a>, a national state of disaster <a href="https://www.gov.za/documents/disaster-management-act-declaration-national-state-disaster-covid-19-coronavirus-16-mar">was declared</a> to manage and mitigate the possible risks and fallout. Extraordinary measures were needed, and the national state of disaster became the vehicle through which the government exercised exceptional powers to curb the spread of the pandemic. The measures included the initial restriction on movement, curfews, mask wearing and a limitation on gatherings.</p>
<p>After 18 extensions of the national state of disaster, some have labelled the situation <a href="https://www.gov.za/speeches/premier-alan-winde-coronavirus-covid-19-national-state-disaster-7-oct-2021-0000">unsustainable</a> and <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/analysis/in-depth-lockdown-hundreds-of-days-later-transition-out-of-state-of-disaster-necessary-experts-20211118">unnecessary</a>. It is time to work out how to exit the state of disaster. </p>
<p>We offer some thoughts on this as members of a team set up by the government to evaluate <a href="https://www.gtac.gov.za/resource/covid-19-country-report-chapter-3-1-south-african-legal-and-regulatory-responses/">the state’s response</a> to the pandemic. </p>
<p>We suggest that the country still needs some health regulations but they can be put in place in terms of the National Health Act instead. </p>
<h2>States of exception</h2>
<p>The law, in general, makes provision for “state of exceptions” – situations where normal laws cannot regulate an exceptional occurrence. These laws usually authorise the limitation, in some instances even derogation, of rights to manage the situation.</p>
<p>Such laws allow for the drastic limitation of specific rights. Because the balance of power shifts to the executive to take quick unitary action, there are clear limitations to this power – both in terms of what can be done and its duration.</p>
<p>Citizens must always be vigilant that the exceptional powers do not become permanent and that the powers are not used to achieve other objectives. It is also not sustainable to govern for prolonged periods under such exceptional circumstances as allowed for by emergency legislation.</p>
<p>South Africa has the <a href="https://www.gov.za/sites/default/files/gcis_document/201409/a64-97.pdf">State of Emergency Act</a> and the Disaster Management Act. These two laws govern two different sets of exceptional circumstances. A state of emergency can only be declared when there is a threat on the nation’s life. This is why the government chose the Disaster Management Act to deal with the pandemic in South Africa.</p>
<h2>The Disaster Management Act</h2>
<p>The Disaster Management Act defines a disaster as an extraordinary event that has a significant impacts on humans and the environment and exceeds the ability of those affected to adequately deal with the situation using their own resources.</p>
<p>As the pandemic unfolded globally, the government quickly realised that extraordinary measures were needed, which were very time-sensitive. Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma declared a state of disaster on <a href="https://www.gov.za/sites/default/files/gcis_document/202003/43096gon313.pdf">15 March 2020</a>.</p>
<p>The declaration of a state of disaster must follow a prescribed process. Once an event that may be a “disaster” occurs, the National Disaster Management Centre is responsible for classifying the event as either a local, provincial or national disaster. This is done to determine which sphere of government is responsible for coordination and management. In the case of a national disaster, the national executive is primarily responsible.</p>
<p>Once it is classified as a national disaster, the Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs is permitted to declare a national state of disaster if existing laws or other arrangements do not adequately provide for the executive to deal with the disaster (or if other exceptional circumstances warrant it).</p>
<p>Once a national state of disaster is declared, the national executive can <a href="https://sacoronavirus.co.za/category/regulations/">issue regulations</a> or directions to deal with it. A national disaster declaration lapses after three months but may be extended by the minister one month at a time. There is no limit to the number of extensions, but can only be extended if there is still a disaster.</p>
<h2>Renewing the state of disaster</h2>
<p>The courts can review the declaration and extension of the state of disaster – through the principle of the <a href="https://www.justice.gov.za/legislation/constitution/saconstitution-web-eng.pdf">rule of law</a> of the constitution, under the <a href="https://www.justice.gov.za/legislation/acts/2000-003.pdf">Promotion of Administrative Justice Act</a>, or against any of the <a href="https://www.justice.gov.za/legislation/constitution/saconstitution-web-eng.pdf">fundamental rights</a> in the constitution.</p>
<p>Likewise, the National Assembly must scrutinise and oversee the executive function. The constitution has specific <a href="https://www.justice.gov.za/legislation/constitution/saconstitution-web-eng.pdf">mechanisms</a> to ensure such oversight.</p>
<p>Members of the executive remain individually and collectively responsible to parliament. Whether this happened or is effective is open to debate – and can be reviewed in the courts – but the fact is that the Disaster Management Act does not preclude parliament or the courts from performing their ordinary functions.</p>
<h2>Alternative legislation</h2>
<p>The Disaster Management Act is only applicable when other legislation is inadequate. So, is there other legislation that the government could have used to manage COVID-19? The <a href="https://www.gov.za/sites/default/files/gcis_document/201409/a61-03.pdf">National Health Act</a>, for instance, already makes provision for regulations and quarantine in the case of certain notifiable medical conditions. Coronavirus is a notifiable medical condition.</p>
<p>The pandemic brought much uncertainty. And the National Health Act focuses on the health system and health services. So the National Health Act probably would not have been able to create the regulations that were needed in March 2020. In that sense, national legislation did not adequately deal with the disaster.</p>
<p>But things have changed.</p>
<h2>Exiting the current state of disaster</h2>
<p>Over the past 20 months, a lot has been learned about the pandemic and what is needed to manage it. There is no need to act so quickly now.</p>
<p>That does not mean one can just exit the state of disaster. The current regulations – from sanitising and mask-wearing to the curfew and restriction on the number of people in gatherings – are done under regulations that depend on a state of disaster being declared. If the state of disaster is not extended, the whole complex web of regulations will no longer be law, and there will be very few regulations to manage the pandemic. </p>
<p>To address this untenable situation, the Minister of Health must make regulations under the National Health Act to regulate matters such as mask-wearing, social distancing, gatherings and vaccinations. Such proposed regulations must be published in the Government Gazette at least three months before commencement, and this can be circumvented “if circumstances necessitate” it.</p>
<h2>Avoiding states of disaster in the future</h2>
<p>Longer-term planning for future pandemics includes the Department of Health institutionalising disaster risk management. The one big lesson learnt from COVID-19 is that the Disaster Management Act and the National Disaster Management Framework require disaster risk reduction planning to be in place in all ministries, all the time.</p>
<p>This will reduce risks in the case of a hazardous event, which in turn means that ordinary legislation might be able to cope with its management, reducing reliance on states of disaster being declared in the future.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/172781/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Citizens must always be vigilant that the exceptional powers do not become permanent and that the powers are not used to achieve other objectives.Elmien du Plessis, Associate Professor of Law, North-West UniversityDewald van Niekerk, Professor in Geography and Head of the African Centre for Disaster Studies, North-West UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1582512021-04-15T15:12:30Z2021-04-15T15:12:30ZPrecarious power tilts towards Ramaphosa in battle inside South Africa’s governing party<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/395051/original/file-20210414-19-9qqbbz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">President Cyril Ramaphosa's campaign against corruption is being undermined from within the governing ANC.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EFE-EPA/Yeshiel Panchia</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>It appears, for the moment, that South African president <a href="http://www.thepresidency.gov.za/profiles/president-cyril-ramaphosa%3A-profile">Cyril Ramaphosa</a> has won a key battle in the war for control of the governing African National Congress (ANC), of which he is also the head.</p>
<p>This became apparent after a <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/southafrica/news/ramaphosa-to-make-closing-address-for-anc-nec-lekgotla-20210328">highly charged</a> recent meeting of the ANC’s national executive committee (<a href="https://www.anc1912.org.za/national-executive-committee">NEC</a>) – its highest decision-making body in between its five-yearly national conferences. The NEC brought a crucial tilt in the factional balance of power towards Ramaphosa. This matters because the post-elective conference fate of presidents of the ANC – who, because it is the majority party in the country, automatically become presidents of the country – is determined by the NEC.</p>
<p>The ANC has governed South Africa since apartheid ended <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/04597239308460952?journalCode=tssu20">in 1994</a>. As far back as 1999 the party acknowledged the existence of <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.18772/12015108844">corruption in its ranks</a>. Since then corruption has <a href="https://pari.org.za/betrayal-promise-report/">become endemic</a>. Few ANC leaders can claim to be perfectly clean. </p>
<p>Ramaphosa’s rise to power, from when he became ANC president <a href="https://theconversation.com/who-is-cyril-ramaphosa-a-profile-of-the-new-leader-of-south-africa-89456">in December 2017</a>, and head of state in <a href="http://www.thepresidency.gov.za/profiles/president-cyril-ramaphosa%3A-profile">February 2018</a>, offered South Africans hope that he would clean up the corruption. Indeed, he <a href="https://ewn.co.za/2018/02/16/must-read-president-ramaphosa-s-state-of-the-nation-address">made promises to do so</a>. But he has met with resistance, especially within the ANC. </p>
<p>This has pitted two ANC factions against each other: Ramaphosa’s (claiming the cleanup label), and the faction associated with former president Jacob Zuma, on whose watch corruption (by all indications) intensified and became so brazen it was equated to <a href="https://www.sastatecapture.org.za/">state capture</a>.</p>
<p>Things came to a head at the 26-29 March virtual NEC meeting, where the controversial issue of sanctions against party members charged with corruption or other serious crimes was finalised. The party’s December 2017 ANC conference had resolved that such members should <a href="https://cisp.cachefly.net/assets/articles/attachments/73640_54th_national_conference_report.pdf">step down </a> from their roles in the party and public structures. The March meeting adopted the guidelines and brought the ANC’s <a href="https://www.702.co.za/articles/389922/the-anc-integrity-commission-makes-recommendations-but-the-nec-has-final-word">integrity commission</a> into the NEC discussions, which was a precondition for implementation.</p>
<h2>Power politics</h2>
<p>The issue of stepping down is hotly contested, especially because it <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/newsletters/comments/mostcommented/never-have-i-done-any-corruption-ace-magashule-insists-he-is-innocent-of-charges-20201114">directly affects Ace Magashule</a>, the party’s secretary-general. Magashule became the flag-bearer for the anti-Ramaphosa camp, both by default and personal ambition. </p>
<p>He and Ramaphosa are among the top six ANC office-bearers who were elected by marginal majorities <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-anc-has-a-new-leader-but-south-africa-remains-on-a-political-precipice-89248">in 2017</a>. </p>
<p>Magashule went on to appropriate the label of a champion for <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/columnists/guestcolumn/were-bound-together-by-spilt-blood-20180520-3">‘radical economic transformation’ (RET)</a> that Zuma had used in the latter parts of his term as his claim to <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/columnists/guestcolumn/were-bound-together-by-spilt-blood-20180520-3">political authenticity</a> within the ANC. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/395052/original/file-20210414-15-1mem8xf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/395052/original/file-20210414-15-1mem8xf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395052/original/file-20210414-15-1mem8xf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395052/original/file-20210414-15-1mem8xf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395052/original/file-20210414-15-1mem8xf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395052/original/file-20210414-15-1mem8xf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395052/original/file-20210414-15-1mem8xf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">ANC secretary-general Ace Magashule in court on corruption charges in November 2020.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">EFE/EPA Conrad Bornman</span></span>
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<p>The RET faction frames itself as the true champion of the interests of the majority of South Africans, engaged in a battle against <a href="https://theconversation.com/white-monopoly-capital-an-excuse-to-avoid-south-africas-real-problems-75143">‘white monopoly capital’</a>, of which Ramaphosa and his associates are allegedly stooges. </p>
<p>Magashule’s political ambition is now threatened by <a href="https://mg.co.za/politics/2021-02-19-with-50-more-charges-magashule-gets-august-court-date/">charges of corruption</a>. </p>
<p>Ramaphosa drew a line in the sand after the March NEC meeting. Backed by the NEC, he said Magashule was being given 30 days to step aside or face suspension and disciplinary action.</p>
<p>I argue that this represents a tilt in the balance of power in the party, albeit not an irreversible and uncontested gain. The Magashule camp continues to fight back, for now in more muted terms.</p>
<p>These dynamics within the ANC are a core theme in my new <a href="http://witspress.co.za/catalogue/precarious-power/">book</a>, <em>Precarious Power: Compliance and Discontent under Ramaphosa’s ANC</em>. The analysis shows how the <a href="https://www.elections.org.za/NPEDashboard/app/dashboard.html">electorally dominant</a> ANC is racked by the existence of discordant camps. It concludes that the party’s hold on political power is precarious, despite it towering over the opposition. The centre holds because of the leaders’ need to keep the party dominant and in command of the state.</p>
<h2>Faustian pact</h2>
<p>A root cause of the stalemate in the party is that Ramaphosa won the party presidency by a <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2017-12-18-cyril-ramaphosa-wins-anc-presidential-race/">slender, opaque margin</a> in 2017. To consolidate his position, he was forced to make uncomfortable compromises. He committed to party unity above all else. The phrase <a href="https://cisp.cachefly.net/assets/articles/attachments/84207_201206_nec_political_overview_final.pdf">‘unity is paramount’</a> became his common refrain.</p>
<p>But this was a Faustian pact with Magashule, who won the powerful position of secretary-general by an even narrower <a href="https://ewn.co.za/2017/12/20/magashule-to-remain-anc-secretary-general-as-vote-discrepancy-clarified">margin</a> than Ramaphosa’s. The position means he effectively runs the organisation. It gives him a big influence over party campaigns and the ability to influence the composition of delegates to elective conferences, and the future leadership of the party.</p>
<p><a href="http://witspress.co.za/catalogue/precarious-power/">Precarious Power</a> explores events within the ANC and the country. It traces how and why Ramaphosa was forced to make piecemeal changes rather than pursue a more aggressive agenda to fix the country’s battered economy and stem widespread corruption as well as poor governance.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/392872/original/file-20210331-13-19utj2p.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/392872/original/file-20210331-13-19utj2p.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=932&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/392872/original/file-20210331-13-19utj2p.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=932&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/392872/original/file-20210331-13-19utj2p.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=932&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/392872/original/file-20210331-13-19utj2p.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1171&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/392872/original/file-20210331-13-19utj2p.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1171&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/392872/original/file-20210331-13-19utj2p.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1171&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p>The book sets out how the unity pledge hobbles Ramaphosa’s dual presidency of the party and South Africa. It tracks developments in the ANC factional battles. It shows that the divisive issues were in essence corruption and the capture of the state for private gain – disguised as ideology.</p>
<p>In Ramaphosa’s three years plus at the ANC’s helm, the “radical economic transformation” faction thrived and exploited his weaknesses. These include his wealth and links to big capital, and the dirt within his cleanup faction.</p>
<h2>Thwarting internal subversion</h2>
<p>Recent events regarding how to deal with corruption charges illustrate the unity curse that’s beset Ramaphosa since he became party president. </p>
<p>He finally has enough NEC backing to confront those who have attached themselves to Zuma’s legacy of imagined radicalism and a bent towards corruption.</p>
<p>The NEC decisions taken in March are designed to close down the spaces in which the Magashule faction has operated. The NEC decided – among other things – that no ANC member should associate with the “radical economic transformation” faction, and that the party would not tolerate the use of its resources and premises for the faction’s activities.</p>
<h2>What next</h2>
<p>It’s too early to say whether Ramaphosa has abandoned his quest for unity above all else. But what are the chances that the ANC might split - yet again? </p>
<p>In my book I explore whether we may see a repeat of what happened in 2008 when some senior ANC figures broke away to form the <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/328066196_The_formation_of_the_Congress_of_the_People_COPE_A_realistic_challenge_to_the_ANC">Congress of the People</a>. This was followed by the formation of the <a href="https://effonline.org/">Economic Freedom Fighters</a> (EFF) in 2013 by former leaders of the ANC Youth League who had been either expelled or suspended.</p>
<p>I argue that ownership of the ANC political brand remains critical. Thus, there is unlikely to be another split. The alternative is for those unhappy with Ramaphosa, or desperate to escape accountability for corruption, to continue to fight for control of the party from the inside.</p>
<p><em>Precarious Power: Compliance and Discontent under Ramaphosa’s ANC is published by <a href="http://witspress.co.za/">Wits University Press</a></em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/158251/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Susan Booysen is affiliated with the Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection. The book Precarious Power was researched and written in her only time using her University of the Witwatersrand resources.</span></em></p>Ramaphosa’s rise to power in 2018 offered South Africans hope that he would end corruption. Indeed, he made promises to do so. But he has met with resistance, especially within the ANC.Susan Booysen, Visiting Professor and Professor Emeritus, University of the Witwatersrand, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1397892020-06-03T14:55:19Z2020-06-03T14:55:19ZSouth Africa’s lockdown: a great start, but then a misreading of how society works<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/339256/original/file-20200602-133902-hefl0x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The ban on the sale of alcohol has been partially lifted, but tobacco remains prohibited. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Roger Sedres/Gallo Images via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>South Africa’s government is proud that its response to Covid-19 relies on science. It might be prouder if it was also guided by knowledge of how society works.</p>
<p>When South Africa’s Covid-19 lockdown began <a href="https://www.gov.za/speeches/president-cyril-ramaphosa-extension-coronavirus-covid-19-lockdown-end-april-9-apr-2020-0000">on 27 March</a>, opposition from some quarters was inevitable. What was not expected was that the most vehement resistance would be aimed at a <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/business-report/companies/gloves-are-off-as-british-american-tobacco-sa-goes-to-court-over-cigarette-ban-48770972">ban on selling tobacco products</a>. Only around <a href="https://bhekisisa.org/article/2018-12-05-00-how-many-people-in-south-africa-smoke/">1 in 5 South Africans smoke</a> and previous government limits on smoking were not controversial.</p>
<p>The ban generated such heat because, when the government <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2020-04-23-ramaphosa-announces-gradual-easing-of-covid-19-lockdown-in-south-africa/">began relaxing the lockdown</a>, President Cyril Ramaphosa announced that tobacco sales would be allowed. Then, at the apparent prompting of the minister responsible for lockdown rules, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2020-04-29-level-four-lockdown-dlamini-zuma-stubs-out-south-africas-hopes-for-a-puff/">the decision was reversed</a>; the ban is still in force.</p>
<p>Dlamini-Zuma has an unfortunate tendency to lecture rather than persuade and her role seems to have turned muttered resentment among some into loud anger, directed not only at the tobacco ban but the <a href="https://businesstech.co.za/news/government/397953/da-to-challenge-irrational-lockdown-rules-in-court/">entire lockdown</a>. And, since the loudest opposition has come from <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2020-05-28-tobacco-ban-unpacking-dlamini-zumas-defence/">white suburbanites</a>, it has revived the familiar conservative argument that a <a href="https://www.biznews.com/thought-leaders/2017/11/15/nanny-state-sa-tobacco-laws">“nanny state”</a> is telling citizens that it knows more about what is good for them than they do.</p>
<p>This complaint says more about the prejudices of those who make it than reality.</p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/lockdown-is-riling-black-and-white-south-africans-could-this-be-a-reset-moment-138044">Lockdown is riling black and white South Africans: could this be a reset moment?</a>
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<p>All governments restrict citizens to protect their health and safety: this is why we have traffic lights. And all democracies allow governments to restrict freedoms to protect citizens in an emergency – by, for example, cordoning off areas hit by fire and flood. </p>
<p>The “nanny state” argument expresses a belief that some of us should not be told what to do by those they consider their inferiors.</p>
<p>But this does not mean health measures will be obeyed. It is here that knowledge of society is important.</p>
<h2>Erosion of legitimacy</h2>
<p>Addictive substances harm health. But knowledge of how humans act in society tells us that, precisely because they are addictive. They can be regulated but <a href="https://theconversation.com/legal-highs-need-regulation-not-an-outright-ban-32462">banning them never works</a> since addicts find other ways to feed their addiction. </p>
<p>Besides the oft-quoted <a href="https://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/alcohol-prohibition-was-failure">failure of American prohibition</a>, when white governments in South Africa banned black people from consuming <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/183619?seq=1">“European liquor”</a>, this created <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/41143613?seq=4#metadata_info_tab_contents">shebeens</a> (speakeasies) which remain a feature.</p>
<p>South Africa’s bans on cigarette and alcohol sales <a href="https://www.fin24.com/Economy/South-Africa/cigarette-ban-is-failing-can-create-lasting-illicit-market-study-20200516">prompted an illicit cigarette trade</a>, <a href="https://businesstech.co.za/news/business/389117/16-liquor-stores-looted-in-the-western-cape-since-lockdown/">the looting of liquor stores</a> and a <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/south-africa/2020-04-28-pineapple-sales-soar-to-90000-in-a-day-from-10000-amid-booze-ban/">sharp rise in the price of pineapples</a> which were used to ferment beer. Dlamini-Zuma’s belief that the ban will prompt “a sizeable number” of people <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/south-africa/2020-05-27-this-is-why-we-banned-cigarette-sales-nkosazana-dlamini-zuma-tells-court/">to give up smoking</a> is contradicted by knowledge of society.</p>
<p>This knowledge also tells us that, even among the vast majority who are not addicts, restrictions will fail if they lack legitimacy: people may not like obeying them, but, if they accept they are there for a good reason, they will comply. If they don’t, even thousands of troops will not get them to obey.</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/pandemics-dont-heal-divisions-they-reveal-them-south-africa-is-a-case-in-point-134002">Pandemics don’t heal divisions -- they reveal them. South Africa is a case in point</a>
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<p>South Africa’s lockdown rules started with high legitimacy. But it has been eroded and has now dissolved.</p>
<p>The country locked down early, when cases and deaths were <a href="https://www.gov.za/speeches/president-cyril-ramaphosa-extension-coronavirus-covid-19-lockdown-end-april-9-apr-2020-0000">relatively few</a>. This creates a legitimacy problem: people must sacrifice yet they do not see the fatalities and overloaded hospitals which influenced citizens of some European countries. But this problem was largely solved because citizens knew – and feared - what was happening elsewhere.</p>
<p>Legitimacy could have remained high if, like some other countries, South Africa’s had done what early lockdowns are meant to do - cut infections and deaths to a handful.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/339186/original/file-20200602-133875-7t2ddt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/339186/original/file-20200602-133875-7t2ddt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/339186/original/file-20200602-133875-7t2ddt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/339186/original/file-20200602-133875-7t2ddt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/339186/original/file-20200602-133875-7t2ddt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=454&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/339186/original/file-20200602-133875-7t2ddt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=454&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/339186/original/file-20200602-133875-7t2ddt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=454&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Cooperative Governance minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Luiz Rampelotto/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images</span></span>
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<p>But this was never an option because the scientists who advise the government insisted that restrictions were not meant to stop the virus transmitting, merely to slow it down so that, when the “inevitable” surge arrived, <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2020-04-14-lockdown-has-bought-us-time-expert-says-as-sa-bucks-the-trend/">the health system was ready</a>.
