It is the ANC that is fighting for political survival, not its suspended secretary-general Ace Magashule. That is the reality President Cyril Ramaphosa has to confront as the clock ticks towards the 2021 local government elections.
The ANC suffered huge electoral losses in the last municipal poll, losing Nelson Mandela Bay, Tshwane and Johannesburg five years ago. A decline in one election in those metropolitan areas, as well as in Bloemfontein, eThekwini and Mahikeng, put it on notice at a time when it was having to contend with public discontent over the Gupta family’s exercise of unofficial power and rampant corruption that was becoming harder to hide.
The ANC also struggled to win a majority in Gauteng and dropped below 60% support in the 2019 national and provincial elections. That it was able to get close to that magic number was attributed by some, including current transport minister Fikile Mbalula, to the elevation of Ramaphosa to the ANC presidency in December 2017. Mbalula, who is also the ANC's head of elections going into those polls, suggested that without change, the party may have dropped to 40%.
Electoral trends show that South Africans are frustrated by the governing party and have stayed away in successive elections, especially in Gauteng. With SA 27 years into democracy, the ANC is struggling to find relevance beyond its historical role as a liberator.
That is what puts the ANC’s suspension of Magashule and 30 others who are facing serious charges into sharp focus, with Ramaphosa acknowledging its declining electoral support during his appearance at the state capture inquiry in April.
“Electoral support of the ANC went down because of corrosive corruption which people found abhorrent,” he said in the most frank comments by an ANC leader on the subject. “We need a renewal.”
Previously, the ANC has been less than honest with itself. Erstwhile president Jacob Zuma, having plastered his face on posters in places he was unpopular such as Soweto and Atteridgeville in Tshwane, then blamed his political opponents for not working hard enough. Meanwhile Zuma’s opponents within local structures blamed him for parachuting in unpopular leaders.
Ramaphosa’s reform agenda seems to be finally bearing fruit despite resistance from within. In a first for the 109-year-old party, an elected official in arguably the second most powerful post in the organisation has been asked to vacate office in the national interest. Ironically, his belligerence might be the event that shows there is no way back.
Elements in the ANC have resisted change from day one and Ramaphosa has not acted with enough force to counter them. Eager to prevent a full-blown fight, he has sought to project a picture of unity, delaying the big decisions and toying with some of their populist pet obsessions such as the call to nationalise the Reserve Bank, at potentially great cost for the country with no discernible benefit.
Magashule’s suspension marks a key achievement for Ramaphosa, who contested for the ANC and SA presidency on a renewal-and-reform ticket. The move, however, sets in motion a fight by Magashule and his loyalists against his suspension and in a bid to have him reinstated ahead of the party’s next elective conference in 2022.
The latter’s outrageous behaviour, unilaterally suspending Ramaphosa, means that at the end of the national executive committee meeting this past weekend there could not be a fake show of unity. In that sense, Magashule’s gamble backfired. Now he will have to show if he has the level of support that could threaten Ramaphosa and possibly split the ANC once again.
History shows that splitting from the party has not been a profitable endeavour, so the remnants of the Magashule faction will eventually desert him and stay inside the fold, even if he is eventually kicked out. If they are, as former president Thabo Mbeki asserted, driven by self-interest, it is hard to see another outcome.
Neutralising Magashule may not necessarily end the warfare within the party. But what is clear is that the electorate will continue to punish the ANC, potentially leading to its demise, if it does not put the national interest first.
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