South Africa

The ANC dissidents, led by Mosiuoa Lekota and former Gauteng premier Mbhazima Shilowa, have continued apace with their plans to form a separate party. They claim that the ANC had become too beholden to the far left, particularly the South African Communist Party (SACP), or at least that the SACP increasingly felt entitled to have a greater say in the direction of the ANC. The new party will reflect social democratic values and will be freed from the constraints of holding together an increasingly untenable alliance while at the same time moving away from elements of that alliance’s ideological impetus.

The ANC, meanwhile, largely whistles past the graveyard. Jacob Zuma acknowledges that he is “concerned” but effectively denies that his party is divided down the middle. In the most literal sense he may be right. But a flood from the ANC to a new party would significantly change the dynamic of South African politics, and the ANC would no longer wield undisputed control. The Democratic Alliance is already jumping on the party breach to demand equal time on the SABC. It’s absurd on its face that a minority party with such relatively small support (12% give or take) might be able to legitimately claim that it deserves equal time with a party that garners more than 60% in national elections, but the demand is slightly less absurd than it might have been a couple of months ago.

The ANC also denies that it might be seeking to hold an early election in order to try to capture support before a full-fledged breakaway party can form. In all honesty an early election might represent Zuma’s best hope to grasp the presidency before either the dissidents can concolidate their support or ANC members can come to the conclusion that Kgalama Mothlante might represent a viable option to the soap opera drama that is Jacob Zuma. This would particularly be true if, as expected, the global economic crisis continues to affect South Africa.

Stay tuned. Like Eastern Cape weather, the conditions are likely to change soon. For better or worse, we have no idea.

Kgalema Mothlante will have his work cut out for him over the course of the next few months. He will have to stanch the exodus from the ANC, including the increasing likelihood that a breakaway faction will form a new party. He will have to placate Zuma’s most ardent supporters, such as the vocal elements within the ANC Youth League.  And he will need to respond to the needs of a deeply discontent populace sure to demand delivery of services and tired of empty promises. Thabo Mbeki failed this population and whatever Zuma’s promises, Mothlante is in the position to act on their behalf and stabilize the ANC. He faces a treacherous few months, but with the fraught circumstances will come opportunity for Mothlante to succeed in his new office and assure himself a chance to make his new job permanent.  

Brief comments about three separate but interconnected stories:

I am not the only one who wonders if Jacob Zuma might not have overplayed his hand and created a situation the unintended consequences of which might be to prevent him from taking over as South Africa’s president in 2009.  Patrick Laurence speculates similarly in a piece in the Star. Given the controversy that swirls around Zuma , the discontented cadres allied with Mbeki, the wariness of many who see a fractured ANC, and the opportunity that Kgalema Motlanthe has before him, do not be surprised if Zuma’s gambit backfires and spectacularly so.

And while those who still maintain power can deny the depth of the ANC’s divisions, do not be fooled by such whistling past the graveyard. Those divisions are real, they are deep, and they will not easily be reconciled. Expect the rumblings of the formation of a breakaway party to grow louder in the months to come.  And if the formation of a new party comes to pass, it will be yet another outcome for which Jacob Zuma and his supporters will have proved to be woefully unprepared.

Finally, to calm the shaken nerves of investors Trevor Manuel has announced that there will be little change in South Africa’s macroeconomic policies. Which is to say that the new dispensation will almost surely find that nelson Mandela and Thabo Mbeki embraced the fundamental tenets of free market capitalism for very sensible and pragmatic reasons. There is ample room for disagreement about the nature of South Africa’s economy, and simply prattling on about the wonders of the market provides no panacea. But those idealists and ideologues advocating fantastical solutions in which South Africa will somehow turn its back on the fundamental tenets of the market economy will be in for a rude awakening.