They have not been challenged to defend this view because the debate never asks scientists difficult questions. An illustrative example is the claim (which she later clarified) by Professor Glenda Gray, chair of the country’s Medical Research Council, that Soweto’s Baragwanath hospital had <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/SouthAfrica/News/unscientific-and-nonsensical-top-scientific-adviser-slams-governments-lockdown-strategy-20200516">no malnutrition cases before the lockdown</a>. But it has created a legitimacy nightmare.</p>
<p>By Ramaphosa’s <a href="https://ewn.co.za/2020/05/31/president-s-notes-ramaphosa-s-interview-with-editors">own admission</a>, South Africa did not use its lockdown to establish the testing and tracing capacity which allowed some countries to beat back Covid-19. But, outside Western Cape Province, it restricted cases to about 11 000 and under 200 deaths <a href="https://sacoronavirus.co.za/category/press-releases-and-notices/">by the end of May</a>, figures similar to South Korea’s <a href="https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/south-korea/">successful fight against the virus</a>. Even in the Western Cape, there are a <a href="https://www.moneyweb.co.za/news/south-africa/south-africas-covid-19-deaths-surpass-700/">few hundred deaths</a>, not the thousands seen elsewhere in the world.</p>
<p>So, the lockdown has been effective enough to ensure that its opponents can demand an end to restrictions without seeming callous. But it has not been effective enough to ensure the drop in infections and deaths which the <a href="https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/technical-guidance">World Health Organisation</a> – and, initially, the chair of the government’s own <a href="https://news365.co.za/salim-abdool-karims-f/">medical advisory council</a> – say are needed to phase out restrictions.</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/coronavirus-corruption-in-health-care-could-get-in-the-way-of-nigerias-response-136913">Coronavirus: corruption in health care could get in the way of Nigeria's response</a>
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<p>The legitimacy which comes from victory over the virus is not available and the official insistence that the restrictions are not meant to stop transmission has handed opponents a good reason to demand that they end even when infections are rising.</p>
<p>Legitimacy has not been eroded among most citizens, who remain deeply concerned about Covid-19. But it has been weakened sufficiently in the policy debate to create an orgy of interest group lobbying for an end to restrictions.</p>
<p>Business began pressing for freedom to operate and has <a href="https://af.reuters.com/article/commoditiesNews/idAFL8N2DE112">largely succeeded</a>. This set off a chain reaction in which, once one lobby wins, the others smell blood and demand that they too be free to operate.</p>
<p>This lobbying has replaced the veneer of science shrouding government decisions: concessions seem based purely on who shouts loudest. Domestic business travel <a href="https://businesstech.co.za/news/government/403657/level-3-lockdown-rules-in-south-africa-here-are-all-the-changes-from-today/">is allowed</a>, which may allow the virus to spread; religious services are opened although they have been <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/south-africa/2020-03-20-entire-church-congregation-being-traced-in-response-to-coronavirus-in-free-state/">prime spreaders</a> of the virus <a href="https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-05-18/mendocino-county-church-service-linked-to-coronavirus-cluster">everywhere</a>; the government has tried to open schools although nearly 2 000 Covid-19 cases are below age 19. Only the tobacco ban remains.</p>
<h2>What’s been missing</h2>
<p>But the legitimacy of measures to fight Covid-19 are more important than ever because the only chance of curbing it is strict observance by businesses and other institutions of health measures.</p>
<p>The government is reduced to doing what it always does when it loses control – telling citizens they must look after themselves. Because people are worried by Covid-19, those who have access to trade unions or other forms of influence may do that. But, if the virus’s spread is stopped, it will be because people fear it, not because they believe that government measures are legitimate.</p>
<p>This might have been avoided if the government paid as much attention to knowledge of society as it says it is paying to science.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/139789/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Steven Friedman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>South Africa’s lockdown rules started with high legitimacy. But it has been eroded and has now dissolved.Steven Friedman, Professor of Political Studies, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1399912020-06-03T14:45:26Z2020-06-03T14:45:26ZCourt throws South Africa’s lockdown exit strategy into disarray. But it got it wrong<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/339529/original/file-20200603-130903-10r366w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South Africa's professional surfers have been allowed back in the water. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Brenton Geach/Gallo Images via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>A South African High Court has declared the government’s lockdown regulations <a href="http://www.saflii.org/za/cases/ZAGPPHC/2020/184.pdf">unconstitutional</a> and, therefore, invalid, driving a coach and horses through its COVID-19 strategy. </p>
<p>Justice Norman Davis found that both the <a href="https://www.gov.za/documents/disaster-management-act-regulations-alert-level-3-during-coronavirus-covid-19-lockdown-28">level 3</a> and <a href="https://www.gov.za/speeches/minister-senzo-mchunu-level-4-risk-adjusted-measures-public-service-response-covid-19-8-may">level 4</a> regulations are “irrational”. The government has <a href="https://www.gov.za/Coronavirus">five COVID-19 alert levels</a>, from level 5 down to level 1, when most normal activity can resume. </p>
<p>After <a href="https://www.gov.za/speeches/president-cyril-ramaphosa-extension-coronavirus-covid-19-lockdown-end-april-9-apr-2020-0000">two months</a> of enduring one of the most stringent lockdowns of any country, there have been signs of restlessness in some communities. As the government added greater detail to the regulations, when the country moved from level 5 to level 3, the credibility of restrictions has been stretched.</p>
<p>But the legal and governance impact of this week’s <a href="http://www.saflii.org/za/cases/ZAGPPHC/2020/184.pdf">judgment</a> is far-reaching. It will heap further unwelcome pressure onto a government that is already under intense pressure as it tries to navigate a complex, wholly unfamiliar and ever-changing decision-making terrain.</p>
<p>The judgment declares that the regulations are invalid. But, with the exception of some, it suspends the declaration of invalidity for 14 days to allow the Minister of Cooperative Governance, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, to</p>
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<p>review, amend and republish the regulations (with) due consideration to the limitation each regulation has on the rights guaranteed in the Bill of Rights contained in the constitution.</p>
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<p>This requires the government to redo the work that it has done in preparing, and then promulgating, the regulations. It also creates a new layer of uncertainty to an already highly fluid situation.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/rule-of-law-has-moved-centre-stage-in-lockdown-what-it-is-and-why-it-matters-139045">Rule of law has moved centre stage in lockdown: what it is and why it matters</a>
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<p>During the 14-day period, the newly instituted <a href="https://www.gov.za/documents/disaster-management-act-regulations-alert-level-3-during-coronavirus-covid-19-lockdown-28">level 3 regulations</a>, which reopened a large part of the economy and allowed the sale of alcohol, will remain in force. But, the judgment means that it will not be possible for the government to revert to the old level 4 regulations without a substantial rewrite.</p>
<p>An appeal by government to the Constitutional Court is highly likely, and highly desirable. It is hard to think of a more significant judgment in terms of how many people and how wide a sweep of the economy it affects. </p>
<p>But, in my view, the judgment is unconvincing in many respects and has applied the law incorrectly. </p>
<p>Given the stakes, it is important that it is properly understood and held up for public scrutiny. </p>
<h2>Rationality test</h2>
<p>For a government decision to be held by the court to be “irrational” does not mean that the court finds the decision itself to not be based on logical reasons or clear thinking.</p>
<p>Instead, the rationality test permits the court to review a decision based on an assessment of whether there is a rational connection between the government decision, the process used to reach it, and a legitimate government purpose.</p>
<p>The court notes that the government’s affidavit had argued that the “means justify the end” and, therefore, the regulations pass the rationality test. But, Justice Davis then observed that he wondered aloud during argument whether in fact the government actually intended to apply the Machiavellian notion of the “end justifies the means”.</p>
<p>As the judgment unfolds, it becomes increasingly clear that he takes a dim view of the reasonableness (not rationality) of a good deal of the government’s decision-making, thereby potentially confusing the law.</p>
<p>He finds, for example, that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Restricting the right to freedom of movement in order to limit contact with others in order to curtail the risks of spreading the virus is rational, but to restrict the hours of exercise to arbitrarily determined time period is completely irrational.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The court’s responsibility was to see if there was any rational connection between the decision and the purpose, not whether there was a better means of serving the end goal.</p>
<p>Moreover, it requires the court to examine with great precision each and every step of the decision-making process, and to assess the evidence of how the decision was taken and whether, in an objective sense, the decision was correctly deemed to be in service of the purpose. </p>
<p>Justice Davis’s judgment fails to do so. Although, if government did an inadequate job at placing sufficient evidence of their reasoning and decision-making process, then they are partly at least the architects of their own misfortune.</p>
<p>Regardless, Justice Davis appears to review both sets of regulations and then pick out the ones that displease him most in terms of whether they “make sense” to him or not, and to declare all of them invalid, and not just those that he has sought to apply the rationality test to.</p>
<p>The reference to evidence is scanty. For example, the court observes – without any citation – that millions of South Africans in the informal sector have less daily contact than people attending a funeral, making the “blanket ban” on them “appear to be irrational”.</p>
<h2>Holes in the argument</h2>
<p>The court describes the approach of the government as “a paternalistic approach, rather than a constitutionally justifiable approach”.</p>
<p>Paternalism may be politically or ideologically unattractive to some, especially libertarians. But, it is not, per se, a constitutionally impermissible policy or strategic position for the government to adopt, pandemic crisis or not.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/339534/original/file-20200603-130929-180zbbl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/339534/original/file-20200603-130929-180zbbl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/339534/original/file-20200603-130929-180zbbl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/339534/original/file-20200603-130929-180zbbl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/339534/original/file-20200603-130929-180zbbl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/339534/original/file-20200603-130929-180zbbl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/339534/original/file-20200603-130929-180zbbl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Waste recyclers queue for food handouts in Johannesburg as the nationwide lockdown left them unable to work.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">EFE-EPA/Kim Ludbrook</span></span>
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<p>The judgment may also be vulnerable to attack for adopting a simplistic approach to the “legitimate government purpose”, which it finds to be solely to contain the spread of the virus. This is a misunderstanding.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/numbers-can-kill-politicians-should-handle-south-africas-coronavirus-data-with-care-136587">Numbers can kill: politicians should handle South Africa's coronavirus data with care</a>
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<p>The risk-adjusted strategy that creates the framework of different COVID-19 alert levels, under the <a href="http://www.cogta.gov.za/cgta_2016/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/DISASTER-MANAGEMENT-ACT.pdf">Disaster Management Act 2002</a>, seeks to strike a balance at every stage of the unfolding crisis between competing and overlapping priorities. </p>
<p>This includes the public health priority of building capacity in the health system to absorb an inevitable rise in infections, and the duty of the state to protect lives and livelihoods.</p>
<p>The other puzzling aspect of the judgment relates to its approach to the Bill of Rights and possible limitation of the rights enshrined in it.</p>
<p>Clearly, the lockdown involved the limitation of certain “normal” freedoms. The question is whether the limitations are constitutionally permissible pursuant to the test set out in section 36 of the constitution. This requires that <a href="http://www.scielo.org.za/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1727-37812014000600002">such limitations be proportional</a>. This means that the government may use only the least restrictive measure for achieving its aim.</p>
<p>But, having found the regulations to be irrational and therefore invalid, the court had no need to consider whether they unjustifiably infringed any right protected in the Bill of Rights. Justice Davis bluntly finds that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>…in an overwhelming number of instances the Minister (sic) have not demonstrated that the limitation of the Constitutional rights already mentioned, have been justified in the context of section 36 of the Constitution.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Confusingly, the court order requires the government not to fix the impugned “irrationality” of the regulations, but instead to review them with regard to whether they may infringe the Bill of Rights. </p>
<h2>Rule of law</h2>
<p>Government lawyers, as well as cabinet ministers and officials, will be scratching their heads over this judgment. Not least because the notion of a “rationally justifiable” infringement of constitutional rights is a novel formulation.</p>
<p>Whether the judgment is overturned on appeal or not, what it shows – once again – is that South Africa’s rule of law and its judicial independence are alive and kicking.</p>
<p>At a time of such extreme crisis, courts may be inclined to give the government a little more latitude – such as the decision of the German Supreme Court last month, <a href="https://www.bundesverfassungsgericht.de/SharedDocs/Pressemitteilungen/DE/2020/bvg20-036.html">in finding</a> that its government has a wide scope for the assessment, evaluation and design of its COVID-19 response. </p>
<p>As South Africa’s Constitutional Court has found in <a href="http://www.saflii.org/za/cases/ZACC/2009/28.html">other cases</a> involving complex public policy and socio-economic rights, the more “polycentric” the governmental decision-making or policy choice, the more careful the court should be not to stray into the executive’s lane. Nothing could be as polycentric as COVID-19. </p>
<p>This is not to say that government should be given a free hand or a blank cheque. A state of national disaster cannot permit lawmaking through the back door, nor enable a slippery slope into autocracy. Far from it. As the High Court judgment shows, government will have to work hard to ensure that it is acting within the law, respecting hard won rights every step of the way.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/139991/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Richard Calland is a Founding Partner in political risk consultancy, The Paternoster Group, and a member of the Advisory Council of the Council for the Advancement of the South African Constitution.</span></em></p>The judgment creates a new layer of uncertainty in an already highly fluid situation and heaps further unwelcome pressure onto government.Richard Calland, Associate Professor in Public Law, University of Cape TownLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1180832019-05-30T15:05:20Z2019-05-30T15:05:20ZCabinet picks show Ramaphosa and allies believe they’re firmly in control<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/277224/original/file-20190530-69051-yzr9b7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Deputy President David Mabuza, right, could pose a potential threat from within the ANC to President Cyril Ramaphosa, left.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">GovernmentZA/Flickr</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has <a href="http://www.thepresidency.gov.za/press-statements/statement-appointment-members-national-executive">selected a Cabinet</a> which shows that he and his allies believe they are now firmly in control of the governing party and can shape the government’s agenda. What is not yet clear is whether they are right.</p>
<p>Ramaphosa’s choice of cabinet was particularly important because government in South Africa is at a crossroads. </p>
<p>The governing African National Congress (ANC) has been the site of a factional battle between the president’s allies and supporters of former president Jacob Zuma. Ramaphosa’s group has vowed to stop the misuse of public money and trust of which the Zuma faction is accused. But their credibility is dented by, among other factors, the claim that they are too weak to counter the Zuma faction’s influence over the ANC. Their detractors point to the continued presence in the national government of ministers in the Zuma faction who are accused of abuses.</p>
<p>A key indicator of whether the government can win back public trust is, therefore, who Ramaphosa appoints to his Cabinet.</p>
<p>Before the announcement, he and his allies seemed to face an impossible task. They had to make good on his promise to <a href="https://www.fin24.com/Economy/ramaphosa-has-full-anc-backing-to-shrink-cabinet-20190510">trim down the Cabinet</a>. But they must know that, in any governing party, fewer jobs means more resentment: one reason why Zuma became ANC president at the expense of his predecessor Thabo Mbeki is that Mbeki rarely replaced ministers and so ANC politicians believed that their job prospects were slim until he went. </p>
<p>Second, they had to meet public demands to remove Zuma faction ministers. But governing party leaders who deny posts to their opponents within the party are likely to be accused of purging them and might be resisted by anyone outside their faction.</p>
<h2>A clear message</h2>
<p>Given these obstacles, the Cabinet appointments send a clear message that Ramaphosa and his allies believe that, having improved the <a href="https://www.elections.org.za/NPEDashboard/app/dashboard.html">ANC’s vote</a> compared to the 2016 local government elections – the first time in 15 years that it did better in any election compared to the previous one – they are firmly in control. </p>
<p>Only five of the 28 ministers are linked to the Zuma faction: one of them, <a href="https://www.pa.org.za/person/nkosazana-dlamini-zuma/">Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma</a>, is probably no longer aligned to it. She was the faction’s <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2017-12-08-00-no-deal-the-anc-battle-is-on">choice for president</a> but was not overly enthusiastic about its style of politics then and seems even less so now. </p>
<p>So only one in seven ministers are aligned to Zuma’s group and none are in posts regarded within government as senior positions. The Cabinet has been reduced although, as Ramaphosa acknowledged when he announced the appointments, <a href="https://ewn.co.za/2019/05/30/ramaphosa-should-be-commended-for-reducing-cabinet-analyst">not as much as he would like</a>. So unconcerned was Ramaphosa about resistance within the ANC that he appointed an opposition politician, former Cape Town mayor <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/i-have-no-plans-to-give-up-fighting-minister-patricia-de-lille-20190530">Patricia de Lille</a>, as his public works minister.</p>
<p>Ramaphosa and his faction did not ignore resistance within the ANC. The Cabinet was announced five days after he was inaugurated, an unusually long delay: the announcement was twice postponed on the day. This signalled that there had been intense bargaining within the ANC. </p>
<p>The Ramaphosa group lost one important battle. They had hoped to drastically cut the number of deputy ministers but reports suggest that they bowed to resistance from various lobby groups, among them the Zuma faction: there are 34 deputies, <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-south-africa-would-do-well-to-fire-all-its-deputy-ministers-58809">three fewer</a> than under Zuma. At least 12 of them are in the Zuma faction.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-ramaphosa-had-to-delay-appointing-south-africas-next-cabinet-117923">Why Ramaphosa had to delay appointing South Africa's next cabinet</a>
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<p>But their strategy seems to have been to give ground only if they believed this would not prevent them from appointing the Cabinet they needed to pursue their agenda. So, as they did when Ramaphosa chose his first Cabinet, they appointed Zuma faction members in posts which are not central to their plans or as deputy ministers, who are not members of the Cabinet and have no say over what it decides.</p>
<h2>Potential threat</h2>
<p>The Cabinet signals to the Zuma faction that the Ramaphosa group believes their star is waning and that they are not strong enough to turn the tide. They are probably right.</p>
<p>First, the election was a huge defeat for the Zuma faction. Three parties formed by or including politicians linked to the faction made no headway in the May election. While parties formed by supporters of factions which lost ANC battles won over 8% in 2009 and 6% in 2014, the three parties – <a href="https://www.atmovement.org/">African Transformation Movement</a>, <a href="https://acmovement.org.za/">African Content Movement </a> and <a href="https://blf.org.za/">Black First, Land First</a> – polled 0,6% between them. </p>
<p>In the North West province, the removal of a <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2018-06-15-revealed-why-supra-mahumapelo-was-removed-as-north-west-premier/">Zuma faction premier</a> and his replacement by a <a href="https://city-press.news24.com/News/mokgoro-shuts-door-on-supra-allies-as-he-makes-sweeping-changes-in-north-west-20190528">Ramaphosa faction appointment</a> boosted an ANC vote which had fallen below 50% in by-elections <a href="https://www.elections.org.za/NPEDashboard/app/dashboard.html">to over 60%</a>. If they were to lead the ANC again, it would probably lose its majority and most active ANC members must know this.</p>
<p>Second, Ramaphosa’s government has <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2019-02-07-special-npa-unit-to-deal-with-zondo-commission-evidence-to-be-set-up">boosted the capacity</a> of the <a href="https://www.npa.gov.za/">National Prosecuting Authority</a> to prosecute crimes committed by politicians accused of misusing public office. There are signs that key Zuma faction politicians are in the firing line. This will hamper their political role and further damage their credibility.</p>
<p>But there is a potential threat to Ramaphosa from within the ANC. <a href="http://www.presidency.gov.za/profiles/deputy-president-david-mabuza%3A-profile">Deputy president David Mabuza</a> was a key member of the Zuma faction. He abandoned it to encourage unity between the factions and was largely <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times/news/2017-12-22-how-david-mabuza-outplayed-the-ndz-camp/">responsible for Ramaphosa’s victory</a> because he allowed his provincial delegates to vote as they pleased rather than delivering Dlamini-Zuma the block vote he had promised.</p>
<p>Mabuza is now politically isolated: the Zuma faction feel he betrayed him while the Ramaphosa faction never trusted him. But he seems bent on reinventing himself. In the weeks before the Cabinet appointment, it was rumoured that he would not be reappointed. He reacted by <a href="https://www.news24.com/Analysis/explained-with-mabuza-standing-back-ramaphosa-will-have-to-move-fast-this-is-how-20190522">delaying his swearing</a> in as a member of Parliament and appearing before the ANC integrity commission to answer allegations of corruption <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/04/world/africa/south-africa-anc-david-mabuza.html">published in the New York Times</a>. His aim was presumably to discredit the claims and so present himself as a champion of clean government and a plausible next president.</p>
<h2>Shifting battle</h2>
<p>His plan worked in the short-term – he is back as deputy president. Ironically that may make it harder for him to build support. ANC history shows that candidates who are removed from government office have plenty of time to campaign for support; some have used this to win election to national or provincial office. Mabuza will now have less time on his hands to campaign behind the scenes as he tackles his governmental duties.</p>
<p>The odds seem stacked against Mabuza if he is eyeing the presidency, for himself or his ally <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/politics/anc54-meet-paul-mashatile-the-man-who-will-control-the-anc-purse-12468701">Paul Mashatile</a>, the ANC’s treasurer. But he still seems a likelier contender for power than the Zuma faction. If he does aspire to lead the ANC, the threat to the Ramaphosa group may shift from the Zuma faction to Mabuza.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/118083/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Steven Friedman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Cabinet signals to the Zuma faction that the Ramaphosa group believes their star is waning and that they are not strong enough to turn the tide.Steven Friedman, Professor of Political Studies, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1054332018-10-28T09:20:46Z2018-10-28T09:20:46ZANC will go to the polls with only one major asset: its president Ramaphosa<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/241666/original/file-20181022-105773-mjwpek.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South African President Cyril Ramaphosa is now more popular than his governing party, the ANC. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EFE-EPA/Stringer</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>It is common cause that the performance of South Africa’s government, led by the African National Congress (ANC), has been worse than abysmal. Under former President Jacob Zuma, ANC functionaries <a href="https://pari.org.za/betrayal-promise-report/">pillaged</a> numerous institutions of state. They enabled state owned institutions to be looted, mismanaged the provision of <a href="https://theconversation.com/local-government-in-south-africa-is-in-crisis-how-it-can-be-fixed-97331">basic services</a> and presided over an alarming downward spiral of the <a href="http://www.saiia.org.za/research/the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly-an-economic-review-of-zumas-presidency/">economy</a>.</p>
<p>Evidence keeps mounting of dishonesty and profligacy. The unfolding scandal around <a href="https://www.news24.com/Tags/Companies/vbs_mutual_bank">VBS Bank</a> has shone a <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/anc-integrity-commission-has-started-looking-into-vbs-scandal-20181022">spotlight on the ANC</a> as a nest of thieves. In addition, a <a href="https://www.sastatecapture.org.za/">commission of inquiry</a> is relentlessly exposing how Zuma’s henchmen <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2018-10-21-magashule-must-account-at-zondo-commission-for-free-state-state-capture-says-da/">amassed huge riches</a> from <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2018-09-14-00-definition-of-state-capture">state capture</a>. And another <a href="https://ewn.co.za/Topic/Sars-commission-of-inquiry">inquiry into the South African Revenue Services</a> is revealing how the state’s capacity to raise revenue from the politically powerful and influential was systematically undermined.</p>
