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South Africa

South Africa: early election results point to ANC landslide

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There wasn’t any doubt that the ruling African National Congress (ANC) would win the fifth post-apartheid election in South Africa’s history.south africa flag

But relatively poor showings by South Africa’s various opposition parties seem to have failed to hold the ANC under 60% of the national vote, with the party set to enter its third decade in power. Under the leadership of Nelson Mandela in 1994, the ANC rose to prominence after a decades-long struggle against white minority rule, and its political dominance hasn’t seriously been challenged at the national level in the past 20 years. That’s despite growing malaise over economic conditions, income inequality and mass unemployment. That’s also in addition to growing concerns about corruption under the leadership of president Jacob Zuma (pictured above), who will now be reelected to a second term once South Africa’s newly elected National Assembly convenes later this month.

Notably, the election was the first to include the votes of the ‘born-free’ generation, South Africans who were born after the end of the apartheid era. It was also the first election held after Mandela’s death last December at age 95.

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RELATED: South Africa votes in 5th post-apartheid election: what you need to know

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Voters in South Africa yesterday elected all 400 members of the National Assembly and the governments of all nine provinces.

With just over 85.5% of the votes counted, the ANC led with 63.04% of the vote. The opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) was winning 21.84%, its highest vote total to date. In third place was the newly formed Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) with 5.46%. Its leader, Julius Malema a former ANC Youth League head and a one-time Zuma enthusiast, was kicked out of the ANC two years ago, and he’s campaigned on a neo-Marxist platform of widespread land redistribution to black South Africans and nationalization of key South African industries, including mining.

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RELATED: Who is Julius Malema?

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Here’s the national breakdown — and the anticipated seat count, on the basis of the current results:

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So for all the hand-wringing over the corruption, a deadly confrontation with striking mineworkers, the tension within the ‘tripartite’ alliance among the ANC, the South African Communist Party and the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), the ANC will hold almost exactly the same number of seats in the National Assembly that it held prior to the elections.

What does this mean for South African policy? Continue reading South Africa: early election results point to ANC landslide →

South Africa

South Africa votes in 5th post-apartheid election: what you need to know

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World Bank, South Africa 2007.

South Africans go to the polls for the fifth time in the post-apartheid era today in a race that the ruling African National Congress (ANC), the liberation movement that forced the end of minority white rule in 1994, is nearly guaranteed to win.south africa flag

South Africans will elect all 400 members of the National Assembly, by proportional representation on a closed-list basis (which may explain, in part, the hierarchical party strength of ANC governance). They will also elect governments in South Africa’s nine provinces.

Here’s the current breakdown:

SANatlAssmly

Notably, it’s the first election that will feature the ‘born-frees,’ the generation of South Africans who were born after the end of apartheid rule. Though they’re only 2.5% of the electorate today, they’ll become an increasingly vital demographic, and they might well change the face of South African politics over the next decade.

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RELATED: Even with victory assured, is the ANC’s future at risk? 

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Jacob Zuma, the president since 2009, is leading the ANC campaign, despite his relative unpopularity as South Africans face dwindling economic growth, rising unemployment and the sense that the ANC is more interested in maintaining — and abusing — power than attending to the pressing policy concerns of most South Africans. Zuma’s spending on ‘security improvements’ to his home at Nkandla has captured the widespread disgust of much of the electorate. His government’s handling of a mining strike at Marikana two years ago ended with a clash with police that killed 44 people in the worst state-sponsored violence since the apartheid era. The fallout has severely strained the so-called tripartite alliance among the ANC, the Communist Party of South Africa and the Congress of South African Trade Union (COSATU).

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RELATED: Zuma is strongest president on HIV/AIDS in South African history

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Notwithstanding those concerns, the ANC is almost assured of victory, thanks to its role as the liberation movement that ended apartheid under the mythic leadership of former president Nelson Mandela, who died late last December. The biggest question is whether the ANC will achieve the support of at least two-thirds of the electorate — it could win just 60% (or even less) of the vote.

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RELATED: How Nelson Mandela’s death provides South Africa a challenge and an opportunity

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The chief opposition party, the Democratic Alliance (DA), seems set to increase its support to a historically high level, possibly more than 20% or even 25%. Continue reading South Africa votes in 5th post-apartheid election: what you need to know →

South Africa

Who is Mmusi Maimane? (Possibly the next premier of Gauteng).

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While left-wing populists like Julius Malema have received much more attention internationally as South Africa prepares for its national elections on May 7, Mmusi Maimane is the rising star to whom the rest of the world should be paying attention.south africa flag

He’s quickly becoming one of the chief spokespersons for the Democratic Alliance (DA), the largest opposition party in South Africa. Although polls show that the DA will nonetheless lose next month’s elections by a massive margin to the ruling African National Congress (ANC), the DA hopes to build on its gains from 2004 and 2009 to win its greatest level of voter support yet. 

In Gauteng, the economic and financial hub of South Africa, and the most populous province in the country with 12.25 million people, Maimane is campaigning hard to become Gauteng’s next premier in one of nine provincial elections that are taking place simultaneously with national elections.

Maimane (like a growing number of world politicians) has been compared to Barack Obama for his quick rise, youthful image and the liberal use of the Obama playbook in his campaign for premier. In 2011, he ran for mayor of Johannesburg, South Africa’s largest city, and he wound up as the opposition leader of the city council. At 33, he’s waging a credible campaign against the ANC, anchored with a pledge to sort legal title for over 200,000 urban South Africans who have only informal ownership of their homes.

Critics in the ANC charge that he’s a convenient black face for a party that draws support predominantly from the white community in South Africa. But as the DA’s support grows, and voters become disenchanted with the ANC, especially the so-called ‘born-frees,’ the emerging class of young voters who never lived under apartheid, voting patterns are slowly changing. If Maimane leads the DA to victory in Gauteng — or even wages a sufficiently tight race — he’ll easily become the party’s dominant figure.

