The ANC’s decline, highlighted by a significant drop in votes and increased breakaway parties, signifies a turbulent political landscape. The formation of the Progressive Caucus, opposing the GNU, underscores racial tensions and ideological divides. With corruption allegations and internal fractures, the future of the ANC, along with its alliances with parties like the EFF and SACP, remains uncertain. The success of the GNU’s reforms will be pivotal in shaping South Africa’s political and economic trajectory.
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By RW Johnson ___STEADY_PAYWALL___
During the run-up to the election we asked respondents to the ENCA poll about the ANC’s decline – already apparent then in a large number of other polls. We pointed out that the ANC had fathered many break-away parties – the UDM, Cope, the EFF and now the MKP – and we asked what the future held for the ANC. Overwhelmingly our respondents thought the ANC would continue to decline and that it would suffer more break-aways. Then came the election. The ANC, which had once gained over 10 million votes, now polled six million. And 60% of possible voters either failed to register or did register but then failed to vote.
In fact the formation of the GNU may itself create further splits. It is no secret that many members of the ANC’s National Executive Committee (NEC) felt that the ANC’s “natural” coalition partners were the EFF and MKP, a view also strongly held by Mandla Mandela, Madiba’s grandson who is also a Thembu tribal chief as well as an ANC MP. Many ANC activists still have links with these other two parties and have collaborated with the EFF in municipal coalitions.
The GNU parties define themselves as believers in and upholders of the Constitution. This fits neatly enough since the MKP openly wants to tear the Constitution up and the EFF believes in it only when it suits its purposes. It is, however, not at all how the opponents of the GNU see things. Jacob Zuma has insisted that the GNU is “white-led” and a return to “apartheid and colonialism”. Solly Mapaila, General Secretary of the SACP, calls it ”an elite pact”. Coincidentally or not this is also the term used by the Progressive Caucus in its Charter.
The Progressive Caucus (PC) is made up of the EFF, MKP, UAT (United Africans for Transformation), the ATM (African Transformation Movement) and the NCC (National Coloured Congress). The PC defines itself by its opposition to the GNU. It says that the GNU “seeks to preserve the current power of white monopoly capital in the economy, give advantage to white privilege and undo the gains of the liberation movement”. One notes, over and over again, how the PC tries to depict the GNU as a white construct. One would never guess from these descriptions that the GNU is an overwhelmingly black body including a mere tiny handful of whites. The fact is that although the PC likes to employ Marxist terminology it is quite transparently a racial, and indeed, racialist body.
Particularly striking is the conviction of the Progressive Caucus that blacks are inferior. This is visible at every point. Why does the presence of just five whites drawn from the DA and FF+ in a cabinet of 34 lead Zuma to think that the GNU is “white led” ? It would seem that in Zuma’s view these five are so vastly superior in intellect and ability that they will lead the other 29 ministers by the nose. Similarly, the MKP’s Chief Whip, Dr John Hlope, claimed that President Ramaphosa’s speech to the opening of Parliament was “probably written by whites” from the DA. Echoing this, Julius Malema insisted that the speech had been written by the DA’s Helen Zille. Again, the assumption is that either a black man can’t write a decent speech or that he is easily manipulated by whites. Similarly, Malema and the EFF harp endlessly on the presence of whites in the government as an unpardonable betrayal. The notion that the liberation movement’s mission is to build a non-racial South Africa is completely lost.
Although the PC calls on workers to support it, its declaration of principles contains only one short sentence about workers’ rights: “We shall defend and promote the principle of collective Bargaining: workers’ rights and freedoms shall be central to our program”. This is interesting because the great unknown in all this is where do the SACP and Cosatu fit in ?
Cosatu’s reaction to the GNU has been critical but pragmatic. It says that it is concerned that some of the ANC’s partners in the GNU do not share the ANC’s views on transformation and labour. However, since the ANC was the biggest party in the GNU Cosatu hoped its views on these matters would prevail. Cosatu was watching the GNU very closely to see if it delivered on its promises. But, it added, “What counts is can the government deliver ? Can they fix the trains, can they fix electricity, can they fix the roads, can they fix corruption, can we see politicians go to prison when they misbehave ?”
Many of Cosatu’s leaders are SACP members but this emphasis on what the government could deliver in practical terms was quite different from the far more ideological view taken by the SACP. The fact is that Cosatu has derived many advantages from its alliance with the ANC: it has seen labour laws passed very much to the specifications that Cosatu wished; the ANC has provided a route to the top for many Cosatu leaders, and Cosatu has been allowed to become the commanding presence in numerous SOEs. So Cosatu cannot easily imagine any twist in the political landscape leading to Cosatu breaking its alliance with the ANC
The Communist leader, Solly Mapaila, took a very different line. He recounted how the Tripartite Alliance (ANC, SACP, Cosatu) had met the day after Ramaphosa had declared the election date. Clearly, those present already anticipated the possibility that the vote for the ANC might fall well below 50% and Mapaila says that he made it clear that on no account must the ANC consider an alliance with the DA or with “the counter-revolutionary MKP”. Indeed, the meeting resolved that “the liberation forces must secure political power”. Then, however, came the election results. Clearly horrified, Mapaila took it upon himself to try to put together a “progressive” coalition. He called up “Comrade Floyd” Shivambu – an interesting appelation since the SACP has by no means routinely referred to the EFF as “comrades”. And Mapaila, in his own words, was “begging people to actually focus on the possible revolutionary path”. Mapaila apparently did a lot of to-ing and fro-ing between the possible coalition partners before he faced the uncomfortable truth that he simply lacked the authority to play the role of king-maker.