<p>All in all, the ANC has completely forfeited its right to be reelected 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. </p>
<p>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 – precisely because he is far <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2018-09-21-as-internal-polls-confirm-his-personal-popularity-emboldened-ramaphosa-moves-to-outflank-plotters-cabal/">more popular than the party</a>. Indeed, South Africa can expect the 2019 election to bring the most presidential-style campaign yet.</p>
<p>The irony is that Ramaphosa will privately welcome a smaller rather than a larger 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 that 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.</p>
<h2>A troubled party</h2>
<p>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 <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/meet-the-ancs-new-top-6-20171218">excruciatingly narrow vote</a>. He lacks control over the party’s national executive (its highest decision-making body between conferences) where Zuma’s supporters remain strong. And, he is facing a robust fight back campaign by Zuma’s acolytes in provinces around the country. </p>
<p>Zuma himself, like <a href="https://www.enotes.com/homework-help/what-importance-banquo-s-ghost-9755">Banquo’s ghost</a>, 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 <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times/news/2018-09-08-exposed-jacob-zuma-plot-to-oust-cyril-ramaphosa/">pulling the strings of his puppets</a>. </p>
<p>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 <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/political-killings-in-kzn-continue-strongly-condemned-20180512">violent</a>, and overall, very probably, embarrassing. </p>
<p>Nonetheless, come the election campaign, it is more than a little likely that 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 to run an election campaign, and how to induce or scare its popular constituency into voting for it. </p>
<p>Even so, it is uncomfortably aware that its <a href="https://theconversation.com/jacob-zuma-likes-to-be-cast-as-a-man-of-the-people-but-is-he-50665">base is eroding</a>. 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 <a href="http://www.africansunmedia.co.za/Sun-e-Shop/Product-Details/tabid/78/ProductID/535/Default.aspx">wearing tired and thin</a>; and the different commissions of inquiry are going to uncover more and more dirt as the campaign goes on. </p>
<p>So, what is the party going to be doing to win back the vote of the disillusioned?</p>
<h2>The campaign</h2>
<p>ANC elections head Fikile Mbalula recently acknowledged that the party has allowed itself to become mired in <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2018-10-11-heads-will-roll-over-vbs-scandal-vows-fikile-mbalula/">“the sins of incumbency”</a>, to have 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, and indicate that the party’s bad apples will be thrown out. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, in all humility, the ANC is promising to renew its bonds with the people. This will involve a country wide process of consultation with what Mbalula has referred to as “strategic sectors of society” in a bid to “broaden and deepen participation” the drawing up of a <a href="https://citizen.co.za/news/south-africa/2022402/anc-changes-tack-with-cyrils-peoples-manifesto/">“People’s Manifesto”</a>. </p>
<p>Amid all this, the party will be promising to build on Ramaphosa’s various reform initiatives to return the economy to growth. </p>
<p>The ANC’s major problem is that none of this is going to be particularly convincing. The gospel of the party’s commitment to virtue and renewal is going to be a hard sell to a corruption-weary electorate. </p>
<p>Its base divided and increasingly cynical, the ANC knows that it is going to have to look for support beyond its normal boundaries. It knows all too well that it is likely to lose important ground to the radical Economic Freedom Fighters. It knows that it may have a hard time in getting the voters out in KwaZulu-Natal, where support for Zuma remains strong. It knows that many of its traditional supporters may be tempted to record their disgust with the party by staying at home. </p>
<p>Given all this, the ANC knows that it will have to play to Ramaphosa as its one major asset. A Ramaphosa-centred strategy is likely to work because there is no credible alternative as a party of government to the ANC. </p>
<p>The main opposition Democratic Alliance will again go unchallenged in the Western Cape, and may do surprisingly well in provincial elections in provinces such as Gauteng and Eastern Cape, based upon its “better-than-the-ANC” 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.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/105433/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Roger Southall receives funding from the National Research Foundation. </span></em></p>The ANC has lost so much support among its traditional voters it’s now forced to look beyond them to retain power.Roger Southall, Professor of Sociology, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/977892018-06-12T14:24:21Z2018-06-12T14:24:21ZRamaphoria in South Africa: just a honeymoon, or the start of true love?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/222198/original/file-20180607-137312-22d1j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The public liking towards South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has benefited the ANC.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">GCIS</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>As 2017 drew to a close South Africa’s governing party, the African National Congress (ANC), had reached <a href="http://citizensurveys.net/sa-citizens-survey/">the nadir</a> of its popularity with voters. The decline was driven by public hostility towards <a href="https://theconversation.com/survey-shows-zuma-and-ancs-mutual-dance-to-the-bottom-92126">Jacob Zuma</a>, then president of both the party and the country.</p>
<p>The good ship ANC wasn’t quite sinking, but it was seriously listing. Then Cyril Ramaphosa became the party and the state’s new leader – and attention turned to whether he could steer the ANC into calmer waters.</p>
<p>The results of our new <a href="http://citizensurveys.net/sa-citizens-survey/">South African Citizens Survey fieldwork</a> – conducted in March 2018 – suggest Ramaphosa has done well so far. Compared to the 23% of all citizens aged 18 and over who said they approved of Zuma’s performance in January and February, almost two-thirds (68%) approved of Ramaphosa’s performance.</p>
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<p>Ramaphosa’s rise in popularity has also helped the ANC. The proportion of people who held a positive image of the party rose from 42% (in November 2017) to 68%. </p>
<p>Such a sharp reversal might simply be chalked up to the usual <a href="https://presidential-power.com/?p=7692">“honeymoon phenomenon</a> historically observed by public opinion polls around the world with new presidents. Even if he’d done nothing at all, Ramaphosa stood to benefit from any comparison with his deeply unpopular predecessor.</p>
<p>But, far from doing nothing, Ramaphosa has acted swiftly in several areas since he took the oath of office <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2018-02-15-the-oath-is-sealed-ramaphosa-is-officially-the-president-of-south-africa/">on February 15</a>. These surely account for a large part of the the good feelings in which he now basks. </p>
<h2>Ramaphoria at work</h2>
<p>The population’s elation about Ramaphosa, tagged as <a href="https://www.fanews.co.za/article/investments/8/economy/1021/south-africa-ramaphoria-and-the-global-backdrop/24085">Ramaphoria</a>, didn’t just begin when he inherited the mantle of high office. His popularity had already begun to rise in mid-2017 (see Figure 1) when his campaign to lead the ANC <a href="http://ramaphosa.org.za/cyril-ramaphosa-website-siyavuma-anc-2017-campaign/">swung into high gear</a>.</p>
<p>During the April to June 2017 polling period, Ramaphosa and his main competitor for party leader, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, enjoyed equal levels of (un)popularity among the electorate. Their favourability ratings were just 34% and 31%, respectively. </p>
<p>Ramaphosa’s numbers increased to 47% during the October-December fieldwork, on the eve of the <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/54th-national-conference">ANC National Conference</a> in December. They kept on climbing in the new year, to 60% in the January - March 2018 survey. Importantly, positive views of Ramapahosa rose sharply across all age and racial groups, and in all nine provinces. </p>
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<p>There are at least two different ways to explain this upward trend. One account would focus on the widely cited explanation for Ramaphosa’s ascendance to the ANC presidency. That was his ability to strike bargains with other party power brokers who then delivered their provincial delegations on <a href="https://www.businesslive.co.za/fm/features/cover-story/2017-12-21-analysis-how-cyril-ramaphosa-won-the-anc-sort-of/">the day of the key vote</a>, making him ANC president. By extension, this logic would also presume that these power brokers were able to shift mass opinion among their respective constituencies.</p>
<p>But such a view would fail to explain why the largest increases in Ramaphosa’s favourability since mid-2017 occurred in the Free State and North West, two of the provinces run by members of the so-called <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/2017/12/19/the-rise-of-the-premier-league-and-their-failed-bid-to-install-ndz_a_23310554/">Premier League</a> of pro-Zuma provincial leaders.</p>
<p>That’s where a second account comes in. This would focus on Ramaphosa’s very conscious attempt to court public opinion directly and to reacquaint himself with average voters. Indeed, Ramaphosa’s <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2017-11-10-00-on-the-hustings-with-cr17">"CR17” campaign</a> for the party presidency was organised, well-staffed, and built around a widely publicised speaking tour that projected his image as a leader.</p>
<h2>The change factor</h2>
<p>Just as important was what Ramaphosa said: particularly, his decision to frame his candidacy as a departure from the “normal politics” of the ANC under Zuma. He ran as a <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/2017/12/18/how-he-won-nenegate-convinced-cr17-to-mobilise_a_23310334/">“change” candidate</a> committed to clean government. </p>
<p>He launched this arm of his campaign in April 2017 at the late South African Communist Party leader Chris Hani’s <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/full-speech-by-cyril-ramaphosa-at-chris-hani-memorial-lecture-20170423">memorial lecture</a> with a sharp attack on Zuma and the <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/3-arrested-in-hawks-gupta-raids-20180214">Guptas</a>, Zuma’s friends who are accused of have <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/download-the-full-state-of-capture-pdf-20161102">captured the South African state</a>. </p>
<p>Given the sourness of the public mood at that time, an attack on the sitting president was not an especially daring act. As of April 2017, 70% of South Africans surveyed said Zuma should resign his position as State President.</p>
<p>But it surely was an exercise in courage to make this speech in a forum of the <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/kids/tripartite-alliance">ANC-led tripartite governing alliance</a> – and to say it as a deputy president who could be easily fired by a president who had already <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2017-10-17-zuma-announces-cabinet-reshuffle/">sacked senior cabinet ministers</a>.</p>
<p>Our data suggests that voters had been waiting for a clear signal that Ramaphosa was not a core part of the Zuma network. Voter ratings of Ramaphosa only began to move upward after that speech. Indeed, as Figure 3 shows, until that point Ramaphosa had enjoyed only slightly higher ratings among voters who wanted Zuma to stay in office, compared to those who wanted Zuma to resign. </p>
<p>After his speech at the Hani memorial his popularity rose sharply among the majority of South Africans who wanted Zuma to go.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/222549/original/file-20180611-191959-1ldvbhf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/222549/original/file-20180611-191959-1ldvbhf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=331&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/222549/original/file-20180611-191959-1ldvbhf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=331&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/222549/original/file-20180611-191959-1ldvbhf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=331&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/222549/original/file-20180611-191959-1ldvbhf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/222549/original/file-20180611-191959-1ldvbhf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/222549/original/file-20180611-191959-1ldvbhf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<h2>Towards a lasting relationship</h2>
<p>The Ramaphosa campaign correctly read the mood of the electorate in 2017 and strategically positioned itself accordingly. It was this crucial decision, as much as any ephemeral “honeymoon” effect, that accounts for the good feelings in which the president now basks. </p>
<p>If he can maintain the focus on clean government, and show that he is committed to fixing the sins of the Zuma years, chances are that the current levels of Ramaphoria" might be more than just a brief honeymoon, but the “beginning of a <a href="https://www.scpr.org/blogs/offramp/2013/07/01/14145/casablanca-a-beautiful-relationship-that-starts-at/">beautiful relationship</a>” with South Africans.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/97789/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Robert Mattes is Professor of Government and Public Policy at the University of Strathclyde, Honorary Professor at the Institute for Democracy, Citizenship and Public Policy in Africa at the University of Cape Town, co-founder and Senior Adviser to Afrobarometer, and has previously worked as a consultant to Citizen Surveys. He receives funding from the South African National Research Foundation,</span></em></p>President Cyril Ramaphosa’s popularity has improved the favourability of the governing ANC among South Africans.Robert Mattes, Professor in the Department of Political Studies, University of Cape TownLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/937972018-03-27T13:09:01Z2018-03-27T13:09:01ZRamaphosa has started the clean up job. But can he turn the state around?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/211567/original/file-20180322-54875-kjykfn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South African President, Cyril Ramaphosa, is on a mission to rebuild a battered party and state. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Nic Bothma</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>South Africa’s new President, Cyril Ramaphosa, is presently receiving numerous <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times/opinion-and-analysis/2018-03-03-ramaphosas-cabinet-clean-up-shows-promising-signs-of-what-lies-ahead/">plaudits</a> on how he’s handling the transition from the troubled Jacob Zuma presidency.</p>
<p>Zuma’s generals have been scattered, his underlings fleeing the battlefield. Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, against whom Ramaphosa fought for the leadership and under whose wing Zuma thought he would be able to shelter had she won, has been brought into the <a href="https://www.ujuh.co.za/cyril-ramaphosas-new-cabinet-a-balancing-game-with-key-victories/">cabinet</a> and safely neutralised.</p>
<p>The ousting of Zuma has also had a dramatic impact on the major opposition parties. Both the Democratic Alliance (DA) and Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) have been deprived of their strongest electoral attraction. </p>
<p>The DA is now in a state of major disarray, attempting to resolve its various internal squabbles. For the moment at least – it seems to be heading towards a bloody nose at the 2019 election. </p>
<p>The EFF has played the brief post-Zuma moment more skillfully, most notably by getting the ANC to back its motion in parliament, albeit with amendments, in favour of expropriation of land without compensation. But Ramaphosa has responded in kind by subtly extending an invitation to the EFF to rejoin the ANC, a ploy which will continually compel it to justify its continuing existence, especially if the ruling party continues to steal its policy clothes.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, Ramaphosa continues to bask in the admiration of whites and seems likely to bring disaffected elements of the black middle class back into the ANC. He has brought back hopes of better days for a previously despondent South Africa. </p>
<p>He is master of all the surveys, Mr Action and Mr Clean. </p>
<p>Yet the new president is no fool. He knows that his major challenge, after the depradations of the Zuma years, is to work towards making what he termed in his inauguration speech, a “<a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2018-02-16-in-full--read-cyril-ramaphosas-first-state-of-the-nation-address/">capable state</a>”. This revolves around addressing challenges of governance, the party as well as the economy.</p>
<h2>Low hanging fruit</h2>
<p>Ramaphosa has had little option but to first turn to addressing immediate problems within the state. The early steps have been relatively easy. The most straight forward task has been to shuffle the cabinet. By doing so he was able to expel or marginalise ministers known for their loyalty to Zuma or their incompetence, while bringing in replacements of known ability and integrity. </p>
<p>He has also moved swiftly to address crises at major parastatals, notably at the power utility Eskom and South African Airways to prevent them defaulting on their loans to banks and other creditors. With new boards now in place, emergency measures have been taken to prevent financial meltdown. </p>
<p>Likewise, Ramaphosa has given notice that he is determined to restore the South African Revenue Service to its former glory. Getting rid of the top brass, notwithstanding the resistance of Zuma’s point man, the commissioner Tom Moyane, should not be too difficult. But, as within the parastatals, it is the problem of what to do with Zuma cronies at lower levels of management that is likely to be more difficult and more time consuming. </p>
<p>Zuma cronies who have been embedded in state organisations for a long time will have set up procurement linkages that will need to be examined closely. This will provoke resistance, some of it overt, much of it covert, for whatever the cronyistic patterns of procurement, they will have been celebrated as black empowerment. Their disruption will be stigmatised as reactionary. Pravin Gordhan, the new minister of state owned enterprises, will probably have to get tough, and the fights could get nasty. </p>
<h2>ANC politics</h2>
<p>The other set of challenges which Ramaphosa faces have to do with his party, the ANC. His narrow victory at the party’s national conference was only secured because he did a deal with David Mabuza, then Premier of Mpumalanga, now promoted to <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/who-is-our-new-deputy-president-elect-david-mabuza-20180226">deputy president</a>. </p>
<p>Ramaphosa will, in time, find that this kind of backing was instrumental. Loyalty will come at a price, and Ramaphosa will have to play his cards carefully. </p>
<p>He may have to make alliances with a lot of party power holders he doesn’t like. This may include ceding control of certain provinces to party barons so that their patronage patterns are left intact. </p>
<p>This is a problem because, as Ramaphosa knows, some provincial governments, such as the Eastern Cape, are grossly inefficient. They are staffed by people who simply lack the capacity to do their jobs – but who have strong connections with local party bosses. Disrupting such networks will take determination and courage, and will meet politically costly pushback. Expect little to be done this side of an election.</p>
<h2>The economy</h2>
<p>Perhaps Ramaphosa’s most formidable challenge is how to kick start economic growth. He has been lauded as the man who, with experience in both the trade union movement and in business, can bring labour and capital together around a new consensus. </p>
<p>It’s a nice idea, and one boosted by Ramaphosa’s smooth talk of convening a summit around the economy. But if it is going to be more than just another talk shop, he is going to have to do an awful lot of arm twisting. Both sides are going to have make concessions. </p>
<p>South Africa’s major corporations have been sitting pretty for years. Despite the horrors of the Zuma years, the stock market has <a href="https://www.cnbcafrica.com/news/2017/07/31/south-africas-stock-market-defies-recession-scales-record-highs/">boomed</a>. The country became a low investment, high profit economy, characterised by the power of huge <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-economy-is-badly-skewed-to-the-big-guys-how-it-can-be-changed-92365">cartels</a>. </p>
<p>Ramaphosa has to convince them that they have to get out of the comfort zone, warning that if they don’t, levels of inequality and unemployment are such that South Africa may explode. Capitalism is going to hit big trouble if they don’t look beyond the short-term bottom line and commit to serious levels of investment, combining this with major commitments to labour-intensive employment and training. </p>
<p>The president is also going to have the difficult job of convincing the unions that they have a greater responsibility to address unemployment. To date their emphasis has been on securing higher wages for their members (that’s what unions do) and they have succeeded in getting the government to implement a minimum wage. </p>
<p>But these wins have come at a cost. For example, central bargaining has resulted in wage agreements with big firms that have imposed massive costs on small and medium sized businesses. </p>
<p>While no one wants a low wage economy, Ramaphosa would need to convince the unions that something has to give if problems like this are going to be addressed.</p>
<p>Ramaphosa’s easiest task will be to win the next election. But history will judge him on his ability to do something much bigger: rendering the South Africa state one that is not only capable, but genuinely developmental.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/93797/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Roger Southall does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>South Africa’s new president, Cyril Ramaphosa, has done well so far but more challenges relating to reigniting the economy lie ahead.Roger Southall, Professor of Sociology, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/925382018-02-27T15:19:14Z2018-02-27T15:19:14ZRamaphosa has chosen a team that will help him assert his authority<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/208119/original/file-20180227-36680-1x0i4mv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">President Cyril Ramaphosa during the late night announcement of his new cabinet. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Elmond Jiyane, GCIS</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>South Africa’s new president, Cyril Ramaphosa, <a href="https://www.news24.com/Analysis/graphic-all-the-changes-ramaphosa-made-to-cabinet-20180227">has announced</a> his cabinet. As widely expected, he either fired or demoted almost all cabinet ministers implicated in corruption or considered incompetent who served under Jacob Zuma. In their stead Ramaphosa appointed his dream team to key ministries, bringing back former finance ministers Nhlanhla Nene and Pravin Gordhan both of whom had been fired by Zuma. But, contrary to expectations, he kept some ministers widely believed to have made a hash of their jobs. Politics and Society editor Thabo Leshilo asked Keith Gottschalk for his perspective.</em></p>
<p><strong>Is the new Cabinet fit for purpose - is it better equipped to do what needs to be done?</strong></p>
<p>This was a major shuffle, affecting two-thirds of ministers, more than most analysts had expected. </p>
<p>The new cabinet is undoubtedly better than the one that served under Zuma. The ministers incriminated in subverting procurement procedures for the benefit of the <a href="https://mg.co.za/tag/gupta-brothers">Guptas</a>, or at best, above their level of competence, have vanished. The Guptas’s were allied to Zuma and were at the heart of corruption and <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/FULL-TEXT-Statement-by-Public-Protector-on-Nkandla-Report-20140319">state capture </a> in the country.</p>
<p>The independence and competence of Gordhan, who has come back to serve as minister of Public Enterprises, and Nene who returns to the finance minister post, are welcome and will be well received by the markets. The appointment of <a href="https://www.gov.za/about-government/contact-directory/grace-naledi-mandisa-pandor-ms">Naledi Pandor</a> to Higher Education and Training is a good fit. Her views and temperament match with the vice-chancellors of higher education institutions.</p>
<p>Ramaphosa appointed two former ministers to their previous jobs: <a href="https://www.pa.org.za/person/derek-andre-hanekom/">Derek Hanekom</a>, who was fired by Zuma, is back running tourism and <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/f45af228-1a10-11e7-a266-12672483791a">Malusi Gagaba</a>, who relinquished the finance ministry, has been put back in charge of Home Affairs. An obvious posting for Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, who ran against Ramaphosa for the position of president of the African National Congress, would have been her former portfolio in international relations. Instead she has become a minister within the presidency.</p>
<p>The country is onto its eleventh minister responsible for energy since 1994. This time the post has gone to <a href="https://www.gov.za/about-government/contact-directory/jeffrey-thamsanqa-radebe-mr">Jeff Radebe</a>. Each of the previous incumbents lasted an average of 2.4 years. </p>
<p>In future the revolving door of ministers, directors-general and deputy directors general will need to end.</p>
<p>Before then, there will be at least one more shuffle and pruning when, as Ramaphosa has <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2018-02-16-ramaphosa-promises-to-cut-bloated-cabinet/">indicated</a>, the cabinet and the number of state departments are cut back. </p>
<p>It is a rule of thumb in political science that the poorer a country, the bigger its cabinet. The USA’s includes the Vice President and the heads of <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-trump-administration/the-cabinet/">15 executive departments</a>. South Africa’s is <a href="https://www.gov.za/about-government/leaders/profile/1083">35</a>, up from 30 <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/article/1994-cabinet">under Nelson Mandela</a>.</p>
<p><strong>What does all this augur for the future, and Ramaphosa’s success?</strong></p>
<p>Politics, except under a dictatorship, involves negotiating trade-offs with those with whom you have to negotiate, not only with those you would like to have as your allies. A winner only wins because he or she has formed a coalition of factions which outnumbers the rival coalition of factions.</p>
<p>Ramaphosa had to do some fancy footwork. This is because there’s broad consensus that his narrow victory over Nkosazana for the presidency was solely due to the intervention of the premier of Mpumalanga David Mabuza who ordered his followers to switch their votes at the last minute. Ramaphosa squeaked through. And, notwithstanding Ramaphosa’s preference for Pandor as his deputy, Mabuza won the necessary backing. Ramaphosa announced Mabuza’s appointment as deputy president of the country as part of his cabinet announcement. (Convention has it that the president and deputy president of the ANC serve as president and deputy president of the country.)</p>
<p>Making Dlamini-Zuma a minister within the presidency is clearly also a gesture of inclusivity to the anti-Ramaphosa faction.</p>
<p>Overall, Ramaphosa has a cabinet that forms a team he can work with, and that will help him assert his authority. As he <a href="http://www.thepresidency.gov.za/press-statements/president-ramaphosa-announces-changes-national-executive">said</a> in announcing it:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>These changes are intended to ensure that national government is better equipped to implement the mandate of this administration and specifically the tasks identified in the State of the Nation Address.</p>