Jacob Zuma has won his power play against Thabo Mbeki. Mbeki resigned from office unpopular and largely unlamented, destined to go down as a disappointment, if not a failure, especially after the heady years of Nelson Mandela,  years for which, ironically enough, Mbeki was indispensible. Soon enough Zuma will slide into what he now surely sees as his rightful position as president of South Africa.

Or will he? Wouldn’t it be an irony if Zuma’s power play, coming as it did so late in Mbeki’s presidency, had the unintended consequence of delaying or even scuttling Zuma’s ascension? After all, what if Kgalema Motlanthe does a good job during these interim months? What if he can unite the ANC, calm skittish investors, and restore normalcy to the country’s politics? Motlanthe kept himself out of the power struggle between the ANC’s two titans. Yet one can assume that his own ambitions never stopped at the deputy presidency and that his ultimate goal is not being realized as a space filler for Zuma. In short, Motlanthe may like the new seat in which he finds himself. 

Meanwhile, Zuma’s biggest strength was always embodied far less in who he is or what he stands for than in who he is not. Which is to say that lots of people projected their hopes and dreams on Zuma largely because he was not Thabo Mbeki. But now Zuma’s baggage will remain front and center while Motlanthe will garner the fruits of incumbency, however peculiarly gained, and may himself benefit from who is is not, in this case because he is not Mbeki, to be sure, but also because he is not Zuma.

Jacob Zuma wanted Thabo Mbeki out of office. He got his wish. But perhaps he should have been careful what he wished for, because Kgalama Motlanthe may well usurp what Zuma for so long assumed was his. It will be quite the irony of fate if Zuma and his allies see what they assumed was their entitled inheritance slip out of their hands because they decided they could no longer live with Thabo Mbeki for another few months.

It appears official. South Africa’s Parliament has chosen Kgalema Motlanthe as interim president to replace President Thabo Mbeki. Motlanthe, who spent a decade on Robben Island and who has a background in labor union politics will likely have as his main responsibility the healing of divisions, though the wounds might simply be too deep. The reality is that the ANC is profoundly split and the current state of the party (the current leadership of which is, in the words of one observer, “a motley crew of know-it-alls”) is likely to have historic ramifications.

Some in the party continue to try to paper over the crisis. Jacob Zuma has argued that there is “no need to panic” and argues that there is “nothing extraordinary” about the resignations of Mbeki and a third of the country’s cabinet, which beggars the question of what Zuma would categorize as  “extraordinary” is the current circumstances do not meet his standard. But then it is in Zuma’s interest for this to pass as quickly as possible, for this transition to look like a normal turn of events, and for the ANC to be able to claim that it will persevere and prosper.

Others are not quite so sanguine. Certainly Mbeki is not without his critics despite the way that he stepped down with little fuss. ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe has declared that Mbeki’s surprise announcement of the resignation of so many of his cabinet ministers was a “dangerous mistake” that fueled the economic instability that followed.

And the opposition parties, most notably the Democratic Alliance, sees mostly silver lining where so many see nothing but dark cloud cover. And from a strictly political vantage point, why not? Chaos within the ANC and a potential irreconcilable break within the party will only redound to the benefit of smaller parties, and particularly the DA.  Prominent members of the DA want an immediate election, their rationale being that Motlanthe will not have been elected by the citizenry. Surely the DA knows that an election now or an election in April will place them no closer to the presidency, but it might well gain them seats in Parliament and thus more concrete leverage.

Expect much more of this jockeying for position as the days, weeks, and months pass. It is unlikely that things are going to get less complicated with the passage of time.

It appears that the ANC has tagged party deputy president Kgalema Motlanthe as caretaker president to keep the seat warm for Jacob Zuma. Motlanthe has kept his powder dry in the Zuma-Thabo Mbeki personality wars, which appears to have paid off for him. Motlanthe is left-leaning but gained status within the party for chastising rowdy younger members of the party for causing divisions in Polokwane in December. Of course Parliament has yet to vote to finalize Motlanthe as Mbeki’s successor, so do not be surprised if this transition does not go as smoothly as some party solons hope.