For, of course, the ANC leadership paid little heed to what the SACP or Cosatu were saying and went ahead with their “elite pact” with the DA. The ANC leadership regarded the MKP as virtually crazy and a quantity one simply couldn’t negotiate with, while they didn’t trust the EFF. Malema had unwisely demanded the Finance portfolio for Floyd Shivambu – an arrogant choice coming from a party with less than ten per cent of the vote – and Gwede Mantashe made it clear that he thought Shivambu was a looter who couldn’t be allowed near any portfolio involving money. In any case, the EFF had flip-flopped on issues so often and had frequently paralysed parliament with their rowdy behaviour that it was difficult to see them as viable coalition partners. Once the MKP and EFF were discarded as possible partners, the ANC was faced with the necessity of a deal with the DA, despite considerable opposition within its own ranks to such a deal.
But for Mapaila, as also for Zuma and Malema, it was precisely the coalition with the DA that was repellent. Put crudely, it meant a deal with the old white enemy, the leader of the counter-revolution. The MKP, EFF and SACP were wholly uninterested in all the other little parties making up the GNU. The deal with the DA crossed every red line and that is why Mapaila called the ANC “a bunch of sell-outs”. (The Star, 17 July 2024) Again, one would never guess from these reactions that the DA is South Africa’s most successful multi-racial party and that whites are a minority within the party’s ranks.
So, the SACP shares most of the criticisms of the GNU made by the Progressive Caucus but it is not joining the PC because it regards the MKP – the largest part of the PC – as a “counter-revolutionary” force. It is, however, clearly willing to envisage a partnership with the EFF, towards whom it adopts a respectful tone. But what are the implications for Communist ministers in the GNU – starting with Blade Nzimande, the long-time SACP leader ?
For many years Nzimande was minister for higher education, but latterly he has been caught up in the major scandal afflicting the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS). NSFAS is clearly in a dreadful mess and large sums of money are involved. Accusations of corruption have been levied at various parties – including Nzimande himself. Ramaphosa has responded by removing Nzimande from the big budget Higher Education portfolio and giving him the much lower budget Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation. A great deal now hangs on Dr. Nobuhle Nkabane, the new minister of Higher Education. She will have to clear up the NSFAS mess which Nzimande left behind, which means identifying the corrupt parties who exploited that mess.
As it happens, another major corruption trial threatens to destabilize the left. The fall-out from the VBS bank scandal; has only just begun, but already it seems clear that both Julius Malema and Floyd Shivambu benefited from R16.1 million of funds looted from the bank. Naturally, both men deny the charges made against them but it seems likely that a major court case will ensue and that both men could potentially face long jail sentences and concomitant political ruin.
Blade Nzimande is also accused of having benefited from R3 million of VBS funds which, it is alleged, were used to finance an SACP conference in 2017 at Birchwood Hotel in Kempton Park. Moreover, Phatse Justice Piitso, the former SACP Secretary for Limpopo, has confirmed the charges and said that the SACP ought to apologise and pay the funds back. Nzimande, who is still chairman of the SACP, denies this charge and says that a food company actually paid for the conference. The fact that Nzimande has not named the food company does not help his case. It is, too, difficult to imagine any food company having to explain to its shareholders that it had given away R3 million to the SACP.
The fact is, of course, that the SACP is a small party with few sources of possible finance. But it is also the case that the Party cannot withstand a corruption scandal. With its chairman now facing corruption charges both over NSFAS and VBS, the situation is extremely difficult. The Party’s significance has, of course, dwindled, as was evidenced by the ease with which the ANC swept aside Mapaila’s objections to the GNU. But it still has a large historic reputation and that alone could still make it a significant component of any opposition to Ramaphosa.
The formation of the Progressive Caucus is highly significant. For the first time there is a substantial Opposition to the ANC with 102 seats in Parliament. Moreover, it claims to be a Left Opposition – though the MKP’s manifesto makes that description arguable. In fact at present the PC seems defined simply by race and most of its demands and views are race-based. However, this is not a new division in the ANC: all the constituent parties have already left the ANC camp. The real questions now are whether the PC can gain greater internal unity and what prospect there is for the PC in its opposition to the ANC.
While it is possible that some of the minor parties in the PC could be absorbed into the MKP or EFF, there is little real prospect of the EFF and MKP uniting. The MKP’s post-Zuma future is anyway an open question and both parties have their own ambitious leadership elites, neither of which is likely to accept subordinate roles in a united movement.
We have seen that, to judge from their rhetoric, the PC parties share a belief in black inferiority. However, it is likely that this is mere pretence and that the PC leaders have selected this stance with an eye to how to rouse the massed against the GNU. As far as possible they will try to present the GNU as a return to white power, with Ramaphosa and the rump ANC playing the treacherous role of inviting back the white masters to rule again. Given South Africa’s history this could be a potent way of fighting the Struggle all over again, if they are able to generate a sufficient mass movement against the government to pull in other parts of the ANC, the SACP etc.
Whether this will work will depend on how successful the GNU is. If the GNU can generate rapid economic reforms which produce higher growth, more jobs and better services, the insurrectionist movement will probably not succeed. The problem is, of course, that the reforms needed to generate higher growth will require the GNU to alienate some of its own following. It is, for example, hard to see how to entice large-scale foreign investment unless the government abolishes BEE. But the struggle has just begun. If the PC were to win South Africa would collapse amidst populist craziness and all-out looting. The real problem is that Ramaphosa should have launched his reform programme in 2018. His dithering and inaction over the past six years was something the country could not afford. He now has only 2-3 years left at most, a worryingly short time in which to show the positive results of reform.
Read also:
- Investors cautiously optimistic SA’s new GNU can deliver growth-friendly reforms
- Democratic Alliance initiates talks to form new government
- Coalition government won’t fix past failures: SA private sector to play a bigger role in service delivery