</blockquote><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/92538/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Keith Gottschalk is an ANC member, but writes this in his professional capacity as a political scientist.</span></em></p>Overall South Africa’s new president has a cabinet that forms a team with whom he can work.Keith Gottschalk, Political Scientist, University of the Western CapeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/901162018-01-16T08:14:57Z2018-01-16T08:14:57ZRamaphosa should end the presidential merry-go-round in South Africa<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/201935/original/file-20180115-101502-16ruhkb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Cyril Ramaphosa (left) has succeed South Africa's President Jacob Zuma to lead the African National Congress. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Kim Ludbrook</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The large majority of South Africans, including members of the governing African National Congress (ANC), will be glad to <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/70-of-south-africans-want-zuma-to-resign-survey-20170405">see the back of Jacob Zuma</a> as president. Many, if not most, will hope that Cyril Ramaphosa, the party’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-anc-has-a-new-leader-but-south-africa-remains-on-a-political-precipice-89248">newly-elected president</a>, will assume the state presidency immediately rather than entertaining the nonsense of the party electing an <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2018-01-12-00-jz-sets-if-hes-to-go">“interim president”</a>.</p>
<p>Zuma’s supporters are strongly supportive of the idea of an interim president. It has its roots in the previous succession drama that unfolded after the ANC forced Thabo Mbeki to resign as the country’s president in September 2008. <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/kgalema-petrus-motlanthe">Kgalema Motlanthe</a>, the ANC’s then deputy president, stepped up to the plate to <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2008-09-25-motlanthe-sworn-in-as-interim-president">serve in his place</a> until the party president – Zuma – <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/article/jacob-zuma-presidency-2009-2017-march">assumed office</a> following the general election in May 2009. It has never been revealed why Zuma did not become state president directly, although it’s clear that they intended Motlanthe to become a cypher, subject to Zuma’s control.</p>
<p>This precedent is now being bandied about as established practice that has to be followed. But there’s no getting round the fact that it’s being pursued by Zuma and his supporters for dubious reasons. In short, they want to put the brakes on the transition to a Ramaphosa presidency so that they can protect and further their personal interests. </p>
<p>Zuma, in particular, wants to place continuing political obstacles in the way of his being subject to prosecution through the courts on <a href="https://theconversation.com/president-zuma-loses-bid-to-dodge-783-charges-but-will-he-have-the-last-laugh-85703">783 criminal charges</a>. The charges go back to before he assumed office. And there are lingering hopes among his closest acolytes that they can push through a deal with the Russians on <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2018-01-12-00-jz-sets-if-hes-to-go">nuclear power</a> before their rule ends. </p>
<p>Fortunately, reports indicate that Ramaphosa <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2018-01-12-00-jz-sets-if-hes-to-go">has rejected</a> the idea of standing aside in favour of an interim president (and certainly, of Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, who has been proposed by the Zuma faction). Indeed, this opens the door to a reconsideration of how the ANC should handle the relationship between the two presidencies. </p>
<p>Presently, the ANC elects its own president at a National Congress which is held some year and a half before the country’s general election. Having won that election, the ANC MPs in parliament, who have up until now constituted a majority, fulfil their constitutional responsibility of electing one of their member as state President.</p>
<p>It is this sequential gap between the two elections which leads to unnecessary political speculation and uncertainty, and now stands in the way of the country putting itself back together again after the disaster of the Zuma presidency.</p>
<h2>Why Zuma should fall</h2>
<p>The idea of an interim appointment is irresponsible. No good reasons have been put forward for postponing Ramaphosa taking over the presidency of the country.</p>
<p>Those against such a proposition might argue that Zuma has every right to remain in office until his term expires. <a href="http://www.justice.gov.za/legislation/constitution/SAConstitution-web-eng.pdf">Constitutionally</a>, he does. But politically he is ever more a lame duck, rapidly leaking support in the wake of Ramaphosa’s election to the party leadership. This is why there is an increasingly determined effort to oust him. </p>
<p>Zuma’s detractors inside and outside the party argue, correctly, that the more he hangs around the more damage he will be doing to the ANC and its <a href="https://businesstech.co.za/news/government/169785/what-zumas-power-play-could-mean-for-the-anc-in-2019/">prospects in any forthcoming election</a>. </p>
<p>In contrast, those still clinging to Zuma may argue that if Ramaphosa takes office immediately, with the possibility that he could serve as state president until the expiry of a second term in office in 2029 (ten years after an election in 2019), he would be doing nothing other than serving his self-interest.</p>
<p>Ramaphosa should ignore such arrant nonsense. There is everything to be gained from his assuming the presidential reins immediately. An extended presidential transition would lead to continuing political uncertainty, of tales of a Zuma push back, and of a divided government. </p>
<p>It would have far-reaching implications for the economy, all of them negative. Hopes that Ramaphosa is a magician and that, with a wave of his wand, he will turn the economy around and restore it to growth are wildly inflated. But the longer there is delay in his becoming president, the faster faith in his magic will recede. </p>
<p>So if Ramaphosa wants to convince onlookers of his abilities to bring about change, he needs to hang tough in his negotiations with Zuma. Quite simply, Zuma has to go on Ramaphosa’s terms if he wants to be taken seriously.</p>
<p>Yet there is more at stake than effecting an immediate transition. Concern has grown during the Zuma years about the way in which <a href="https://democracyworks.org.za/too-much-power-in-one-persons-hands/">power has become concentrated in the presidency</a> beyond what was intended by those who drew up the constitution (Ramaphosa among them). </p>
<p>So far the constitutional provision that no president should hold more than two terms has held. The constitution also lays down (para 88:2) that while a president may not hold office for more than two terms (of five years each)</p>
<blockquote>
<p>the period between that election and the next election of a President is not regarded as a term.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In other words, there is no constitutional obstacle to Ramaphosa becoming president now. And there is certainly no suggestion in the constitution that South Africa must have an interim president between now and the next election. This is merely an ANC invention, plucked from the air after the party dismissed Mbeki for its own internal reasons.</p>
<h2>Avoiding future political uncertainty</h2>
<p>It’s not too dangerous to prophesy that, presuming the ANC wins the next two elections, Ramaphosa will – in his time – face pressure to stand down early in favour of his eventual successor. Perhaps, too, he might prove unwilling to go. South Africa would again be put through the quite unnecessary political uncertainty about the transition from one ANC president to another.</p>
<p>It follows that Ramaphosa should do more than simply ensure that he replaces Zuma immediately. As he does so, he should state unequivocally that the ANC will change the way things are currently done. That it will adopt as undisputed practice that the person elected as president of the party should immediately take on the post of president of the country. This would of course require him to resign following the election of his successor as party leader. </p>
<p>This is a normal democratic practice. It is common sense. It would be stabilising. And it would demonstrate that South Africa is no <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-42685356">shithole democracy</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/90116/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Roger Southall receives funding from the National Research Foundation. </span></em></p>President Jacob Zuma’s camp is pushing to have him replaced by an interim leader as an excuse to prolong his disastrous rule for their own benefit.Roger Southall, Professor of Sociology, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/896602018-01-04T13:16:20Z2018-01-04T13:16:20ZTo lead South Africa, Ramaphosa must balance populism and pragmatism<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/200779/original/file-20180104-26163-1w66w78.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Cyril Ramaphosa, newly elected president of South Africa's governing ANC, during his maiden address.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA-EFE/Stringer</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Maiden speeches are tricky. They only come once. The one delivered in South Africa by newly-elected president of the African National Congress (ANC) Cyril Ramaphosa required extraordinary ingenuity. </p>
<p>Ramaphosa had to knit together multiple dynamics into a coherent whole. He managed to do this, delivering a <a href="https://www.power987.co.za/news/politics/read-ramaphosas-full-maiden-speech-as-anc-president/">speech</a> which largely resonated with the delegates. His maiden address to the party, at the end of its <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/54th-national-conference">54 National Conference</a>, was shaped by the context of a narrow victory following a fierce and highly polarised contest in a factionalised organisation. A necessary aspect of his leadership was therefore to unite the ANC for a new beginning in a way that didn’t rock the boat. </p>
<p>Ramaphosa’s maiden speech showed he might indeed be the leader South Africa has been waiting for. Its power lay in its simplicity and ordinariness. Measured, but forthright, he touched on many policies that were approved by the conference. These included a raft of resolutions that tried to give meaning to the goal of achieving <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-odd-meaning-of-radical-economic-transformation-in-south-africa-73003">“radical socio-economic transformation”</a>. Two policy initiatives in particular set the cat among the pigeons: <a href="http://city-press.news24.com/Special-Report/ANC_Conference/anc-decides-on-expropriation-of-land-without-compensation-20171221">land redistribution </a> without compensation and <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/anc-conference-2017/2017-12-20-anc-conference-wants-swift-implementation-of-free-education/">fee-free higher education</a>. </p>
<p>These are policy extremes with far-reaching implications for the economy, and that could easily create distress. They require exceptional leadership, a sense of ingenuity and dexterity, both at party and state levels – lest recklessness sully policy intentions.</p>
<p>Ramaphosa struck the right note as he thanked delegates for electing him. But the real test of his leadership will lie in how he walks the tightrope between populism and pragmatism, and his ability to make his incongruous leadership team share his vision and approach.</p>
<h2>Corruption</h2>
<p>Ramaphosa did not shy away from the elephant in the room – corruption. But will he be able to take decisive action given the permutations of the motley crew of the ANC’s top leaderhip team as well as those chosen to serve on its national executive committee? These two outcomes may in fact have made his presidential victory Pyrrhic. </p>
<p>The power dynamics in the national executive committee – the party’s highest decision making body between national conferences – will come to the fore as soon as Ramaphosa moves to act against those implicated in a report – called <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/download-the-full-state-of-capture-pdf-20161102">State of Capture</a> – produced by Thuli Madonsela, the country’s former public protector.</p>
<p>The trickiest issue will be what to do about Jacob Zuma who remains president of the country even though his term as ANC president has ended. This means that South Africa faces a gridlock as the two “centres of power” – Ramaphosa as head of the ANC and Zuma as head of the country – vie for power.</p>
<p>There are many in the country who want the ANC to <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/anc-conference-2017/2017-12-21-anc-stalwarts-call-on-partys-new-leadership-to-recall-jacob-zuma/">“recall”</a> Zuma as president of the republic. There are a number of understandable reasons for this, over above the two-centres of power problem. </p>
<p>Chief among them relate to various court judgements against him. One of the latest was a decision by the North Gauteng High Court to dismiss his application for the review of the <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/download-the-full-state-of-capture-pdf-20161102">State of Capture Report</a>. It also ordered Zuma to comply with the remedial action set out in the report. </p>
<p>Zuma is appealing the court’s decision. This runs against the wishes of the ANC conference which called for Zuma to institute a judicial commission of inquiry, as recommended by the public protector. </p>
<p>How the ANC deals with this will determine whether Ramaphosa meant what he said when he <a href="https://www.power987.co.za/news/politics/read-ramaphosas-full-maiden-speech-as-anc-president/">declared</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The people of South Africa want action. They do not want words.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Land and fee-free higher education</h2>
<p>On policy issues, the speech tried to moderate populism with a semblance of pragmatism. A caveat that the ANC’s new policy on land reform shouldn’t compromise food security and destroy financial markets, and that its implications on property rights should be adroitly managed, exemplifies this. </p>
<p>In politics, populism is as important as pragmatism. As American anthroposopher Joel Wendt put it, populism is <a href="http://ipwebdev.com/hermit/pgplt.html">“rooted in the people”</a>, and therefore gives legitimacy to a political system. It is sustained by pragmatism, especially at the level of policy implementation. </p>
<p>It appears that, as his speech showed, Ramaphosa’s leadership of the ANC’s newly-found radicalism is going to be that of <a href="http://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4152&content=flr">pragmatic populism</a> – the ability to manage expectations generated by populist policy posturing to recapture waning electoral support, with extraordinary care not to destroy the sources of revenue necessary to sustain the state.</p>
<p>But this will be a huge challenge, particularly when it comes to delivering on the promise of fee-free higher education. At issue is the haste with which Zuma announced the new policy on the eve of the ANC’s elective conference, sparking suspicion that it was intended to influence the outcome of the race for the presidency in favour of Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, his anointed candidate. </p>
<p>Zuma’s announcement sent the higher education sector into a <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2017-12-19-zumas-fee-free-education-does-not-tackle-fees-must-fall/">tailspin</a> and caught the National Treasury <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2017-11-13-top-treasury-official-quits-in-row-over-free-tertiary-education/">off-guard </a> as no discussions had been had about how to fund it. </p>
<p>Fee-free higher education is a poisoned chalice for Ramaphosa. It is already being used by opposition parties for <a href="https://www.enca.com/south-africa/higher-education-minister-mkhize-slams-malema">political opportunism</a> on campuses. And uncertainties about its administration are likely to be blown out of proportion to spark disruptions. </p>
<p>Zuma’s hasty pronouncement on this politically charged and emotive issue is going to be the first test of Ramaphosa’s mastery of the art of managing the confluence between populism and pragmatism, not as binary opposites, but as elements of the same policy.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/89660/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mashupye Herbert Maserumule received funding previously from the National Research Foundation. He is affiliated to the South African Association of Public Administration and Management(SAAPAM). He is the Chief Editor of the Journal of Public Administration.</span></em></p>Free university education and land redistribution without compensation have far-reaching implications for South Africa’s economy, and requires exceptional leadership.Mashupye Herbert Maserumule, Professor of Public Affairs, Tshwane University of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/892482017-12-18T17:03:17Z2017-12-18T17:03:17ZThe ANC has a new leader: but South Africa remains on a political precipice<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/199756/original/file-20171218-27554-19f1lki.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Cyril Ramaphosa, the new president of South Africa's governing party, the ANC, and potentially the country's future president. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters/Siphiwe Sibeko</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Rumours that President Jacob Zuma has instructed the South African National Defence Force to draw up plans for implementing a <a href="https://citizen.co.za/news/south-africa/1756940/sa-presidency-rejects-reports-of-state-of-emergency-regulations-draft/">state of emergency</a> may or may not be true. Nonetheless they are evidence of South Africa’s febrile political atmosphere.</p>
<p>But any assumption that <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/anc-conference/anc54-breaking-ramaphosa-elected-anc-president-12453127">the election</a> of <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/cyril-matamela-ramaphosa">Cyril Ramaphosa</a> as the new leader of the African National Congress (ANC), after winning the race against Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, will place South Africa on an even keel are misplaced. Indeed, the drama may only be beginning.</p>
<p>It’s useful to look back to 2007 when President Thabo Mbeki unwisely ran for a <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/i-asked-mbeki-to-stand-for-a-third-term-to-stop-zuma-kasrils-20171108">third term as ANC leader</a>. His unpopularity among large segments of the party provided the platform for his <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/Politics/Zuma-sweeps-to-resounding-victory-20071218">defeat by Zuma</a> at Polokwane. Within a few months the National Executive Committee of the ANC latched onto an <a href="http://www.saflii.org/za/cases/ZAKZHC/2008/71.html">excuse</a> to ask Mbeki to <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/article/thabo-mbeki-resigns-south-africa%E2%80%99s-second-democratic-president">stand down as president of the country</a> before the end of his term of office. Being committed to the traditions of party loyalty he complied, resigning as president some eight months before the Constitution required him to do so.</p>
<p>The question this raises is whether South Africa should now expect a repeat performance following the election of a new leader of the ANC. Will this lead to a party instruction to Zuma to stand down as president of the country? And if it does, will he do what Mbeki did and meekly resign?</p>
<p>There’s a big difference between the two scenarios: Mbeki had no reason to fear the consequences of leaving office. Zuma, on the other hand, has numerous reasons to cling to power. This is what makes him, and the immediate future, dangerous for South Africa, and suggests the country faces instability.</p>
<h2>Why Zuma won’t go</h2>
<p>It is not out of the question that Zuma may say to himself, and to South Africa, that he is not going anywhere. He is losing <a href="https://theconversation.com/dramatic-night-in-south-africa-leaves-president-hanging-on-by-a-thread-57180">court case</a> after <a href="https://www.economist.com/news/middle-east-and-africa/21732538-judges-keep-finding-against-south-africas-embattled-president-jacob-zuma-loses-two">court case</a>, and judicial decisions are increasingly narrowing his legal capacity to block official and independent investigations into the extent of <a href="http://ewn.co.za/Topic/State-Capture">state capture</a> by business interests close to him.</p>
<p>With every passing day, the prospects of his finding himself in the dock, <a href="https://theconversation.com/president-zuma-loses-bid-to-dodge-783-charges-but-will-he-have-the-last-laugh-85703">facing 783 charges</a>, including of corruption and racketeering, also increase. </p>
<p>Zuma will have every constitutional right to defy an ANC instruction to stand down as state president until his term expires following the next <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/newsmaker-2019-elections-results-will-be-credible-20171015-2">general election in 2019</a>, and the new parliament’s election of a new president. In terms of the <a href="http://www.treasury.gov.za/legislation/bills/2002/b16.pdf">South African Constitution</a>, his term of office will be brought to an early end only if parliament passes a vote of no confidence in his presidency, or votes that, for one reason or another, he is unfit for office.</p>
<p>But today’s ANC is so divided that it cannot be assumed that a majority of ANC MPs would <a href="https://theconversation.com/whats-happening-inside-the-anc-not-parliament-is-key-to-why-zuma-prevails-82399">back a motion of no confidence</a>, even following the election of <a href="http://allafrica.com/stories/201712040357.html">Ramaphosa</a> as the party’s new leader. </p>
<p>In other words, there is a very real prospect that South Africa will see itself ruled for at least another 18 months or so by what is termed <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2007-06-27-anc-debates-two-centres-of-power">“two centres of power”</a>, with the authority and the legitimacy of the party (formally backing Ramaphosa) vying against that of the state (headed by Zuma).</p>
<h2>Throwing caution to the wind</h2>
<p>As if that is not a sufficient condition for political instability, we may expect that Zuma will continue to use his executive power to erect defences against his future prosecution. He will reckon to leave office only with guarantees of immunity. Until he gets them, Zuma will defy all blandishments to go. And if he does not get what he wants, he may throw caution to the wind and go for broke.</p>
<p>Hence, perhaps, the possibility that he is prepared to invoke a state of emergency.</p>
<p>The grounds for Zuma imposing a state of emergency would be specious, summoned up to defend his interests and those backing him. They would be likely to infer <a href="https://theconversation.com/as-pressure-mounts-on-south-africas-jacob-zuma-he-blames-an-old-enemy-western-intelligence-agencies-69599">foreign interference</a> in affairs of state, alongside suggestions that <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/business-report/zuma-again-denounces-the-monopoly-of-white-economic-power-11988619">white monopoly capital</a>, whites as a whole as well as nefarious others were conspiring to prevent much needed <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2017-12-15-know-your-candidate-dlamini-zuma-beats-the-ret-drum/">radical economic transformation</a>. Present constitutional arrangements would be declared <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-south-africans-should-be-worried-by-anc-talk-of-a-colour-revolution-87019">counter-revolutionary</a> and those defending them doing so only to protect their material interests. </p>
<p>After a matter of time, such justifications would probably be declared unconstitutional by the judiciary. It is then that there would be a confrontation between raw power and the Constitution. If such a situation should arise, we cannot be sure which would be the winner.</p>
<h2>South Africa’s army</h2>
<p>It is remarkable how little the searchlight that has focused on state capture has rested on the Defence Force. Much attention has been given to how the executive has effectively co-opted the <a href="https://theconversation.com/leaked-emails-ramaphosas-hypocrisy-on-spying-by-the-south-african-state-83605">intelligence</a> and <a href="http://www.ngopulse.org/article/2016/09/29/political-interference-weakening-rule-law-sa">prosecutorial service</a>, as well has how the top ranks of the police have been selected for political rather than <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/15/world/africa/south-africa-police-commissioner-under-investigation-is-suspended.html">operational reasons</a>. </p>
<p>It seems to have been assumed that South Africa’s military is simply sitting in the background, observing political events from afar. But is it? Where would its loyalties lie in the event of a major constitutional crisis? </p>
<p>The danger of the present situation is that South Africa might be about to find out.</p>
<p>Were the military to throw its weight behind Zuma the country would be in no-man’s land. Of course, there would be a massive popular reaction, with the further danger that the president himself would summon his popular cohorts to <a href="https://theconversation.com/anc-military-veterans-and-the-threat-to-south-africas-democracy-76118">“defend the revolution”</a>. </p>
<p>And South Africans should not assume that Zuma would be politically isolated. Those who backed Dlamini-Zuma did so to defend their present positions and capacity to use office for personal gain. If they were to rise up, the army would then be elevated to the status of defender of civil order.</p>
<p>What is certain is that in such a wholly uncertain situation the economy would spiral downwards quickly. Capital would take flight at a faster rate than ever before, <a href="http://www.statssa.gov.za/?p=10658">employment</a> would collapse even further, <a href="http://www.statssa.gov.za/?p=10334">poverty</a> would become even further entrenched. </p>
<h2>Reasons to be hopeful</h2>
<p>Is all this too extreme a scenario? Hopefully yes. There are numerous good reasons why such a fate will be averted. </p>
<p>Zuma’s control over the ANC is waning, as is his control over various state institutions, notably the National Prosecuting Authority. And the country has a checks and balances in place: there is a vigorous civil society, the judiciary has proved the Constitution’s main defence and trade unions and business remain influential. </p>
<p>Even so, it remains the case that what transpires now that the ANC’s national conference is over will determine the fate and future of our democracy. South Africa is approaching rough waters, and a Jacob Zuma facing an inglorious and humiliating end to his presidency will be a Jacob Zuma at his most dangerous.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/89248/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Roger Southall receives funding from the National Research Foundation.</span></em></p>South Africa’s ruling ANC has a new leader - Cyril Ramaphosa. But this doesn’t mean that the country is out of the woods. Political instability remains a real possibility.Roger Southall, Professor of Sociology, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/893172017-12-18T13:15:42Z2017-12-18T13:15:42ZVintage Zuma delivers a vengeful swansong, devoid of any responsibility<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/199689/original/file-20171218-27607-1xxomej.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South African President Jacob Zuma sings before his opening address at the 54th National Conference of the governing ANC.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters/Siphiwe Sibeko</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The hope was that in <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/anc-conference-2017/2017-12-16-in-full--president-jacob-zumas-final-speech-as-anc-president/">opening</a> the <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/54th-national-conference">54th National Conference</a> of the African National Congress (ANC), South Africa’s President Jacob Zuma would rise to the occasion, seize the moment of his last address as party president with honesty and leave something worthy of history. For posterity to cherish.</p>
