South Africa's ANC to lose majority: 'It is a seismic and a pivotal moment'
Visit our website:
http://www.france24.com
Like us on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/FRANCE24.English
Follow us on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/France24_en
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00 Another world news outgoing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa is facing calls to resign
00:05 after leading his ANC party to its worst election result in three decades.
00:10 The African National Congress, a now divided movement that led the nation out of white
00:16 minority rule and into democracy, remains the largest party in parliament but loses its absolute
00:22 majority. It will need to find coalition partners in order to remain in power.
00:27 Well for more we're joined now for our guest of the day slot by Sanusha Naidoo,
00:32 Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Global Dialogue.
00:36 Thank you so much for being with us on the programme this morning, Sanusha.
00:40 So firstly just talk to us a little bit about how significant this moment is for South Africa.
00:46 It's been described as a seismic shift.
00:49 Good morning and good morning to the viewers. Indeed it is.
00:53 It is very much a seismic and a pivotal moment in our democracy. I mean the ANC has been
01:01 that party that has remained in power for more than 30 years. And of course the point is that
01:08 it was the party that many saw as the liberation of South Africa but also played a pivotal role
01:14 in the negotiations of the political transition. So where it finds itself right now I think is a
01:19 very hard reality for the ANC that given that its history of being the oldest liberation movement
01:27 in the continent, not just in South Africa but in the continent of Africa, actually it's quite
01:32 a difficult time for them to digest that they've lost almost 17 percent from the last national
01:38 election in 2019 and where they find themselves now at 40 percent. But I think it's also a very
01:44 interesting time because we have to understand that this democracy has gone through ebbs and
01:49 flows. And so the fragmentation of the political spectrum, the fragmentation of the body politic,
01:54 but also I think the reality check for not just the ANC but also for opposition parties
01:59 is that nobody actually got a majority in this election, which makes it very interesting at that
02:05 level as well. But I think now the real issue for the ANC and other political parties is about what
02:10 kind of coalition talks they are going to enter into, what kind of engagements they're going to
02:15 enter into, and what kind of discussions they're going to enter into in terms of where they want
02:20 to be in forming a government. But right now we also are dealing with the disruptor to this
02:27 election, which is the Encounter-Caesar Party, which has now issued a statement late last night
02:32 by its president, former President Jacob Zuma, to say that they want to revote. So we're kind
02:38 of in limbo right now because the Independent Electoral Commission will have to call the
02:42 election this evening. But we're not sure where this goes even after this. Yeah, because Jacob
02:47 Zuma's MK party, it has said as well that it's willing to negotiate with the ANC, but not the
02:53 ANC of Cyril Ramaphosa. So is there any way for him to remain on as president at this point,
02:58 do you think? Well, the ANC itself, we listened to the Deputy Secretary General yesterday,
03:06 and she indicated, Ms. Nomvula Makunyane, she indicated that they'd have to go back to internal
03:13 structures and discuss that option. And I don't think it's an option that they were willing to
03:17 also put on the table in terms of saying, well, we're going to get- because remember,
03:22 President Ramaphosa has been reelected for another five years as president of the party.
03:27 So it's all about the internal dynamics. And I think they are not willing to also engage in that
03:32 kind of discussion where the MK party will only speak to the ANC if President Ramaphosa is asked
03:40 to step down. But there's another dilemma here, is that that's one set of the talks. So the one set
03:45 of the talks is where will the coalition be and what kind of coalition talks will happen between
03:52 the ANC, the MK, and perhaps even the EFF as one set of actors in that coalition.
03:58 But what's the other issue right now that is more immediate for us is what's going to be the IEC's
04:06 results proclamation later this evening at 6 p.m. South African time, and how the MK party
04:12 yesterday evening issued its own briefing to say- and what former President Jacob Zuma said,
04:19 which was very, very chilling in a way, is that they don't want this election result to be called,
04:25 to be finalized, to be proclaimed. And if they do, they feel that that is kind of provoking the MK.
04:33 And I think we're sitting now in a bit of a very difficult corridor between what the coalition
04:39 talks are looking like and whether this election can be proclaimed and what's going to be the
04:43 impact if indeed the IEC is feeling- is being threatened, quote unquote, by the MK party.
04:51 And Sunushe, there's also been some speculation that the centrist Democratic Alliance might end up
04:57 playing a kingmaker role here. Do you see that as a possibility? It opposes, for example,
05:04 the ANC's black empowerment policy. So how might that work out, if it were,
05:09 to end up playing a kingmaker role?
05:11 Well, I think the DAO has realized that it itself also has to think about where it is
05:19 in the political spectrum. So I'm not sure whether they'll be completely opposed to the
05:24 actual policy. I think they kind of look at the policy and they want the policy to be much more
05:30 measured in alignment with the kind of meritocracy of what black economic empowerment should be
05:37 articulated in terms of policymaking, in terms of economic decision making, and of course,
05:43 in terms of the economy and where it should be empowering the economy. So there may be some
05:48 level of discussion and negotiation around the implementation of it. And I think that's where
05:55 the Democratic Alliance and the ANC may find that they can discuss some level of how do you
06:02 implement it? Because I think this is the challenge. The challenge is not black economic
06:05 empowerment per se. It's the implementation of the black economic empowerment, which the DA says
06:11 tends to create more de-skilling of the economy or more cracks in the economy, or it doesn't really
06:18 promote an entrepreneurial meritocracy of an economic growth strategy. So I think those are
06:25 the dynamics where both the DA and the ANC may find themselves trying to discuss what will be
06:31 the measures on implementation that they could go forward with in terms of finding a common ground
06:37 on black economic empowerment.
06:39 And just finally, how has South Africa gotten to this point? Why has the ANC been struggling
06:44 to get through to voters?
06:45 Well, I think the ANC has also been kind of disconnecting itself from the voters. There's
06:52 been an increasing level of internal turmoil in the ANC. There's a lack of trust again in the ANC.
07:01 It hasn't really performed at the economic and socioeconomic level. When it talks about
07:05 black economic empowerment, then it also looks at how that aligns to its patronage networks.
07:10 It talks about socioeconomic challenges, but it hasn't really done anything
07:14 substantive in the transformation of people's lives and livelihoods, especially around economic
07:20 architecture, around employment, poverty, inequality.
07:25 And I think there's a younger generation, and of course, the service delivery issues where people
07:29 are still living in situations that haven't really given them a dignified life. And I think there's a
07:36 younger generation which just don't have loyalty to the ANC. They're not held to the ANC by the
07:42 rhetoric of liberation.
07:43 Sanusha, we'll have to leave it there for now. But thank you so much for that very incisive
07:49 analysis. That's Sanusha Naidoo, Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Global Dialogue.
07:54 Thank you so much.