Sunday Times E-Edition

Brace yourself if Cyril goes

William Gumede

President Cyril Ramaphosa has consistently been more popular than the ANC. His appeal extends beyond party supporters, enabling him to unite its disparate factions. This has extended the sell-by date of ANC dominance and his resignation would unleash internal forces that cause it to self-destruct.

Ramaphosa’s departure, if indeed he does step down, will usher in the long-awaited post-liberation reconfiguration of this country’s politics, making it more balanced and offering opposition parties greater opportunities to form national governments.

His departure would plunge the ANC into internecine factional battles as different leaders and groups try to capture control of the party and hence the state, dishing out government tenders, making appointments and controlling corruption investigations and prosecutions. The ANC has become a party state, the government and the organisation becoming intertwined, causing disarray in governance. Chaos in the party will paralyse the government, service delivery and the battle against corruption.

African liberation movements such as the ANC remain in power long after their political shelf life, even if they are corrupt, incompetent and uncaring. The public continues to vote for them based on loyalty, colour and regional solidarity, rather than competence, honesty and compassion.

Since the leaders of these liberation movements have no real incentive to be accountable, African countries so governed remain in a rut of incompetence, corruption and state collapse. However, they often reach a tipping point and implode as lack of accountability, complacency, corruption, zero opposition, internal competition for control of state resources, security services and tenders eat them from within.

Ramaphosa’s installation as leader of the ANC in 2018 stalled its implosion as voters who would have

None of Ramaphosa’s potential successors has the appeal he does across ethic groups and classes

left stayed, hoping he would clean up the organisation. His departure would hasten the ANC’s implosion.

Given the party’s slate politics, in which leaders align themselves at national elective conferences to presidential candidates, Ramaphosa’s departure is likely to result in anyone associated with him not being elected at the ANC’s national elective conference that gets under way on December 16.

This period of uncertainty for the party and South Africa will continue until the 2024 national elections, when voters will either support a declining ANC or throw their weight behind opposition parties.

Ramaphosa is the last of the Convention for a Democratic South Africa (Codesa) generation of leaders who negotiated the transition from apartheid to democracy, and who have appeal across ethnic groups and classes. None of his potential successors has such attraction within or outside the party, or the wherewithal to unite its factions.

The ANC’s two largest groupings — Ramaphosa’s and the “radical economic transformation” brigade — have been held together because Ramaphosa pursued unity among them in cabinet, at senior government level and concerning tenders, even if they were corrupt or incompetent, or publicly attacked him.

Importantly, both the Ramaphosa and RET factions consist of many disparate factions, some run along provincial lines, others include the Julius Malema-generation youth league lobby, and yet others are just organised criminal syndicates.

Should he leave, these two umbrella groups will splinter into multiple factions and there will be no cohesive force to continue his programme of party renewal, tackle corruption and foster pacts between the state, private sector and civil society. Ramaphosa has failed to groom a successor.

His departure would mean voters who supported the ANC purely because of him will desert. Support for the post-Ramaphosa ANC is likely to drop below 40% in 2024, making it easier for opposition parties to form a national coalition. If Ramaphosa remains ANC leader into the 2024 polls, the ANC is likely to drop below 50% to the mid-40s, which would allow the party into a national governing coalition with smaller parties.

Of course, Ramaphosa could dissolve parliament if he exits and call for national elections to give the ANC or the opposition a mandate to govern, so reducing the impact of the party’s turmoil on the state, economy and society.

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2022-12-04T08:00:00.0000000Z

2022-12-04T08:00:00.0000000Z

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