<p>It sounded as though he was taking the bull by the horns when he referred to <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/jackson-mthembu-ending-slate-politics-cant-happen-like-instant-coffee-20151108">slate politics</a> as the function of ANC factionalism, which he acknowledged had fractured the governing party, including corrupting its systems and processes. Slate politics are the reason for internecine contests for leadership positions in the ANC, which, as he correctly pointed out, rob the ANC of good leadership.</p>
<p>But, in the end, his narcissistic streak shaped his swansong. It was largely couched in aspirational rather than diagnostic terms. For a political report of a leader whose 10-year tenure was coming to an end, it left much to be desired. </p>
<p>He claimed that he was leaving behind a stronger ANC, a statement he could only make if he’s suffering from delusions of grandeur, or because he’s indulging in self-gratification. Which ever it was, it exposed the dishonesty of the <a href="http://www.thenewage.co.za/anc-political-report-by-outgoing-president-jacob-zuma/">political report</a> he subsequently delivered, which was cluttered with rhetorical ploys and lacked a coherent theme for the august event. In truth, the divisions in the ANC are at their worst under him. So is its governing <a href="http://www.cosatu.org.za/show.php?ID=2051">Tripartite Alliance</a> - with the <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-communist-party-strips-the-anc-of-its-multi-class-ruling-party-status-88647">South African Communist Party</a> and labour federation <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/politics/zuma-banned-from-speaking-at-cosatu-events-9300206">Cosatu</a> - that it leads.</p>
<h2>An attack on democracy</h2>
<p>Zuma missed the purpose of a valedictory address – to guide the future in the wake of leadership changes. Instead, he became vengeful, taking issue with what he termed ill-discipline in the organisation. Here he was referring to members who <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/just-in-anc-free-state-pec-several-branches-barred-from-attending-elective-conference-20171215">take the ANC to court</a> for violating its own constitution and processes. He suggested that they should be dismissed from the organisation immediately. </p>
<p>This is a strange way of dealing with issues, particularly for a president in a constitutional democracy who spent <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/jacob-gedleyihlekisa-zuma">half of his life</a> selflessly fighting for a more just system of organising society. The idea that someone’s membership of an organisation be immediately terminated when they take it to court to protect their rights is at variance with the principle of the supremacy of the constitution. </p>
<p>Zuma’s suggestion violates the right to external recourse for those aggrieved by internal organisational processes. That it’s even entertained by some in the leadership of the ANC demonstrates the extent of the crisis under Zuma. This is because ideas such as these pose a danger to the party’s <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/what-anc">foundational values</a> - of unity, non-racialism, non-sexism and democracy - as well as to the future of democracy in the country. That is because the ANC, despite its waning electoral performance, remains <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-anc-has-remained-dominant-despite-shifts-in-support-base-63285">politically dominant</a>. Thus, what happens inside it ultimately affects the running of the country, hence it’s imperative <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-a-countrys-constitutional-court-can-consolidate-and-deepen-democracy-54184">internal party democracy</a> be entrenched in the ANC.</p>
<p>Had Zuma looked objectively and honestly into what led some members to take the ANC to court, his report would have perhaps managed to get to the core of the morass.</p>
<h2>Factional till the end</h2>
<p>Zuma also squandered the last opportunity he had to remove himself from petty factional politics of the ANC and assert himself as a unifier and a statesman. This was his chance to echo the voice of <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/oliver-reginald-kaizana-tambo">Oliver Tambo</a>, the revered leader of the ANC who is attributed with holding the organisation together during its turbulent years as a <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-anc-is-celebrating-the-year-of-or-tambo-who-was-he-85838">banned organisation</a>. </p>
<p>But he blew it by making a point of graciously thanking three senior members of the ANC who are leaders of the factions behind <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2017-11-03-anc-leadership-race-dlamini-zuma-supporters-in-battle-to-secure-the-final-prize-the-eastern-cape/">Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma’s presidential campaign</a>. These were the ANC Women’s League President <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/the-judiciary-carries-itself-as-if-its-being-lobbied-ancwl-president-20171209">Bathabile Dlamini</a>, ANC Youth’s League <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/anc-conference-2017/2017-12-16-maine-accuses-judges-of-seeking-to-influence-outcome-of-anc-conference/">Collen Maine</a>, and ANC military veterans leader <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2017-12-16-mkmva-boss-launches-scathing-attack-on-judiciary">Kebby Maphatsoe</a>.</p>
<p>On top of this, his political report lacked the valedictory message of hope for the future. It tinkered at the edges, and largely misrepresented the reality about the state of the ANC. Instead, he fanned the flames of revenge, particularly against those who have consistently tried to hold him accountable. </p>
<p>He made references to corruption, but deflected attention from his alleged implication in it. He set out to create the impression that South Africans are outraged only about corruption in the public sector, not what’s happening in the private sector. A veiled retort to those who have questioned his moral credentials and ethical leadership was that: if you don’t talk about corruption in the private sector, you shouldn’t talk about it in the public sector.</p>
<p>And rather than denouncing slate politics and factionalism, he stuck to lamenting their existence. I believe that the only reason he mentioned them at all was because they have led to splinter groups that have affected the ANC <a href="https://www.power987.co.za/news/read-its-been-an-honor-zumas-full-speech">“quantitatively and qualitatively”</a> . If slate politics hadn’t led to the current malaise, I doubt he would have made any reference to organisational maladies, which have in fact been spawned and sustained by his leadership over the past 10 years.</p>
<p>Zuma has bequeathed the ANC (and the country) a highly divided party, one that is factionalised and a threat to its own existence. Even when history gave him the opportunity to apologise for the mess his leadership has left the country in, the vintage Zuma didn’t want to take responsibility. </p>
<p>It is now left to those picking up the baton to take on the challenging task of returning the ANC to its foundational values of selflessness and service and its stature as a leader of society.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/89317/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mashupye Herbert Maserumule received funding from the National Research Foundation(NRF) for his post-graduate studies. He is a member of the South African Association of Public Administration and Management(SAAPAM). He is the Chief Editor of the Journal of Public Administration.</span></em></p>Zuma’s last address to South Africa’s governing party, the ANC, as its president, betrayed his strange way of dealing with issues. He came across as delusional and self-indulgent.Mashupye Herbert Maserumule, Professor of Public Affairs, Tshwane University of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/888202017-12-14T08:09:58Z2017-12-14T08:09:58ZSouth Africa needs electoral reform, but president’s powers need watching<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/198518/original/file-20171211-27693-1jk3w15.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Jacob Zuma, president of South Africa. There are renewed calls for citizens to directly elect their president and other representatives. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters/Sumaya Hisham</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Within a short time, the 4000 odd delegates to South Africa’s governing African National Congress’s <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/54th-national-conference">54th National Conference</a> will elect a new party leader. In turn – save death, disaster or unlikely electoral defeat – a parliament stuffed with an ANC majority will at some point elect that leader as the new <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-anc-presidential-elections-trump-south-africas-constitution-78553">President of South Africa</a>. The expectation is that this will be <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/nkosazana-clarice-dlamini-zuma">Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma</a> or <a href="http://allafrica.com/view/group/main/main/id/00057409.html">Cyril Ramaphosa</a>. But, if the ANC elects a pig, the ANC parliamentary majority will vote for the pig.</p>
<p>Although it is by no means unusual for parliaments to elect countries’ political leaders, there is widespread complaint in South Africa that it is the small ANC elite which attends the conference that effectively selects the next president of the country. This, it is said by many, is undemocratic. </p>
<p>Two main reasons are cited. First, ANC electoral procedures are deeply corrupted by money <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/mantashe-warns-anc-delegates-against-selling-their-votes-20171126">changing hands</a>, personal ambition and <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/armed-guards-for-anc-factions-20171107">factionalism</a>. Second, it should be the people, not the party, which should be charged with electing the country’s leader.</p>
<p>It is therefore of considerable interest that, rather than emanating from civil society or another political party, the <a href="http://ewn.co.za/2017/12/04/anc-gauteng-proposes-expansion-of-party-leadership">proposal</a> has been made by the ANC’s Gauteng provincial conference that consideration should be given to ordinary voters voting directly for presidents, premiers and mayors. This is of particular interest given that Gauteng is one of the ANC’s most powerful provinces, and at the same time, one which is often at odds with the party’s current leadership.</p>
<p>The proposal that the state president, provincial premiers and mayors be directly elected is a most welcome one, as there is much need to consider the quality of South Africa’s democracy, and to encourage public participation in decision-making. However, direct election of such offices simultaneously holds its risks.</p>
<h2>The electoral reform debate</h2>
<p>The debate about electoral reform in post-1994 South Africa has largely focused on the system used to elect MPs and their counterparts in the country’s nine provinces. The standard argument for a change was captured succinctly by ANC dissident and Umkhonto we Sizwe veteran <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/opinionista/2017-10-13-when-will-we-wake-up-and-reform-our-crooked-electoral-system/">Omry Makgoale</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>When will we wake up and reform our crooked electoral system? </p>
</blockquote>
<p>The argument is that the list proportional representation system results in the election of MPs who are <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2012-04-20-sas-electoral-system-fails-the-people">accountable to party bosses</a> rather than voters. Such an outcome is rendered more certain by the fact that <a href="https://www.gov.za/documents/constitution-republic-south-africa-1996">South Africa’s constitution</a> lays down that MPs or provincial legislature representatives who leave or are ejected from their parties lose their seat in the relevant legislature, plus the handy salary that goes with it. To continue with the animalistic referencing, parties’ elected representatives become sheep, devoid of any capacity for independence.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/198533/original/file-20171211-27714-1xx858k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/198533/original/file-20171211-27714-1xx858k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=873&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/198533/original/file-20171211-27714-1xx858k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=873&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/198533/original/file-20171211-27714-1xx858k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=873&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/198533/original/file-20171211-27714-1xx858k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1097&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/198533/original/file-20171211-27714-1xx858k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1097&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/198533/original/file-20171211-27714-1xx858k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1097&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Presidential hopeful Nkosazana Dlamini-ZumaChairperson.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters/Francois Lenoir</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Such critiques often suggest (very sensibly) that the electoral system should become a mixed one which combines proportionality of outcomes with the direct election of representatives from constituencies. This was recommended in 2002 by the <a href="http://pmg-assets.s3-website-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/docs/Van-Zyl-Slabbert-Commission-on-Electoral-Reform-Report-2003.pdf">Van Zyl Slabbert Commission</a> on electoral reform. But there has been relatively little debate about whether the President and premiers should be directly elected.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://pmg-assets.s3-website-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/docs/Van-Zyl-Slabbert-Commission-on-Electoral-Reform-Report-2003.pdf">survey</a> conducted on behalf of the Van Zyl Slabbert Commission indicated that 63% of respondents would have liked to vote for the president directly. This level of preference was pretty much the same across all racial groups. Given the disastrous nature of the Zuma presidency, it is very possible that the preference for direct election would be considerably higher if the issue was put to survey respondents today.</p>
<h2>Virtue of direction election</h2>
<p>The virtue of the direct election of key political leaders is said to be that it renders them directly accountable to voters rather than to their political parties. On the face of it, it is an attractive argument, and it is one which could usefully introduce more diversity into the South African political system.</p>
<p>If they wanted to maximise their vote, parties would have to look at the qualities of their candidates, and ask themselves whether they would appeal to the electorate as a whole. (On this reckoning, it is a dead cert that Cyril Ramaphosa would streak home and dry, rather than, as under the ANC’s present system, running neck and neck with his chief rival, whose popular appeal is that of a wet fish). This would mean that candidates would end up openly campaigning for the leadership, dispensing with the ANC’s absurd pretence that individuals should not demonstrate political ambition. </p>
<p>There is also the possibility that voters would elect a president from a party other than the one which enjoys a majority in the National Assembly. </p>
<p>Would direct election of the president, premiers and mayors be a good idea? And, if so, what system should be adopted?</p>
<p>The second question is easily answered. To avoid the election of a president who gains less than 50% of a popular vote but more than any other candidate, provision would wisely be made for a second round of a presidential election in which the top two candidates engage in a run off.</p>
<h2>A good idea?</h2>
<p>So would direction elections be a good idea? </p>
<p>Parliamentary systems work well because they devolve the election of prime ministers to the legislature. On the continent, countries that inherited a parliamentary system from Britain subsequently opted for elective presidencies. </p>
<p>The results are not unambiguously encouraging. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/198536/original/file-20171211-15358-6s5noo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/198536/original/file-20171211-15358-6s5noo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=796&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/198536/original/file-20171211-15358-6s5noo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=796&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/198536/original/file-20171211-15358-6s5noo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=796&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/198536/original/file-20171211-15358-6s5noo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1000&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/198536/original/file-20171211-15358-6s5noo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1000&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/198536/original/file-20171211-15358-6s5noo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1000&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">South African Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">GCIS</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In Kenya and Zambia, for instance, the direct election of presidents may have weakened the link between legislatures and executives. This has allowed executives to trample over legislatures, and for leaders to claim a legitimacy separate from that of their party. Presidents from <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/2161868.stm">Daniel Arap Moi</a> through to <a href="https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Africa/Africa-Monitor/2014/0210/Kenya-slides-toward-authoritarianism">Uhuru Kenyatta</a> in Kenya and from <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/20/world/africa/20chiluba.html">Frederick Chiluba</a> through to <a href="https://theconversation.com/we-need-to-talk-about-zambia-as-it-falls-from-grace-under-president-lungu-77520">Edgar Lungu</a> in Zambia have all proved exceedingly authoritarian.</p>
<p>It follows that changing the South African system to allow for direct election would require the country to look carefully at how a directly elected president should be rendered accountable to parliament. Would the change enhance the accountability of the government by empowering MPs, or would it render them increasingly irrelevant?</p>
<h2>Dangers of an all-powerful president</h2>
<p>It is also worth recalling that there is now much greater awareness about how much power is concentrated in the Presidency, in a way, it would seem, that the makers of the country’s constitution did not intend. Under Zuma, the presidency has a direct say in far too much, such as the right to appoint the head of a National Prosecuting Authority which might have the responsibility of calling him to legal account. </p>
<p>South Africans need to be wary of any change in the system which ends up making the President less – rather than more – accountable.</p>
<p>In any case, while there can be very good reasons for reforming an electoral system, this will not automatically result in better governance. Form can rarely trump substance. Robert Mugabe only “won” the Zimbabwean presidency in 2008 through his army and police terrorising the opposition and effectively forcing his rival, Morgan Tsvangirai, <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/zimbabwe/2175377/Zimbabwe-Morgan-Tsvangirai-withdraws-from-poll-citing-Robert-Mugabes-reign-of-terror.html">to withdraw</a>.</p>
<p>It will take more than a piecemeal change to South Africa’s constitution to improve it’s democracy. South Africans should be careful what they wish for, as they can never be quite sure what they will get.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/88820/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Roger Southall receives funding from the National Research Foundation. </span></em></p>Changing the South African system to allow for direct election would require the country to look carefully at how a directly elected president should be held accountable to parliament.Roger Southall, Professor of Sociology, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/888922017-12-10T11:26:21Z2017-12-10T11:26:21ZWhy talk of unity in South Africa’s ANC is disingenuous, and dangerous<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/198317/original/file-20171208-27705-12qlydt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Are calls for unity in the ANC an attempt to prevent Cyril Ramaphosa from cleaning out the stables if he wins the presidency.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters/Mike Hutchings</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>South Africa is gripped by anxiety laced with anticipation as the much anticipated African National Congress (ANC) 54th <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-anc-leadership-race-will-go-down-to-the-wire-heres-why-88667">elective conference</a> draws closer. All the country’s nine provinces have consolidated their leadership preferences for the ANC’s presidential race from the branches. But the question about who will emerge victorious remains difficult to answer as a neck and neck scenario emerges. </p>
<p>The conference has very important implications for the country’s future: the president of the ANC becomes the president of South Africa. Whoever leads the ANC determines the kind of leader the country will get, and what policy trajectory will be taken.</p>
<p>President Jacob Zuma has been the president of the ANC and the country for almost a decade now. His tenure has been marked by successive controversies, some of which led to <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-jacob-zuma-is-fast-running-out-of-political-lives-80009">attempts to oust him</a>. All were foiled. He’s presided over the ANC’s declining <a href="http://www.heraldlive.co.za/opinion/2017/12/04/justice-malala-zuma-unity-bad-joke/">electoral prospects</a>, South Africa’s downgrading by <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2017-11-25-global-credit-ratings-agency-has-downgraded-south-africa-to-junk-status">international rating agencies</a>, and allegations that he manoeuvred his allies into positions that allowed them to manipulate state tenders and even <a href="https://www.news24.com/Columnists/GuestColumn/how-jacob-zuma-conquered-the-anc-20171027">government appointments</a>. </p>
<p>In a few days, he will not be the president of the ANC any more. So, who is likely to succeed him? The frontrunners are <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2017-11-03-00-ramaphosa-takes-an-early-lead-as-anc-branches-cast-their-vote">Cyril Ramaphosa</a> and <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times/business/2017-11-29-dlamini-zuma-endorsed-by-free-state-in-anc-leadership-race/">Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma</a>. </p>
<p>The Premier of Mpumalanga, David Mabuza has thrown a spanner in the works. He has called for a vote for <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/mabuza-sheds-light-on-unity-mystery-20171201">“unity”</a>, suggesting that no particular candidate should be backed unless they agree on a unity ticket. </p>
<p>Mabuza’s call makes predictions about the conference impossible because the province he leads commands the party’s <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2017-10-06-mpumalanga-now-second-biggest-voting-bloc-in-anc/">second biggest membership</a> after <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2017-09-26-anc-leadership-race-kwazulu-natal-a-province-waiting-to-exhale/#.WiqoyFWWbIU">KwaZulu-Natal</a>.</p>
<p>I believe that the “unity” narrative feigns a solution to what is not a problem, but a manifestation of it. “Consensus leadership” – which the “unity” narrative wants to be the outcome of the elective conference – fudges internal organisational democracy. The absurdity is that if it was allowed, it could mutate into a political system where people’s choice doesn’t matter, while leadership is simply imposed. This is where and how dictatorship starts.</p>
<h2>More about power elites sharing the spoils</h2>
<p>Branches in Mpumalanga <a href="https://www.businesslive.co.za/bd/politics/2017-12-01-anc-delegates-vote-with-their-abstentions-for-unity-in-mpumalanga/">have already voted</a>. The tally shows that 223 supported the “unity” approach which under the ANC’s electoral process these will be considered abstentions. </p>
<p>But Mabuza’s stunt to cajole for a non-contest doesn’t make him a kingmaker, or show that he’s mastered the art of brinksmanship. If anything, the ploy has weakened his position in the presidential race because the province he leads isn’t unanimously behind this particular manoeuvre. </p>
<p>In any case, what exactly is the “unity” that Mabuza says he’s vehemently pursuing? Is it really about uniting the ANC? Why doesn’t it rhyme with <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2017-10-15-is-zweli-mkhize-ancs-plan-b-if-dlamini-zumas-campaign-collapses/">Zweli Mkhize’s campaign</a> – he’s one of the other presidential hopefuls – framed around the same concept? How does it relate to the ANC’s <a href="https://www.marxists.org/subject/africa/anc/2001/eye-needle.htm">Through the Eye of the Needle</a> report, where the attributes of the leadership of the party are defined? </p>
<p>Why does it appeal largely to those who perfected the politics of the slate which determines their positions in the party and state, those with a cloud hanging over their heads? How is it to, anyway, play itself out in the presidential race? Is it to take the form of horse-trading? If so, how does it differ from Zuma’s <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/deshnee-subramany/president-jacob-zumas-opening-address-at-ancs-5th-national-pol_a_23009668/">remarks</a> at the end of the ANC’s 5th policy conference, that whoever loses the race for the presidency of the party should automatically become the deputy president? </p>
<p>Aren’t these all inventions of the same logic, essentially seeking power-sharing deals, which are about the political elites trying to accommodate each other in the leadership positions? The unity narrative is a facade. If anything, it institutionalises the very phenomenon it seeks to expunge from the ANC: slate politics.</p>
<p>Contest for the leadership positions is part of the democratic process. It only becomes a problem when sullied by slates, which are the function of factionalism. </p>
<h2>Unity issue misses the point</h2>
<p>Talk about “unity” and “consensus leadership” misses the point. It’s deflecting attention from the fact that the ANC is atrophying. The contest for the leadership of the ANC is in fact about proximity to state resources, not restoring its foundational value. As Senator William Marcy <a href="http://www.bartleby.com/73/1314.html">put it</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>To the victor belong the spoils. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Ramaphosa <a href="https://www.enca.com/south-africa/ramaphosa-criticises-abuse-of-resources">talks tough</a> against this. He doesn’t mince words. During his campaign he has consistently critiqued the status quo and unambiguously taken a stand against corruption. This is a good start for the ANC’s redemption. He insists that a commission of inquiry into state capture should be established, as recommended in the public protector’s report. This implicates Zuma and the coterie that makes up his oligarchy. It’s a move that’s ruffled feathers and unsettled those who have been shielded from being pursued for allegedly bagging ill-gotten gains from the state. </p>
<p>What’s disturbing is that the “unity” narrative could easily be a ploy to preempt Ramaphosa’s presidency, contriving to ensure that if he succeeds he will be entrapped in the consensus leadership arrangements. This would emasculate his vigour in pursuing those alleged to have looted the state.</p>
<p>Another possibility is that it’s being used to co-opt those with a sense of ethics into the company of those who are ethically compromised so that they could all look the same. </p>
<p>However, the questions around the call for “unity” are answered, it’s important to remember that when the ethical edifice collapses, society becomes the victim of the leadership of scoundrels.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/88892/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mashupye Herbert Maserumule receives funding from National Research Foundation for my postgraduate studies. I am a member of the South African Association of Public Administration and Management (SAAPAM), including being a chief editor of its journal.</span></em></p>The ANC’s elective conference has very important implications for South Africa’s future. Whoever leads determines the kind of leader the country will get, and what policy trajectory will be taken.Mashupye Herbert Maserumule, Professor of Public Affairs, Tshwane University of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/886672017-12-06T07:35:13Z2017-12-06T07:35:13ZThe ANC leadership race will go down to the wire: here’s why<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/197828/original/file-20171205-22989-1mfx9qu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South Africa's President Jacob Zuma, with presidential contenders Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma and Cyril Ramaphosa.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters/Siphiwe Sibeko</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The suspense is tangible as the African National Congress (ANC) – South Africa’s former liberation movement that’s turned into a tired governing party – approaches its fiercely contested <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/54th-national-conference">2017 elective conference</a>. </p>
<p>By December 5, the party’s branches had largely spoken, and its provincial structures had consolidated the branch delegates’ voting preferences. The lay of the land seemed clear. Yet, on close dissection it’s evident that <a href="https://science.nasa.gov/astrophysics/focus-areas/black-holes">developments</a> could still subvert what appeared to be definitive trends in branch nominations.</p>
<p>Less than two weeks prior to <a href="http://www.polity.org.za/article/anc-nomination-process-2017-10-02">ballots being cast</a> at the <a href="http://www.jhblive.com/Places-in-Johannesburg/outdoor-activities/nasrec-expo-centre/5552">Nasrec Expo Centre</a> in Johannesburg, the contest is closer than both the <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/52nd-national-conference-polokwane">Polokwane race of 2007</a>, (when Jacob Zuma beat Thabo Mbeki) and <a href="http://www.actsa.org/newsroom/2012/12/anc-mangaung-conference-election-results/">2012 in Mangaung</a> (when Zuma beat then deputy Kgalema Motlanthe).</p>
<p>The branch nominations have confirmed that the <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-safrica-politics-anc/south-africas-ramaphosa-gets-most-nominations-ahead-of-anc-leadership-vote-idUSKBN1DY2LD">two leading 2017 candidates</a> for the ANC presidency are <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/cyril-matamela-ramaphosa">Cyril Ramaphosa</a> and <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/nkosazana-clarice-dlamini-zuma">Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma</a>. While Ramaphosa <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2017-12-04-ramaphosa-emerges-as-frontrunner-in-anc-presidential-race?utm_source=Mail+%26+Guardian&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Daily+newsletter&utm_term=https%3A%2F%2Fmg.co.za%2Farticle%2F2017-12-04-ramaphosa-emerges-as-frontrunner-in-anc-presidential-race">has a lead</a>, the intricacies of the election process caution against early celebrations: there are black holes that could still devour the advantages he appears to have.</p>
<h2>The voting</h2>
<p>The voters at the ANC conferences comprise roughly of 90% delegates from <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/constitution-anc">ANC branches</a> across the nine provinces. Provinces had been allocated a total of 4,731 delegates (proportionately in terms of membership figures). The rest of the about 5,240 <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2017-11-14-anc-leadership-will-be-decided-by-5240-delegates/">voting delegates</a> come from the ANC’s national executive committee and top six officials (roughly 90 in total). The nine provincial executive committees (27 each, thus 243), the women’s, youth and veterans’ leagues <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/2017/12/04/ancs-leagues-will-each-send-60-delegates-to-conference-reveals-mantashe_a_23296292/">(60 each, thus 180)</a>.</p>
<p>The number of branches endorsing Ramaphosa by the evening of December 4 were 1,860 and Dlamini-Zuma 1,333. A total of 3,193 for both candidates, or around 2,000 fewer than the total number of conference voters. </p>
<p>Given that the race will go down to the wire, and that a few hundred ballots in either direction could make a world of difference to the ANC and South Africa, this analysis dissects eight black holes that account for the approximately 2,000 “discrepancy”.</p>
<h2>Uncertainties</h2>
<p>At the core, the uncertainties that make up the eight black holes are:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>The scores released by the ANC’s Provincial General Councils have a “margin of error”. This is because the scores are of branches and not individual delegates. But big branches send more than one delegate and are given more weighting in the voting. This can substantially change the balance between leading candidates come the election. </p></li>
<li><p>Mpumalanga province brings its own black box of 223 “unity” votes. The biggest bloc of branches refused to endorse a particular candidate and entered ‘unity’ on nomination forms, following the instruction of provincial leader DD Mabuza. These votes can therefore go to either leading candidate should the delegates cast their vote rather than waste it.</p></li>
<li><p>A further uncertainty comes in the exact number of branches that have missed the deadline for their branch general meetings. The deadline for convening these was a week ago. Missing the deadline means they have missed the opportunity to be represented at the conference. The ANC in an interview with the author estimated that between 95-98% made the target date. Exclusions will lower the number of delegates.</p></li>
<li><p>A number of branches are caught up in disputes. Challenges centre on the lack of legality of the branch general meetings, some of which have been <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-safrica-politics-anc/south-africas-ramaphosa-gets-most-nominations-ahead-of-anc-leadership-vote-idUSKBN1DY2LD">chaotic</a>. Some battled to reach quorums (50% of members had to be present), or they faked quorums. In other instances officials disappeared with meeting materials and memberships lists, attendance registers were signed off-site, or bickering and fist-fights ruled. These branch delegates could still make it into the voting booths at the conference if the ANC task teams resolve the disputes.</p></li>
<li><p>A number of branches and provincial structures have taken their disputes <a href="https://www.businesslive.co.za/bd/national/2017-10-02-how-courts-hands-are-full-with-anc-disputes/">to court</a>. Prominent cases are in KwaZulu-Natal, Free State and the <a href="http://ewn.co.za/2017/11/30/analysis-stephen-grootes-road-to-anc-conference-may-be-ruined-by-dispute-and-confusion">Eastern Cape</a>. The national conference does not ultimately depend on the provincial structures, but provincial leaders may have influenced their branch-based underlings substantially, or have covered up irregularities that affected whom the <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2017-10-11-more-anc-legal-woes">branches nominated</a>. Disputes at the time of conference could exclude some <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2012-12-18-00-concourt-ancs-free-state-decision-irregular">from voting</a>, or having their votes counted.</p></li>
<li><p>The ballots of individual delegates are secret and it’s therefore uncertain to what extent branch nominations will convert into matching votes. Prior conference outcomes show that the branch or provincial counts tended to hold: delegates are inclined to vote according to their mandates. But, political times have changed. Beyond the scrutiny of the superiors and away from branch commissars, delegates might vote according to <a href="https://citizen.co.za/news/south-africa/1637193/anc-delegates-must-vote-with-their-conscience-at-december-elective-conference-says-mchunu/">“conscience”</a>.</p></li>
<li><p>Hand-in-hand with individual discretion in the voting act is the practice of <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/mantashe-warns-anc-delegates-against-selling-their-votes-20171126">“brown envelopes”</a>, or bribes. Speculation is that the bribes could be enormously persuasive, going into six-figure rewards for the right vote. </p></li>
<li><p>The final big uncertainty comes <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/2017/12/04/ancs-leagues-will-each-send-60-delegates-to-conference-reveals-mantashe_a_23296292/">via the three leagues</a> - for women, youth and veterans - and the ANC’s executive structures. The large block of around 90 NEC and top-six votes, for example, could split relatively equally between the big candidates. It is this block that has kept Zuma in power through a series of votes in the National Executive Committee, and interventions in parliamentary votes. But, they could by now see that the writing is on the wall given that Zuma will cede his position as head of the party in two weeks time, and his post as head of state in 2019.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2>Hard to call</h2>
<p>The battle lines are drawn and the result is close. Exact calculations will remain impossible; the result is likely to be known by 17 or 18 December. In the interim, all South Africans can do is rely on circumstantial evidence, including signs of confidence or panic in the ranks of the candidates. They can also try and plug the black holes.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/88667/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Susan Booysen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The race for the presidency of South Africa’s governing ANC will go down to the wire. Exact calculations for the frontrunners are impossible and the result is likely to be known by 17 or 18 December.Susan Booysen, Professor in the Wits School of Governance, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/884042017-12-05T08:54:13Z2017-12-05T08:54:13ZSnags that could cast doubt on ANC’s choice of new leaders<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/197139/original/file-20171130-30919-kk4cjo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South Africa's governing African National Congress has begun the process of choosing its leaders.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA-EFE/Kim Ludrick</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>South Africa’s governing African National Congress (ANC) holds its highly contested national elective conference for its top six leaders, between <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/splash/index">December 16 – 20</a>. The conference will, among other things, mark the end of <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/jacob-gedleyihlekisa-zuma">Jacob Zuma’s</a> <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/ancs-nec-must-quit-20161023-2">controversial decade-long tenure</a> as party president. It will also bring to an end a <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times/news/2017-11-18-its-gloves-off-in-the-anc-leadership-race-after-ndz-snubs-cyrils-overture/">bruising contest</a> to replace him. The top two contenders are <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2017-11-03-00-ramaphosa-takes-an-early-lead-as-anc-branches-cast-their-vote">Cyril Ramaphosa</a> and <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times/business/2017-11-29-dlamini-zuma-endorsed-by-free-state-in-anc-leadership-race/">Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma</a>. The Conversation Africa’s Politics and Society Editor, Thabo Leshilo, asked Keith Gottschalk about the process.</em> </p>
<p><strong>Why does the conference matter?</strong></p>
<p>The elective conference is important for the party as well as the country. This is because the person chosen to lead the party has, since 1994, gone on to become president of the country – an outcome dictated by the fact that the parliament elects the next president and the ANC has a large majority in parliament. The outcome is therefore watched very closely by both South Africans who support the ANC and those who don’t.</p>
<p><strong>How does the ANC choose its top leaders?</strong></p>
<p>The ANC’s <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/sites/default/files/docs/NEC-Nomination-Process.pdf">election process</a> is full of extraordinary contradictions. It has built into it some of the most stringent checks and balances of any party in the world. On paper, the process could not be more fair. In practice either incompetence or manipulation causes much anger.</p>
<p>The party holds an elective conference every five years. According to the <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/constitution-anc">ANC rules</a>, 90% of the delegates to the conference must be from party branches. Each branch in good standing is entitled to send one delegate, and if a branch has more than 250 delegates it is allowed to send one extra delegate per 250 extra members.</p>
<p>The additional 10% of delegates is made up of representatives from each provincial executive, delegates representing the women, youth and veterans leagues as well as members of the party’s National Executive Committee who attend in an ex officio capacity. </p>
<p>Before the conference ANC members are required to take part in a specially convened annual general meeting of their branch. There are over 2 000 branches in good standing. To be able to vote at this special AGM members have to have their ANC membership card as well as their South African national identity document.</p>
<p><strong>What checks and balances are in place to make sure the process is fair?</strong></p>
<p>Voting at the branch AGMs is monitored by trusted veterans chosen by the Provincial Executive Committee who are deployed to monitor the process. </p>
<p>Voting usually takes place by show of hands, but may be done by secret ballot. The team monitoring the process must take a picture of results of voting recorded on paper using their cellphones and send the image to the party’s national headquarters at <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/contacts">Luthuli House</a>, in Johannesburg. This is to prevent ballot results being tampered with.</p>
<p><strong>What are the flaws in the system?</strong></p>
<p>I believe the process is fair. But it would be fairer if there was a direct one-member-one-vote system instead of branch totals. </p>
<p>The flaws in the system relate to the extent to which rigging can take place. This can happen by wealthy politicians setting up ghost branches. Provincial executive committees also sometimes try to manipulate the outcome of the branch AGMs. This can happen through manipulating who <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/kzn-anc-rebels-lash-out-at-leaders-20171106">gets chosen to represent the branch</a> as a delegate to the national conference.</p>
<p>But the biggest opening to possible fraud is through using the issuing of ANC membership cards to “gatekeep” – stopping people from being able to vote in branches, or even from attending the conference. Membership cards, and being included on the membership list compiled by Luthuli House, national HQ (as opposed to lists kept by one’s own branch and provincial office) matter because they give individuals the right to vote at their branches, as well as at the conference if they’re chosen to go as a delegate.</p>
<p>During the last few conferences there were accusations that the Zuma faction of the ANC deliberately used the fact that renewals and new cards can take a very long time to issue to keep certain people from attending (and voting). </p>
<p>The issuing of cards is a mess. New members complain bitterly about waiting inordinately long periods - sometimes up to 21 months - to get their membership cards. Renewals can also take forever. The renewal of the late ANC former cabinet minister Kader Asmal’s membership card reached his widow five years after he died.</p>
<p>Sometimes, some members in good standing suddenly discover that their names have been removed from the membership register. The most high profile of these cases was <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/dailynews/zweli-mkhizes-name-not-on-branch-voters-roll-11891535">Zweli Mkhize</a>, the party’s treasurer and one of its top six leaders. </p>
<p>Five years ago an example of gatekeeping hit one branch’s delegate when he arrived at the national conference at Mangaung. He was told he was not a member in good standing. He was in fact an ANC Member of the Provincial Legislature. Only after votes were cast which saw Jacob Zuma re-emerge as party president was it conceded that he was actually a member in good standing.</p>
<p>Another potential flaw is that delegates who are mandated by their branch to vote for one particular candidate are persuaded – for example by being bribed when they get to the conference – to vote for someone else. </p>
<p>Voting at the conference is by secret ballot. The assumption is that branch delegates will behave with integrity and vote for the person their branch mandated them to vote for. </p>
<p>But even if they do accept a bribe, those reportedly offering <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2017-11-23-cyril-ramaphosa-leads-but-foul-play-may-snatch-victory">the bribe</a> have no way of knowing if the delegate actually did change his or her vote.</p>
<p>South Africans, especially ANC voters, will be watching closely for any signs of rigging, bribing branch delegates to switch their votes, and other manipulations. If all is free and fair the process certainly equals, for example, the degree of democracy in UK and US parties choosing their leaders.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/88404/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Keith Gottschalk is a member of the ANC, but writes this in his professional capacity as a political scientist.</span></em></p>The ANC’s elective conference is important for the party and South Africa. This is because the person chosen to lead the governing party since 1994, has gone on to become president.Keith Gottschalk, Political Scientist, University of the Western CapeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/877742017-11-20T17:23:20Z2017-11-20T17:23:20ZLessons for South Africa’s Jacob Zuma in Robert Mugabe’s misfortunes<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195466/original/file-20171120-18574-kx9gwt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The political troubles of Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe comes with lessons for his South African counterpart Jacob Zuma. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">REUTERS/Siphiwe Sibeko</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>President Robert Mugabe’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-military-coup-is-afoot-in-zimbabwe-whats-next-for-the-embattled-nation-87528">endgame</a> in Zimbabwe holds various lessons for his South African counterpart, <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-south-africans-should-resist-an-amnesty-deal-for-zuma-68101">Jacob Zuma</a>, as the latter too, considers his prospects towards the end of his presidency. The first, obviously, is that while, from the pinnacle of power, a country’s president may feel the monarch of all he can survey, it is always possible that the blade of the guillotine is just around the corner. </p>
<p>Accordingly, it is always prudent to keep at least two bags packed for a hasty exit: one full of suit, shirts, underwear and socks, another full of foreign currency (preferably dollars or Euros). You just never know how things might pan out, so it is best to be prepared.</p>
<p>Following the <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-military-coup-is-afoot-in-zimbabwe-whats-next-for-the-embattled-nation-87528">almost-coup</a>, Mugabe has been in a stronger position than many African dictators before him because the African Union has in recent years become a lover of democracy and a hater of coups. It therefore now demands that changes of leadership must have at least a veneer of <a href="https://www.news24.com/Africa/Zimbabwe/zuma-slams-unconstitutional-take-over-of-zim-20171115">constitutionality</a>. </p>
<p>This has always been the Zimbabwean military’s weak point during this past week of flirting with political power. Hence its insistence that, despite its take-over of the airwaves, State House and parliament, alongside its house-arrest of the president and his family, its actions are not a coup. </p>
<p>In turn, this has provided Mugabe with a considerable degree of wriggle room, which he has sought to exploit to the full. Indeed, it has remained his key bargaining chip, not least because the African Union does not want to be seen as party to the overthrow of a hero of African liberation. </p>
<h2>Explicit political actor</h2>
<p>Zuma will feel confident that whereas in Zimbabwe the army has long been deeply involved in the ruling party’s internal affairs and the wider political arena, the South African National Defence Force is not an explicit political actor. He stands in no fear of a military coup (or even a Zimbabwe-style non-coup). Yet he does have to worry about what happens within his political party, the African National Congress (ANC).</p>
<p>Even if his favoured candidate, <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-woman-president-in-south-africa-sadly-top-contender-offers-more-of-the-same-71944">Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma</a>, were to win the party leadership at the ANC’s December congress, Zuma’s continuing as South African President might be seen as a political embarrassment. If strong contender <a href="https://citizen.co.za/news/south-africa/1643579/zumas-popularity-slides-again-ramaphosa-favourite-to-lead-anc-survey/">Cyril Ramaphosa</a> wins, even more urgent calls will be made from within the ANC for the him to be “recalled” because he will be viewed as an electoral liability. </p>
<p>It is a fair bet that, whoever wins, an excuse will be made for a delegation from the party leadership to visit the president and to ask him to stand down. Just ask former <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2008-09-20-anc-recalls-mbeki">President Thabo Mbeki</a> who was fired by his own ANC. If Zuma refuses to cooperate, then the ANC might turn to parliament, where enough ANC MPs might feel emboldened to vote with the opposition to dethrone him.</p>
<h2>Fighting for survival</h2>
<p>Like Mugabe, Zuma will be battling for a dignified exit. Even more urgently, he will be fighting for survival. In previous years, Mugabe may have feared the prospect of retribution for his sins, and would have been determined to secure immunity from prosecution. </p>
<p>Now, at 93, he is confident that once out of office he will be left in peace. He may or may not appreciate the irony that, unlike his country’s last white ruler Ian Smith, he will not be able to stay in Zimbabwe after he has been forced to stand down, but he will know that he has to leave.</p>
<p>Neither the army nor Zanu-PF will want him hanging around, fearing his ability to continue pulling strings. So off he must go, to South Africa, Dubai or Singapore (anywhere with a few decent shops for his shopaholic wife Grace). His major immediate concern then, we may presume, is safe passage and immunity for his family. We may further presume, that there is <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/17/robert-grace-mugabe-missing-millions-money-zimababwe">lots of money</a> stashed away in foreign bank accounts to keep the crocodile from the door.</p>
<h2>Zuma’s tricky position</h2>
<p>Zuma is differently placed. If he loses the Presidency he stands in all sorts of dangers, not least of which is prosecution for past financial crimes and the prospect of his ending his days in prison. In other words, he has much more to bargain for, and he will be doing so from a considerably weaker position. Not least of his problems is that he is a lot younger than Mugabe, so could spend quite a few years in jail. </p>
<p>Zuma’s major strength is that, whoever wins the party leadership, the ANC will probably want to grant him immunity and get him out of the way, as otherwise they face the prospect of their former leader facing a corruption trial during the lead up to elections in 2019.</p>
<p>But for a start, there is no provision for presidential immunity in the constitution, and its grant would face a strong challenge in the courts. Furthermore, if the Gupta or other Zuma allies in the project of “<a href="https://theconversation.com/zuma-and-anc-run-out-of-road-as-bad-news-piles-up-68197">state capture</a>” were to be prosecuted, Zuma could face being dragged into court as a witness. </p>
<p>In short, Zuma will realise that it will make sense to hot-foot it out of the country, preferably to a comfortably authoritarian country which will turn down requests for extradition. </p>
<h2>The fickle people</h2>
<p>What Mugabe is learning now, and it is something of which Zuma should take good note, is that the people are an ungrateful lot, and are likely to turn against you just when you most need their support. Up till a week ago, it was presumed that Mugabe retained the backing of all who mattered in Zanu-PF and that he would again be its candidate for president at the next election. But now, like many a dictator, he is having to learn fast that the people no longer love him. </p>
<p>Past allies, like the war veterans, had already turned against him, repudiating his apparent bid for his wayward wife, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jul/27/zimbabwe-first-lady-grace-robert-mugabe-successor">Grace</a>, to replace him. Zanu-PF Youth leader, <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/africa/2017-11-16-watch--from-die-for-mugabe-to-fawning-apology-zanu-pf-youth/">Kudzai Chipanga</a>, initially declared his willingness to “die for Mugabe” and labelled Major-General Constantino Chiwenga, the leader of the non-coup, a traitor when the army first intervened. After being locked up, he shamefacedly read out an abject apology, begging forgiveness, and pleading the inexperience of youth. </p>
<p>This has been followed by all 10 provincial organisations of Zanu-PF calling for Mugabe to go, and even encouraging ordinary people to join the marches being organised by opposition parties and civil society demanding his dismissal. </p>
<p>Zuma is too wily a politician not to know that once he loses the party presidency, his support base will drain away, and that he will become known as yesterday’s man. Yet like Mugabe, he will take comfort from the regional body, the Southern African Development Community (SADC), for there is nothing his fellow presidents dread more than the prospect of any one of their number facing impeachment.</p>
<p>He will also know that, unlike Mbeki, whose stature in Africa remains high, he has no viable future as a roving ex-president. Zuma will know that if he wants to enjoy his retirement in peace, he has to leave South Africa before he gets tangled up in court proceedings.</p>
<p>His best option will be to grab those two suitcases, make a hasty exit and move in next door to Bob and Grace in Dubai.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/87774/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Roger Southall receives funding from the National Research Foundation</span></em></p>The unfolding misfortunes of Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe hold key lessons for his South African counterpart Jacob Zuma who faces the possibility of a forced exit.Roger Southall, Professor of Sociology, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/857742017-10-17T08:10:01Z2017-10-17T08:10:01ZCan Zuma untie Gordian knot after failing to quash corruption charges?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190423/original/file-20171016-30971-1z0h47y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South Africa's president faces a difficult time ahead, following the loss of his bid to escape justice. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">GCIS</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Supreme Court of South Africa’s <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/2017/10/13/zuma-the-full-judgment_a_23242105/">rejection</a> of President Jacob Zuma’s appeal against an earlier judgment that he face 783 criminal charges has renewed uncertainty about his future.</p>
<p>The earlier High Court ruling had <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2016-04-29-high-court-on-zumas-corruption-charges-not-the-end-but-damning/#.WeQ_61uCypo">found</a> that the 2009 decision by the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) to withdraw the charges of corruption, money laundering and racketeering against Zuma was irrational.</p>
<p>The judgment forms part of three milestones in Zuma’s recent history dominated by corruption, unethical conduct and his ability to avoid criminal charges. These were, firstly, the <a href="https://www.nelsonmandela.org/omalley/index.php/site/q/03lv03445/04lv04015/05lv04148/06lv04149.htm">Schabir Shaik case</a> in which Zuma’s financial advisor was convicted of corruption as a result of his relationship with him. The second was the <a href="http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/full-text-constitutional-court-rules-on-nkandla-public-protector-20160331">Nkandla case</a> that involved the use of public funds on lavish renovations to Zuma’s private homestead. The Constitutional Court found that Zuma had acted illegally and in a way that was inconsistent with the Constitution. </p>
<p>The third is the latest case, known as the <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2017-10-13-recounting-eight-years-of-the-spy-tapes-saga-as-zuma-returns-to-court/">“spy tapes” case</a>. This involved intercepted discussions in 2007 between the then National Director of Public Prosecutions Bulelani Ngcuka and Leonard McCarthy (head of the then elite crime-fighting unit, the Scorpions) about the timing of Zuma’s indictment. Mokotedi Mpshe, who succeeded Ngcuka in an acting capacity, <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2009-04-06-npa-drops-corruption-charges-against-zuma">withdrew the charges</a> in 2009, arguing that these discussions showed the charges were politicised. </p>
<p>The “spy tapes” saga returned with the application by the opposition Democratic Alliance to be given a copy of the tapes Mpshe used to exonerate Zuma. It was followed by another application for a judicial review of Mpshe’s decision. The High Court subsequently declared Mpshe’s decision irrational. This view has now been affirmed by the Supreme Court of Appeal.</p>
<h2>Complications</h2>
<p>A number of factors are going to complicate Zuma’s options after this judgment. The first is that, unlike most other states, the South African legal system does not include <a href="https://www.businesslive.co.za/opinion/2016-10-25-no-privilege-for-presidents-and-everyone-is-equal-before-the-law--even-no-1/">presidential immunity or amnesty</a>. </p>
<p>The second factor is about timing. Zuma’s term as president of the governing African National Congress ends in December when the party is due to elect a new leader. He will at that point lose most of his political power and will therefore be less able to protect himself by co-opting key figures in the criminal justice system. </p>
<p>It’s against this background that his preference for Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma to succeed him is part of his strategy to avoid being convicted during his <a href="http://www.politicsweb.co.za/opinion/will-zuma-go">retirement</a>. </p>
<h2>Implications of the judgment</h2>
<p>The implications of the Appeal Court judgment for a Zuma counter-strategy are important. The first one is that the relevance of the spy tapes has been removed. The fact that the Court concluded that the motive for charging a suspect is irrelevant and that procedural questions can only be settled by the trial court, removed the contextual arguments of political misappropriation of <a href="http://www.sowetanlive.co.za/news/2017/10/13/polokwane-conference-timing-bad-reasons-for-npa-to-drop-zumas-783-charges-sca">judicial processes</a> and also important discretionary options from the NPA.</p>
<p>The second one is that the judgment made it impossible for the National Director of Public Prosecutions to review his own decisions and that only a trial court could do it. Again, it limits the NPA’s discretion.</p>
<p>The third one is that the Supreme Court of Appeal raised serious concerns about the NPA’s integrity in 2009, the quality of its legal interpretations and the serious internal differences of opinion. This will become a major test of the NPA’s credibility.</p>
<p>The fourth implication is that the rationality principle has been reinforced. The final decision taken by the National Direct of Public Prosecutions Shaun Abrahams will be subjected to the same test.</p>
<p>The Supreme Court of Appeal did not spell out in any detail what steps the NPA should take next. Two interpretations have emerged: the one is to take the process back to 2009 and that the charges must be reinstated by the NPA. The second one is that the matter should be considered anew by the NPA. This would have to include Zuma’s insistence that he makes presentations before he <a href="http://www.thepresidency.gov.za/press-statements/decision-supreme-court-appeal">can be indicted</a>. </p>
<p>The scene is therefore set for legal game-playing. What’s clear is that the decision about Zuma’s indictment will not be finalised and implemented any time soon.</p>
<h2>Implications of a Zuma trial</h2>
<p>What are the implications of a Zuma court case in the near future? </p>
<p>The first is that having him in court would have a negative effect on government activities until 2019. This can’t be used as an excuse not to prosecute him – in any case this would amount to another irrelevant political motive which the Appeal Court has, in principle, disqualified. A power void would nevertheless cascade down the tiers of government.</p>
<p>The second possible implication is that, if summonsed, Zuma would have no choice but to resign of his own accord. If this happened, an Acting President would have to be appointed and a new President elected within 30 days. This could either be the new ANC President, due to be chosen at the party’s conference in December, or a caretaker president (as <a href="https://www.brandsouthafrica.com/governance/government/kgalema-motlanthe">happened previously</a>) until 2019. </p>
<p>The third possibility is that Zuma would be forced to resign in the same way that the governing ANC forced <a href="http://www.politicsweb.co.za/news-and-analysis/thabo-mbekis-resignation-speech">Thabo Mbeki</a> out of presidency in 2008. Given its inherent potential to create instability and lead to splits in the ANC makes this the worst case scenario.</p>
<p>All three possible outcomes are not only detrimental to Zuma, but also to the ANC in general. Revelations that are bound to come out in any court case will seriously embarrass the ANC and will provide ample ammunition for the opposition in an election campaign. This would be true whether Zuma was still president or not.</p>
<p>This leaves presidential hopeful Cyril Ramaphosa and the part of the ANC that is aligned to him with a conundrum. They have characterised themselves as being anti-corruption as well as striving for the moral renewal of the ANC. They would have to weigh this against the countervailing effects of having Zuma on trial.</p>
<p>The option of a political settlement can also <a href="http://ewn.co.za/2017/07/15/reports-of-zuma-exit-package-as-fake-news-anc">not rescue the situation</a>, because the case against President Zuma has become a moral litmus test for the ANC.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/85774/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dirk Kotze does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>South Africa’s President Jacob Zuma’s loss in the Appeals Court forms part of three milestones in his recent history dominated by corruption, unethical conduct and a knack to avoid criminal charges.Dirk Kotze, Professor in Political Science, University of South AfricaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/850002017-10-02T16:51:31Z2017-10-02T16:51:31ZBritain’s Labour Party and South Africa’s ANC: why the stark contrast of fortunes?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/188319/original/file-20171002-12107-1jdnjzo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">UK Labour Party Leader Jeremy Corbyn at the party's recent conference. His leadership has revived the party's fortunes.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters/Toby Melville</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Compare the state of two political parties which share a close past connection but which today face distinctly different futures. I’m referring to Britain’s Labour Party and South Africa’s African National Congress (ANC).</p>
<p>The British Labour Party has just held its most <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/sep/24/the-guardian-view-of-the-labour-conference-corbyns-party">successful national conference for years</a>. It projected an image of unity, confidence and enthusiasm constructed around its leader, Jeremy Corbyn, who less than a year ago was widely portrayed as leading his party into the political wilderness. </p>
<p>Corbyn won the leadership by mobilising mass backing among an increased party membership (encouraged by internal party reforms). But he also alienated many of the party’s MPs. Forced into a repeat leadership election after most of his shadow cabinet resigned, he had been overwhelmingly re-elected by the membership, yet still failed to <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/the-media-isnt-jeremy-corbyns-problem-his-personality-is-a7331021.html">convince the media he was electable</a>. </p>
<p>In early May 2017, Labour was trounced in <a href="https://theconversation.com/local-elections-how-the-parties-fared-59013">local government elections</a>, losing a swathe of seats while the ruling Conservatives gained heavily. So when new Prime Minister Theresa May called a snap general election <a href="https://theconversation.com/where-it-all-went-wrong-for-theresa-may-79219">a few weeks later</a>, seeking a personal mandate to pursue the country’s fateful “Brexit” negotiations, it was widely expected that Corbyn would drag Labour down to another miserable defeat.</p>
<p>Corbyn defied expectations. Rather than sweeping to a triumphant victory, May lost her party’s majority and was <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-will-conservative-deal-with-the-dup-work-79448">forced into a humiliating deal</a> with the Democratic Unionist Party. Labour lost the election, yet managed to project its unexpectedly improved performance as a victory. </p>
<p>Now it was the Tories in disarray. May hung on to her leadership only because those eyeing the top job feared that a new leadership contest would pull the party apart. </p>
<p>Labour’s success is <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/sam-flint/jeremy-corbyn_b_11330752.html">widely ascribed to Corbyn</a>. His election campaign was remarkably low key, almost old fashioned. Above all, he projected himself as a rarity in politics – a man of principle whose adherence to a socialist platform had been consistent throughout his career. His idealism appealed especially to younger voters, and “Corbinistas” <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-39856464">won the war on social media. </a></p>
<p>Corbyn has yet to win back many of Labour’s traditional working class. But with the Tories increasingly led by the nose by their <a href="https://theconversation.com/theresa-may-and-the-tories-three-ways-to-stop-the-bleed-84972">most right-wing elements</a>, and their incompetence in negotiations with the EU <a href="http://www.eureferendum.com/blogview.aspx?blogno=86555">threatening a disastrous Brexit</a>, Corbyn has claimed convincingly that Labour occupies the critical centre-ground in British politics. And that the Thatcher revolution has run its course and that neo-Liberalism is dead. </p>
<p>In its place, Labour will lead a crusade against the vicious social inequalities that neo-liberalism has brought in its wake, promising a <a href="http://www.labour.org.uk/page/-/Images/manifesto-2017/Labour%20Manifesto%202017.pdf">new social project</a> “For the Many, not for the Few”. Labour is smelling power, and the making of a new social revolution.</p>
<p>In contrast, today’s ANC seems to have much more in common with the Tories than with the revitalised Labour Party. Just like the Tories, it is brutally factionalised and is led by a discredited leader. It is bereft of new ideas and is manifestly failing in government. The South African economy has slumped; investor confidence has plummeted; key parastatals have been bankrupted and social services are failing. Worse, its president and its party cadres have converted the state into a feeding trough for private interests. </p>
<p>The ANC is openly divided and locked into an increasingly bitter battle for the party leadership, to be elected by delegates to the party’s national conference in December. </p>
<h2>ANC contenders</h2>
<p>There are six or seven notional candidates for the top job. But the race for the leadership appears to be between Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma and Cyril Ramaphosa. Zweli Mkhize is now running close behind, threatening to overtake and win by a nose. The ANC likes to boast that it’s a forum for the “battle of ideas”. Yet this contest is almost totally <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/sites/default/files/National%20Policy%20Conference%202017%20Communications_1.pdf">bereft of ideas. </a></p>
<p>Dlamini-Zuma has claimed the banner of “Radical Economic Transformation” for <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2017-08-29-dlamini-zuma-pushes-radical-economic-transformation/">her campaign</a>. Her lacklustre performance, though, has failed to clothe it with any convincing content. Rather than promising a new world, her strong backing by President Jacob Zuma suggests the main purpose of her candidacy is to keep him out of jail and to maintain the state as a site of political largesse for those who have benefited from his rule. </p>
<p>Ramaphosa is projecting himself as the <a href="http://www.news24.com/MyNews24/the-best-candidate-for-president-20170711">reform candidate </a>: the man of common sense and experience who will cleanse the party of its corruption and set the economy back on track. Yet, for all his talk about corruption and his railing against “state capture”, he has exhibited a total aversion to any naming of names. The firebrand union leader of yesteryear has turned into a pussycat. </p>
<p>Some in the ANC claim he is constrained by his awkward position as Deputy President, and that were he to step out of line, Zuma would not hesitate to sack him. Others fear that he does not have the courage and determination to win the prize. </p>
<p>So up comes Zweli Mkhize on the outside track, being projected as the candidate who could straddle the Dlamini-Zuma and Ramaphosa divide and <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/2017/09/28/why-zweli-mkhize-could-very-well-be-the-ancs-unity-candidate_a_23226316/">restore the ANC to unity</a>. But at what cost? As with both other candidates, Mkhize would have to make major compromises with many powerful elements in the party to win, and his triumph would herald greater continuity than change.</p>
<h2>The ANC a lost cause?</h2>
<p>Former President Kgalema Motlanthe has suggested that the party must lose the national election due in 2019 if it wishes to regain its soul. Similarly, Makhosi Khoza recently resigned both as an MP and a member of the ANC declaring that the party has become <a href="https://citizen.co.za/news/south-africa/1662489/breaking-makhosi-khoza-has-quits-the-anc/">“alien and corrupt”</a>. </p>
<p>Such siren calls, issued from under its own roof, suggest that – given the right circumstances – the ANC is capable of “self-correction”. Yet the evidence for this is thin. South Africans were promised this after the party’s dismal showing in the 2016 local government elections. All they have had is more of the same. </p>
<p>The problem for the ANC is that unlike the Labour Party, it lacks a credible prophet with moral appeal and related new ideas to lead it out of the wilderness. Despite its divisions, it may well creep home in 2019, or at least win enough seats to become the major party in a governing coalition. </p>
<p>However, the more its desperation in clinging to power, the more its inability to tackle the fundamental reforms needed to restore it to its former glory. A politics of patronage will remain at its core; principles will be sacrificed to personal ambitions and material gain; and the ANC will remain a party, not for the many, but the privileged few.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/85000/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Roger Southall receives funding from the National Research Foundation.. </span></em></p>Britain’s Labour under Corbyn is smelling power, and the making of a new social revolution. In contrast, in South Africa’s governing ANC is in disarray, with no moral compass or credible leadership.Roger Southall, Professor of Sociology, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/844412017-09-24T06:44:41Z2017-09-24T06:44:41ZSouth Africa’s ruling ANC faces dreadful choices as voters grow more sceptical<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187060/original/file-20170921-17987-pnce5n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South Africa's governing party, the ANC, faces a crucial, decisive but potentially divisive leadership choice.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Nic Bothma</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>South Africa’s governing African National Congress is caught between the mythological monsters <a href="https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-moral-or-point-of-the-story-of-Scylla-and-Charybdis-in-Homers-Odyssey">Scylla and Charybdis</a> as it heads towards its crucial 54th national elective conference in <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/54th-national-conference">December</a>. In choosing its new leader the party’s factions could push its leadership succession battle to a finale that produces a credible winner and leads to the party’s purported <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/2017/07/02/ancs-journey-of-self-correction-and-healing-has-begun-cyril_a_23012604/">self-correction</a>. But the process could just as easily split the party further and damage its already dented 2019 electoral prospects. </p>
<p>Either way, the ANC of 2017 faces dreadful choices.</p>
<p>Amid this comes the rallying call for <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times/opinion-and-analysis/2017-09-18-how-the-ancs-premier-league-is-shifting-to-back-a-unity-ticket/">unity</a> at the conference.</p>
<p>But “unity” has become an over exploited catchall for ANC provincial power brokers and candidates. For unity to work beyond the conference, mountains of looting and corruption will have to be swept under a carpet of compromise and inclusion. </p>
<p>The most likely outcome is that South Africa’s cynical and savvy new electorate will be left underwhelmed which is why the outcome of the December conference will affect the ANC’s subsequent election prospects more directly than any of its six preceding meetings since 1991. These were <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/53rd-national-conference-mangaung">Mangaung (2012</a>, <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/52nd-national-conference-polokwane">Polokwane (2007)</a>, <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/51st-national-conference-stellenbosch">Stellenbosch (2002)</a>, <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/50th-national-conference-mafikeng">Mafikeng (1997)</a>, <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/49th-national-conference-bloemfontein">Bloemfontein (1994)</a> and <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/48th-national-conference-durban">Durban (1991)</a>. The last two – Mangaung and Polokwane – laid the foundation for the party’s current woes.</p>
<h2>Road to self-destruction</h2>
<p>Previous leadership contests – structured equally by actual voting by delegates and deal making – have shaped the character of the organisation. </p>
<p>Jacob Zuma’s Pyrrhic 2007 victory in Polokwane to become ANC president brought in the fleeting belief that the ANC was reconnecting with the people and that it was set to drive <a href="http://witspress.co.za/catalogue/the-african-national-congress-and-the-regeneration-of-political-power/">“radical” change</a>. </p>
<p>Its dramatic impact was matched only by the 1991 conference in Durban – held after the unbanning of the ANC but before it assumed power in the 1994 elections. </p>
<p>The contest in Durban was precarious. Different groupings – former exiles and political prisoners on the one hand, and those who had remained to lead the liberation struggle internally on the other – had to be accommodated. Compromises were reached. Among others, Cyril Ramaphosa became secretary-general and Jacob Zuma deputy secretary-general. This united front was accepted widely.</p>
<p>In 1994, Ramaphosa retained his position, while Thabo Mbeki slipped into the deputy presidency and Zuma became the national chairperson. Mbeki, Zuma and Ramaphosa now constituted a triangle of power that set the tone for turmoil in the decades to come. Mbeki leapfrogged Ramaphosa to become president of the ANC in 1997. The effect of this was to side-line Ramaphosa from the main succession line, and to open the door to Zuma’s ascendance. This in turn established the tracks for future power trysts and discreditation.</p>
<p>As the country’s president from 1999 Mbeki became maligned by the left for championing <a href="http://www.sacp.org.za/main.php?ID=2816">neo-liberal policies</a>. Yet he won a second term. The resolutions at the 2002 conference showed a state that was confident of its abilities to eradicate the social scourges of the day. But Mbeki <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books?id=qNA4wTl5pjkC&pg=PA1&lpg=PA1&dq=Zunami">baulked at entrusting this project</a> to his deputy Zuma who was already implicated in arms deal corruption. The only way to stop Zuma would have been to bring charges – a decision that was unpalatable in the prevailing climate because the charges would have come across as being politicised.</p>
<p>The transition from Mbeki to Zuma catalysed the process of self-destruction in the ANC. Zuma’s formal rise to power followed his involvement in the <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2017-05-03-zuma-corruption-and-the-arms-deal-the-gift-that-just-keeps-on-giving/">arms deal saga</a>. Multiple scandals followed, including a <a href="http://www.jonathanball.co.za/component/virtuemart/khwezi-the-remarkable-story-of-fezekile-ntsukela-kuzwayo-detail?Itemid=6">rape case</a> in which he was acquitted, and detailed allegations that he facilitated <a href="https://www.scribd.com/document/329757088/State-of-Capture-Public-Protector-Report#from_embed">state capture</a> by his networks of family and associates.</p>
<p>In his second term, Zuma’s loyalists bent on mobilising for their <a href="http://witspress.co.za/catalogue/dominance-and-decline/">“turn at the trough”</a>, entrenched their hold on power, fusing the ANC’s succession contests with guarding access to political power and state resources.</p>
<p>The ANC has gone into all previous conferences reasonably secure about its electoral support. Leadership elections in the previous rounds have not been accompanied by concerns over whether or not the choice of leadership would pose any electoral risk.</p>
<p>That’s changed. Corruption in government has become a major issue for the electorate and public trust in state institutions is <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2016-08-22-bumpy-political-ride-ahead-what-the-effs-coalition-refusal-means-for-south-africa">evaporating</a>. This loss of support was evident in the <a href="https://businesstech.co.za/news/government/195876/new-poll-shows-anc-is-losing-support-below-50/">2014 and 2016 elections</a>.</p>
<p>Yet, depending on the leaders it chooses, the ANC runs the risk of either ceding its outright electoral majority nationally, and even potentially in provinces beyond the Western Cape – the only province it does not run – to <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2017-06-14-coalition-politics-a-common-enemy-a-divided-future/#.WcLd-2dfB2A">opposition coalitions</a>. Or becoming dependent on questionable small parties to forge governing coalitions.</p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/new-survey-data-shows-zuma-cost-the-anc-dearly-in-the-2016-election-75811">Opinion surveys</a> over the last year all show a singular direction: the need to cleanse state of Zumaist influences, and minimal tolerance of corruption. Yet the ANC succession campaigns have been vacillating, often ignoring the dangling sword.</p>
<p>This means that for the first time since its unbanning the ANC requires foundational renewal and correction. Its supporters and general electorate are no longer content with conference resolutions that simply promise to root out corruption, as was the case in Mangaung 2012.</p>
<h2>Quest for unity</h2>
<p>These realities leave the ANC with unpalatable choices: does it maintain unity in its leadership contest and avoid angry fall-outs – and even another split? ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe <a href="http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/anc-scrambles-for-unity-20170625-3">assumes that</a> unity can be infused by electing</p>
<blockquote>
<p>a leadership that will send a signal that we are serious about stopping looting from our people. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Yet efforts to drive unity have put little emphasis on exorcising corruption and correcting the ANC.</p>
<p>Several unity initiatives have been aired since the run-up to the <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/5th-national-policy-conference-2017">ANC’s mid-year policy conference</a> in June. For example, in a poorly sponsored initiative Zuma, as president, proposed that the loser of the presidential race automatically become the <a href="http://ewn.co.za/2017/06/30/president-zuma-uses-opening-of-anc-policy-conference-to-call-for-unity">deputy president</a>.</p>
<p>Subsequent bilateral meetings between ANC provincial executives have attempted forging united fronts in multiple guises. Proposed amendments to the <a href="http://www.power987.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/ANC-Document.pdf">ANC constitution</a> (to be deliberated at the conference, just prior to the final nominations in December) include several options to accommodate a greater number of top ANC officials.</p>
<p>Even the ANC parliamentary caucuses’ stance in August 2017’s <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/2017/08/07/secret-ballot-the-motion-against-zuma-will-still-be-defeated_a_23068726/">opposition driven vote of no confidence</a> was a manifestation of the “unity above all” mantra. It pointed to the type of ANC that might follow if unity prevails over the substance of governance.</p>
<p>Weaknesses that followed that vote included further declines in <a href="http://ewn.co.za/2017/09/20/eskom-meets-minister-s-deadline-to-respond-to-trillian-questions">state-owned entities</a> (South African Airways, and the power utility Eskom, for example), evidence of the capture of the National Treasury and attempted capture of the <a href="https://mg.co.za/tag/public-investment-corporation">Public Investment Corporation</a>, while private sector associates to the Gupta-Zuma network <a href="https://www.businesslive.co.za/.../2017-09-12-bell-pottingers-british-business-collapse">went into tailspins</a>.</p>
<h2>High stakes</h2>
<p>None of the preceding conferences could prepare the ANC for the decisions, including leadership choices, that the December conference is required to deliver. The stakes are high and the delegates’ task unenviable.</p>
<p>They will be presiding over an ANC that squirms in Scylla’s clutches, amid differences over the theme of unity. Simultaneously, they will be fighting to avoid the crosscurrents of Charybdis’ whirlpool. This, as the electorate demands that the ANC show integrity and accountability. Unity above all might entail unpalatable compromises. A <a href="http://ewn.co.za/2017/09/20/motlanthe-not-having-zuma-as-president-would-create-new-environment">post-Zuma order</a> that still bears the Zuma imprint may not be good enough, even if keeps the ANC united.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/84441/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Susan Booysen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>For the first time since its unbanning the ANC needs to find a new direction. Its supporters and South African voters are no longer content with resolutions that promise to end to corruption.Susan Booysen, Professor in the Wits School of Governance, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/838292017-09-12T15:13:00Z2017-09-12T15:13:00ZBestiality and BS: Lessons from South Africa’s sleazy political climate<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/185484/original/file-20170911-1373-bpl46u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South African Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa unwittingly fell for an old trick used to discredit politicians. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">GCIS</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>There is a famous polling story, commonly attributed to US President Lyndon B. Johnson. Attacking his rival in Texas, where the vote was close, Johnson used the sucker-punch tactic. As <a href="https://masscommons.wordpress.com/2012/03/15/fear-loathing-on-the-campaign-trail-make-them-deny-it/">re-told</a> by famous American journalist Hunter S Thompson, </p>
<blockquote>
<p>The race was close and Johnson was getting worried. Finally he told his campaign manager to start a massive rumour campaign about his opponent’s life-long habit of enjoying carnal knowledge of his own barnyard sows.
“Christ, we can’t get a way calling him a pig-fucker,” the campaign manager protested. “Nobody’s going to believe a thing like that.</p>
<p>I know, Johnson replied. But let’s make the sonofabitch deny it.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>South African Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa just fell for the same trick, albeit a more mundane: "he sleeps around (with humans)”. Whether it was apartheid era <a href="http://ewn.co.za/2017/09/03/ramaphosa-sex-scandal-a-well-resourced-operation-against-me">“stratkom” style dirty trick</a> at work or the usual dirty game of electioneering, Ramaphosa was forced onto the back foot.</p>
<p>Instead of ignoring or laughing at the claims, he <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/sundayindependent/news/ramaphosa-in-womanising-e-mail-shock-11056138">went to court</a> to prevent a Sunday paper from publishing. Then he engaged the issue and revealed a <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times/news/2017-09-02-ramaphosa-speaks-out-im-not-a-blesser-but-i-did-have-an-affair/">long-past affair</a> of little interest to anyone. How did his advisers think this necessary in the sleazy moral climate created by Jacob Zuma’s ANC? </p>
<p>The challenge for voters is that there are multiple election-related battles happening simultaneously within the ANC. There is a fight for the <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2017-09-01-00-anc-presidential-race-wide-open">post-Zuma leadership</a>, fairly obviously. </p>
<p>But there is also Zuma’s own fight for <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/crime-courts/spytapes-case-court-rules-that-zuma-charges-be-reviewed-2015740">safety from prosecution</a> for alleged fraud, money laundering, corruption and racketeering once he steps down. His <a href="https://www.enca.com/south-africa/dlamini-zuma-indicates-she-is-ready-for-presidency">chosen candidate</a> – Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma – isn’t attractive to voters, according to polls. The one attribute she can play on is the mantra <a href="https://www.thesouthafrican.com/dlamini-zuma-tweeted-about-why-sa-needs-a-female-president-twitter-responded-with-a-roast/">“we need a woman as president”</a>. That explains why Ramaphosa was attacked as a <a href="http://ewn.co.za/2017/08/16/ramaphosa-s-ex-wife-abuse-claims-seek-to-prevent-him-from-becoming-president">wife-beater</a>, and when that didn’t stick, as a sequential <a href="http://www.enca.com/south-africa/the-blesser-explainer"><em>blesser</em></a> (sugar daddy). </p>
<h2>What the polls say</h2>
<p>Leadership polls in the <a href="http://www.enca.com/south-africa/presidents-popularity-at-an-all-time-low-enca-ipsos-poll">public domain</a> – of all voters, not just ANC voters – suggest that this election is Ramaphosa’s to lose. Among potential voters from all parties, he has overtaken the main opposition Democratic Alliance’s Mmusi Maimane, to lead Dlamini-Zuma by a considerable margin. Dlamini-Zuma seems to be on an ineluctably downward spiral, matched only by her ex-husband. Her campaign urgently needs an injection. Becoming an MP and presumably thereafter a minister is part of the attempt to do just that, as will the rumoured appointment as Higher Education Minister and <a href="http://ewn.co.za/2017/09/10/report-nzimande-s-future-in-balance-as-dlamini-zuma-set-to-become-mp">bestower</a> of more or less free education for all, if it occurs.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/185810/original/file-20170913-23138-iyb1cq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/185810/original/file-20170913-23138-iyb1cq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=380&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/185810/original/file-20170913-23138-iyb1cq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=380&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/185810/original/file-20170913-23138-iyb1cq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=380&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/185810/original/file-20170913-23138-iyb1cq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/185810/original/file-20170913-23138-iyb1cq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/185810/original/file-20170913-23138-iyb1cq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But the problem is Ramaphosa. If Dlamini-Zuma needs a bounce, he needs his bubble burst. The ANC’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/anc-policy-conference-shows-shifting-balance-of-power-80705">mid-year policy conference</a>, which begun with Zuma proxies’ braggadocio, gave Ramaphosa a major bounce in the polls to the point where he is on a continued upward trend. The party’s <a href="http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/anc-tightens-leadership-nomination-process-ahead-of-elective-conference-20170130">December elective conference</a> is suddenly very close. A repeat performance would secure Ramaphosa’s position; and leave current president Zuma looking very fragile indeed. Cue the smears.</p>
<p>If Dlamini-Zuma remains burdened by “that” name – and focus groups make it clear that the name is a curse, not a blessing – then attacking Ramaphosa for philandering and beating his wife is meant to take the gloss off his campaign and, crucially, influence women voters. Who wants a(nother) president who cheats on his wife? Who wants a president who apparently beat a former wife <a href="http://www.702.co.za/articles/268641/hope-ramaphosa-cyril-never-lifted-a-finger-to-me-he-wouldn-t-beat-a-woman">(despite her strenuous denials)</a>? These are all intended to dent Ramaphosa’s appeal to women voters. Above all, their aim is to reinforce the “<a href="http://www.politicsweb.co.za/news-and-analysis/the-time-for-a-female-president-is-now--ancwl">we need a woman president</a>” mantra – which is the central and only message of the Dlamini-Zuma campaign. </p>
<h2>The 2019 national elections</h2>
<p>All this is being fought out in the ANC, even if simultaneously in the full glare of a willing media. But the ANC nowadays is merely a player in the game – a big one, but most certainly not too big to fail.</p>
<p>There is still, in 2019, the <a href="http://www.702.co.za/articles/251032/anc-stands-to-lose-majority-in-2019-research">real national election</a> where South African citizens go to vote. This may be Zuma’s major miscalculation. All evidence suggests that the national leadership have not learned the <a href="https://theconversation.com/sharp-tongued-south-african-voters-give-ruling-anc-a-stiff-rebuke-63606">lesson of the 2016 municipal elections</a>, which is core to all polling: do not take your voters for granted. </p>
<p>The ANC has failed to find its mythical reset G-spot, and its post-election post-mortem seems to have found nothing needed correcting barring the removal of some peskily ethical ministers. The <a href="http://ewn.co.za/Topic/Gupta-leaks">#Guptaleaks</a> – the thousands of leaked emails exposing the extent of the powerful Gupta family’s capture of the state – and the <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africa-has-lost-a-key-line-of-defence-against-corruption-what-now-75549">cabinet re-shuffling</a> plus simple cravenness of the entire ANC project, have worsened since 2016.</p>
<p>The ANC is still the “mothership” – the famous <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/organisations/african-national-congress-anc">liberation party</a>, settled deep in the heart and subconscious of many South Africans. But the same lovers of history are judging the present, and will vote accordingly. They did so in 2016. The warning seems to have passed unheeded.</p>
<p>The cloak and dagger cleverness being unleashed by all sides in the ANC struggle assumes one thing – that the party will win in 2019. Polls suggest that at the moment, the ANC remains the majority party. But that is voter sentiment right now – it does not measure voter intention in 2019. Moreover, winning and being a majority party are very different – just ask the ANC in Johannesburg post-2016, for example. A <a href="https://www.ipsos.com/en-za/ipsos-poll-voters-uncertain-pre-2019">recent IPSOS</a> poll found the following:</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/185458/original/file-20170911-1323-m2eiv0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/185458/original/file-20170911-1323-m2eiv0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=266&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/185458/original/file-20170911-1323-m2eiv0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=266&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/185458/original/file-20170911-1323-m2eiv0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=266&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/185458/original/file-20170911-1323-m2eiv0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=335&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/185458/original/file-20170911-1323-m2eiv0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=335&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/185458/original/file-20170911-1323-m2eiv0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=335&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Ipsos</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Nice guys don’t win</h2>
<p>Maimane’s coy slip of his <a href="http://www.politicsweb.co.za/news-and-analysis/anc-polling-below-50--mmusi-maimane">own poll</a> – that the ANC was polling below 50% – may represent a 2016-2018 downward trend. If that happens attacks on Ramaphosa will come from the main opposition DA as well. This doesn’t mean the DA will win. Maimane neatly said nothing of how his party was faring – but the messy business of bartering their way to provincial power via unshaky coalitions may be the future for an ANC that has truly toppled itself from the moral high ground. </p>
<p>Ramaphosa is clearly trying to chart a more moral and honest path than his predecessor. Where Zuma faced a rape trial and repeated evidence of infidelity, Ramaphosa initially fell for the sucker-punch (hence the failed interdict against <em>The Sunday Independent</em>) and then took the route of quiet dignity. </p>
<p>If Ramaphosa can lose that initial twitchiness, maintain the dignity, but toughen up for far worse muck that will be thrown at him, the country’s most famous buffalo farmer may yet prevail.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/83829/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Everatt does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Instead of ignoring his accusers, South Africa’s Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa entertained them, tried to silence them through court, and then revealed a long-past affair of little interest.David Everatt, Head of Wits School of Governance, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/835392017-09-06T18:51:21Z2017-09-06T18:51:21ZCyril Ramaphosa’s leaked emails: echoes of apartheid-era dirty tricks<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/184880/original/file-20170906-9871-19somya.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South African Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">GCIS</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>A routine smear. This is the view of the overwhelming majority of commentators and analysts about last weekend’s <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/sundayindependent/news/ramaphosa-in-womanising-e-mail-shock-11056138">“revelations”</a> in the <em>Sunday Independent</em> that Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa was a serial womaniser.</p>
<p>The commentariat can expect more such smears. They will come against more than one candidate running for the presidency of the governing ANC - and subsequently of the country. It’s not hard to predict that this slapstick routine will continue all the way to voting at the <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/54th-national-conference">ANC’s national conference</a> in December.</p>
<p>This was at least the second anti-Ramaphosa smear, following an earlier damp squib that alleged that he <a href="https://citizen.co.za/news/south-africa/1612116/malema-alleges-ramaphosa-is-the-worse-member-who-beat-his-wife/">abused his ex-wife</a>, a claim she firmly <a href="http://ewn.co.za/2017/08/16/ramaphosa-s-ex-wife-abuse-claims-seek-to-prevent-him-from-becoming-president">refuted</a>.</p>
<p>Ramaphosa has alleged that rogue elements in the country’s intelligence services hacked into his private emails and doctored them before handing them to the newspaper <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2017-09-02-intelligence-resources-hacked-my-email-ramaphosa/">to smear him</a>. This, he said, was intended to scupper his campaign to become president of the governing ANC and the country. He predicted that it would get worse ahead of the governing party’s elective conference.</p>
<p>Ramaphosa is in a virtual <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times/news/2017-07-22-poll-has-ramaphosa-beating-dlamini-zuma/">two-horse race</a> with former head of the African Union, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, for the presidency of the ANC. Her former husband President Jacob Zuma has <a href="https://www.enca.com/south-africa/dlamini-zuma-indicates-she-is-ready-for-presidency">endorsed her</a> as his preferred successor.</p>
<p>ANC Secretary General Gwede Mantashe has since urged factions within the governing party to desist from using state resources to <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2017-09-05-keep-state-resources-out-of-party-wars-says-mantashe/">discredit</a> those competing for the presidency.</p>
<h2>Then and now</h2>
<p>Several dimensions of this are worth unpacking. </p>
<p>Police states, unlike democracies, by definition abuse their secret services to spy on peaceful, lawful opponents. But to find a case where the secret services are also abused to spy on factions and rivals within the governing party, one has to go back all the way to the 1960s.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/obituary-hendrik-van-den-bergh-1246509.html">General Hendrik van den Bergh</a>, who set up the Bureau for State Security <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/dated-event/south-african-bureau-state-security-boss-established">(BOSS)</a>, to spy on the apartheid regime’s leftist and liberal opponents, also founded the <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books?id=gmzFBQAAQBAJ&pg=PT60&lpg=PT60&dq=republican+intelligence+services&source=bl&ots=aFTKywMWyA&sig=2MqkJSQe8ANrKKoPaLIdqlsMW1k&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi4h4bdpY7WAhUEvBQKHTfQCOYQ6AEIRzAE#v=onepage&q=republican%20intelligence%20services&f=false">Republikeinse Intelligensie Diens</a> to spy on the then governing National Party’s right-wing faction. These <em>verkramptes</em> (conservatives) broke away in 1969 to form the <a href="https://www.nelsonmandela.org/omalley/index.php/site/q/03lv03445/04lv03446/05lv03472.htm">Herstigte Nasionale Party</a>. </p>
<p>It’s painful to make comparisons between the apartheid police state and post-apartheid South Africa’s Westminster-style democracy. But secret service abuse of phone tapping and letter opening leaves analysts no choice.</p>
<p>While it’s now over a decade since a horrified former Intelligence minister <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/ronald-ronnie-kasrils">Ronnie Kasrils</a> discovered that some of his subordinates and phone tappers in the National Intelligence Service (NIS) strayed beyond their brief. They <a href="http://sacsis.org.za/site/article/771.1">took opposite sides</a> in the <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/politics/mbeki-zuma-fight-it-out-in-damaging-anc-race-379445">acrimonious split</a> between President Thabo Mbeki and his fired deputy Jacob Zuma.</p>
<p>What we now seem to have again are rival cliques within the <a href="http://www.ssa.gov.za/AboutUs.aspx">State Security Agency</a>. Each clique sucks up to a rival politician. One clique made available a selection of Ramaphosa’s emails for others to doctor and leak to the <em>Sunday Independent</em>. Another, different clique, was presumably involved in the earlier <a href="http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/gupta-leakscom-everything-you-ever-need-to-know-about-guptaleaks-in-one-place-20170721">Gupta email cache</a>. The <a href="http://ewn.co.za/Topic/Gupta-leaks">“#Guptaleaks”</a> exposed the extent of the alleged corrupt relationship between the powerful <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2016-03-24-00-the-gupta-owned-state-enterprises">Gupta family</a> and state officials, parastatals, as well as its influence on Zuma’s government. </p>
<p>A second dimension of the latest smear against Ramaphosa is equally fascinating. The smear organisers, no doubt after some debate between themselves, made the deliberate choice that their smear should be leaked to the <em>Sunday Independent</em> – instead of to <a href="http://www.thenewage.co.za/"><em>The New Age</em></a> and <a href="http://www.ann7.com/">ANN7</a>. The later was established by Zuma’s friends, the Guptas. With their television station, <em>The New Age</em> are at the heart of <a href="http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/download-the-full-state-of-capture-pdf-20161102">state capture </a> allegations and rabidly pro-Zuma and his faction. </p>
<p>This must reflect the spooks’ considered judgement that <em>The New Age</em> and ANN7 are so completely tainted as Gupta business outlets as to be discredited. So, their smear’s only chances of credibility lay with placing their bait in some alternative media go-between. It does help that Steven Motale, the editor of the <em>Sunday Independent</em>, who wrote the story on the leaked emails, is also perceived to be in the pro-Zuma camp, having written an impassioned <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/opinion/letter-im-sorry-president-zuma-1899205">open letter</a> in 2015 expressing his regret that he was part of a “sinister” campaign against the president. </p>
<p>Motale also praised ordinary members of the ANC members who “consistently supported Zuma despite the sustained barrage of propaganda against him”. He followed it with another this year in which he condemns former Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan as being an impediment to Zuma’s idea of <a href="https://blackopinion.co.za/2017/03/27/steve-motale-writes-open-letter-president-zuma/">radical economic transformation</a>.</p>
<p>Presumably this leaking and smearing will continue. There will always be one media outlet desperate enough for an exclusive scoop from the secret services. That, also, has not changed since the apartheid decades. Remember <em>The Star</em> newspaper alleging that thorn in the apartheid government’s side, <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/joe-slovo">Joe Slovo</a>, who was general secretary of the South African Communist Party during the liberation struggle, <a href="http://publishing.cdlib.org/ucpressebooks/view?docId=ft4p3006kc&chunk.id=d0e5784&toc.depth=1&brand=ucpress">killed his activist wife</a> Ruth First? That was of course a total fabrication by the apartheid regime’s agents.</p>
<p>Here in 2017 though, democracy relies on a politically savvy public of informed voters who will respond to smears not with credulity, but amusement, cartoons, and sarcasm.</p>
<h2>Campaigns, slates and splits</h2>
<p>The remaining months of the formal ANC election campaign between now and the party’s <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/54th-national-conference">national elective conference in December</a> recall to mind Helen Zille’s comment when she suddenly sprung her <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/capetimes/news/zille-resigns-as-da-leader-1843970">surprise resignation</a> as national leader of the main opposition Democratic Alliance (DA). She commented that any internal DA campaigning longer than a few brief weeks would <a href="http://www.knysnakeep.org/helen-zilles-resignation-explanation/">harm her party</a>.</p>
<p>By contrast, ANC internal campaigning resembles primary years in the United States, stretching over pretty much at least 12 months. The ANC needs to develop mechanisms to manage this without splits - such as those that led to the formation of the <a href="http://udm.org.za/history/">United Democratic Movement</a>, the <a href="http://www.congressofthepeople.org.za/content/page/History-of-cope">Congress of the People</a>, and <a href="http://www.effonline.org/">Economic Freedom Fighters</a> - in its past.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/ramaphosa-pleads-for-one-anc-slate-20170512">“Slates”</a> have plagued ANC politics during its 2007 and 2012 conferences. With the slate system, delegates to the national conferences are lobbied to vote for a prescribed list (or slate) of candidates linked to a specific presidential candidate. Such a list then automatically becomes the party’s highest decision making body, its national executive committee.</p>
<p>One solution is for the ANC to change its voting procedures for its national and provincial executive committees. This will ensure that the maximum number of candidates any delegate may vote for should be significantly less than the number of seats contested. This would ensure that while the winning slate still wins, the losing slate gets some representation. So it is neither purged nor splits off to form yet another breakaway party.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/83539/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Keith Gottschalk is a member of the ANC, but writes this analysis in his professional capacity as a political scientist.</span></em></p>South Africa’s Deputy President, Cyril Ramaphosa, claims the intelligence services are being used to discredit him and prevent him becoming the country’s next leader.Keith Gottschalk, Political Scientist, University of the Western CapeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/823882017-08-13T08:32:41Z2017-08-13T08:32:41ZZuma won, but the ANC will never be a united party again<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181778/original/file-20170811-1192-1dhctmz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Supporters of South African President Jacob Zuma celebrate his triumph in the no confidence vote.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Nic Bothma</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>To say there is victory in defeat sounds like a contradiction in terms. But, this is exactly what happened when South Africa’s opposition parties failed to remove President Jacob Zuma through a motion of no confidence.</p>
<p>When National Assembly Speaker Baleka Mbete announced the <a href="http://ewn.co.za/2017/08/08/zuma-survives-no-confidence-vote">results</a> - 177 “Yes” against 198 “No” - ANC parliamentarians broke into song. But were they really the winners? </p>
<p>I don’t believe so. But to understand the party’s real defeat we need to go beyond the song.</p>
<p>A day before the vote the ANC was thrown into disarray by the speaker’s decision to <a href="http://www.sowetanlive.co.za/news/2017/08/08/this-is-not-setting-a-precedent---speaker-mbete-on-zuma-secret-ballot">give MPs the right to a secret ballot</a>, something the party had vehemently <a href="http://www.enca.com/coverage/zumas-secret-ballot-test">opposed</a>.</p>
<p>Mindful of rebellious members within the ranks of its own parliamentary caucus – such as <a href="https://www.businesslive.co.za/bd/national/2017-07-19-pravin-gordhan-makhosi-khoza-pull-no-punches-on-zuma/">Makhosi Khoza, Pravin Gordhan</a>, <a href="https://www.businesslive.co.za/bd/politics/2016-11-28-fellow-ministers-back-hanekom-as-anc-meeting-on-zuma-continues/">Derek Hanekom</a> – the ANC didn’t know <a href="https://theconversation.com/opposition-parties-have-found-the-ancs-achilles-heel-jacob-zuma-82322">how many more silent rebels</a> it harboured in parliament. </p>
<p>The evening of August 7, the day before the vote, will be remembered as the night of telephonic bombardment as ANC MPs got panicky calls from both their party and opposition parties. After each call, the dilemma they faced was: “Do I listen to my conscience, or ignore it?”</p>
<p>The human soul expresses itself through people’s faces. A smile tells us that the soul is brimming with good nourishment. A grimace suggests a troubled person. Before 2pm on August 8, the starting time for the debate on the motion of no confidence, the tormented state of the souls of both ANC and opposition party leaders was masked by a deliberate effort to feign confidence – even though no one was certain of victory. For a few hours there was a disconnect between the soul and the face.</p>
<p>The rest is history. Zuma remains in office – for now. How, then, could this be interpreted as a victory for opposition parties when they were clearly trounced? </p>
<p>It is victory because they succeeded in proving to the ANC that party bosses in <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/contacts">Luthuli House</a>, the ANC’s headquarters in Johannesburg, have lost control of a number of their MPs. It’s true that the ANC was divided before August the 8th. But, despite the subsequent singing, the injuries it suffered in the no confidence vote are now impossible to conceal.</p>
<h2>The unravelling of the ANC</h2>
<p>ANC bosses and parliamentarians no longer trust each other. Given the secrecy of the ballot, it’s impossible to sniff out all the rebels and flush them out of Parliament. It is like living with the knowledge that a dangerous snake lurks somewhere in your own house.</p>
<p>It is also a strong possibility that those who voted with the opposition enjoy the support of some party leaders. Given the fractiousness of the ANC, the party cannot embark on a united witch hunt against rebels in Parliament because the rebels are clearly part of an anti-Zuma campaign. It can therefore be assumed that most of them support Cyril Ramaphosa, not Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma – the two frontrunner contenders for the presidency of both the ANC and the country – as the successor to Zuma. It would be self defeating for Ramaphosa to hunt them down. They are his underground troops.</p>
<p>Four months before the ANC’s <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/54th-national-conference">national elective conference</a> there is no time for the party to waste in complicated disciplinary hearings. In any event its factions are more interested in securing their own victory than chasing down those who voted in favour of the no confidence motion.</p>
<p>Before the vote the party could sell the propaganda that the problem was Zuma, not the ANC. By voting to keep him in the job, the party has now made it plain that the problem is the whole ANC, not just Zuma.</p>
<p>The bitter attitude of ANC leaders who spoke inside and outside Parliament before and after the vote added fuel to growing public anger at the arrogance of ANC power. The most shocking statement came from the ANC Women’s League president – and staunch Zuma supporter – Bathabile Dlamini who told reporters that she hadn’t voted with her conscience because her conscience had not <a href="http://citizen.co.za/news/south-africa/1604598/bathabile-dlamini-says-her-conscience-didnt-put-her-in-government/">“sent her to parliament”</a>.</p>
<p>And South Africans are very angry – in taxi ranks, in churches, at funerals and in shebeens across the country. They cannot believe what has happened to the ANC of Nelson Mandela. When asked what to do, people say, “2019 is coming” – a reference to the country’s next national elections. Increasingly South Africans seem to be gaining a deeper appreciation of the power of the vote. The 2016 municipal elections, which saw the ANC <a href="https://theconversation.com/sharp-tongued-south-african-voters-give-ruling-anc-a-stiff-rebuke-63606">lose three metropolitan councils</a>, were a turning point.</p>
<h2>Who’ll save the party?</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.enca.com/south-africa/watch-zuma-sing-along-endorsing-ndz-campaign">Should Dlamini-Zuma</a>, Zuma’s anointed successor, win in December, the ANC shouldn’t be surprised by the punishment meted out to them at the polls. She will be rejected overwhelmingly by citizens who are sick and tired of Zuma and the Guptas, his friends and architects of <a href="http://pari.org.za/betrayal-promise-report/">state capture.</a></p>
<p>Even Ramaphosa, her main competitor for the presidency of both the ANC and the country, will have no smooth ride to power. Indications are that, should he win, the ANC may lose voters in KwaZulu-Natal. There the Inkatha Freedom Party – which is firmly and unabashedly tribalist in its Zulu stronghold – is <a href="http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/ifp-wins-nquthu-by-election-20170525">once again gaining groud</a>. Even though South Africans don’t like admitting it, tribal consciousness is a feature of the country’s politics.</p>
<p>Should Ramaphosa succeed Zuma, he will have to do a great deal of explaining. Where was he, and what did he do, when Zuma and the Guptas were looting public resources? Why did he continue to support a discredited president? Zuma will haunt Ramaphosa like a ghost.</p>
<p>It doesn’t matter who takes over the ANC in December. The party will never be a united party again. After the vote of no confidence, the party is seriously injured. It will limp all the way to the 2019 elections. Such is the contradictory victory scored by the ANC on August 8.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/82388/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Prince Mashele does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The bitter attitude of ANC leaders who spoke inside and outside Parliament before and after the no confidence vote added fuel to already existing public anger at the arrogance of the governing party.Prince Mashele, Senior Research Fellow, Centre for the Study of Governance Innovation, University of PretoriaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.