He’s capitalized on the ANC’s unpopularity in several regards — police brutality deployed against miners during a strike in Marikana a couple of years ago, pervasive corruption that’s now highlighted by $23.5 million in state spending for ‘security improvements’ to president Jacob Zuma’s home in Nkandla, and pervasive unemployment among South Africa’s young, urban, black population.

Here’s an ad from last month that went viral after South Africa’s government tried to ban it from the airwaves — it shows just how damning the anti-Zuma and anti-ANC message has become:

It also helps that the ANC in Gauteng is divided by rival factions — that’s why the incumbent, Nomvula Mokonyane, doesn’t seem to be running for reelection, and the provincial secretary general David Makhura is leading the ANC campaign, even though the ANC hasn’t formally announced a candidate for premier.

Dali Mpofu, a longtime ANC politician — who once allegedly had an affair with Winnie Mandela in the 1990s — left the ANC to join Malema’s socialist Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) in November 2013, and is leading the EFF’s efforts as its premier candidate in Gauteng. That, too, could pull votes away from the ANC, much to Maimane’s benefit.

Given those dynamics, and given Maimane’s serious policy proposals and considerable political talent, it’s a puzzler why Maimane isn’t the overwhelming favorite in the race.

Some of the answer lies in the wariness of South African voters to turn away from the ANC, which still looms mythically for its role in ending white apartheid rule 20 years ago.

In 2009, the Democratic Alliance won 16.66% of the vote and increased its representation in the 400-member National Assembly from 47 to 67, and it won control of the Western Cape province. Polls show that the Democratic Alliance will win between 20% and 25% this time around. The DA is expected to retain control in Western Cape (where the DA’s leader Helen Zille, a white former Cape Town mayor and former journalist and anti-apartheid activist, serves as premier). It will also contest for control of Northern Cape province as well.  Continue reading Who is Mmusi Maimane? (Possibly the next premier of Gauteng). →

South Africa

Even with victory assured, is the ANC’s future at risk?

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cyril-ramaphosa-and-jacob-zuma-create-south-africa-s-politcal-team-photodpa_0.

No one doubts that the African National Congress (ANC) will win South Africa’s parliamentary elections on May 7, extending its political hold on the country since the end of apartheid in 1994 and the election of the ANC’s Nelson Mandela as South Africa’s first non-white president.south africa flag

Twenty years later, South Africans are going to the polls for the first time following Mandela’s death late last year, and the chief opposition party, the Democratic Alliance (DA) will be satisfied if it can make further gains, consolidating its hold on Western Cape province, where the DA’s leader Helen Zille serves as premier, appealing to voters in Northern Cape and Eastern Cape, and growing its presence in Gauteng under the leadership of rising star Mmusi Maimane, currently a member of the Johannesburg city council.

But even if the ANC wins with over 60% of the vote, the same level of support as it has generally attracted in the past three elections, South Africa’s ruling structure will enter its third consecutive decade in power exceedingly unpopular, increasingly divided and with no clear path of transition to a compelling successor to the 71-year-old Zuma (pictured above, right, with deputy ANC leader Cyril Ramaphosa).

As Zuma is term-limited as South Africa’s president (the president is elected shortly after parliamentary elections, so the ANC’s dominance will all but assuredly result in Zuma’s reelection later in May or June), he’ll enter his second term as a lame duck with nagging controversies over mismanagement and corruption.

What’s more, the ANC will elect a new leader in 2017 — meaning that, unless Zuma tries to hold onto the party leadership, the ANC will determine the individual who could lead South Africa from 2019 to 2029 within the next three-year window. Though posturing for the 2017 contest is well under way, if quietly, too few ANC leaders are talking about how to revitalize the ANC for a new generation of issues and policy challenges.

Policy and governance woes

Over the past five years, South Africa’s once-booming economy has slowed. Continue reading Even with victory assured, is the ANC’s future at risk? →

South Africa

Ramphele debacle leaves South African opposition reeling

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Less than a week after anti-apartheid activist Mamphela Ramphele became the presidential candidate of the Democratic Alliance (DA), the second-largest political party in South Africa, Ramphele on Sunday backed out of her decision to lead the South African opposition into expected spring parliamentary elections.south africa flag

Though the deal would have merged the DA with Ramphele’s smaller party, AgangSA, founded just over a year ago, the merger collapsed over whether AgangSA would remain a separate entity or would be collapsed entirely within the Democratic Alliance.

It’s a short-sighted decision that leaves neither Ramphele nor Helen Zille (pictured above), the leader of the Democratic Alliance and premier of Western Cape province, looking very skilful.  The collapse of the Ramphele-led alliance must surely rank among the worst self-inflicted disasters of recent world politics.

Zille, in particular, released a harshly worded statement late Sunday savaging Ramphele:

“This about-turn will come as a disappointment to the many South Africans who were inspired by what could have been a historic partnership,” Zille said.  “By going back on the deal, again… Dr Ramphele has demonstrated – once and for all – she cannot be trusted to see any project through to its conclusion. This is a great pity.”

Insisting that the DA had negotiated with Ramphele in good faith, Zille added: “Since Tuesday’s announcement, Dr Ramphele has been playing a game of cat and mouse – telling the media one thing, Agang supporters another thing, and the DA another.  “It is not clear what her objective is, but whatever it is, it is not in the interests of the South African people.”

Without Ramphele, the Democratic Alliance seemed set for its most successful election since its foundation in 2000.  Zille won 16.7% of the vote in the previous April 2009 elections, 23.9% of the national vote in May 2011 municipal elections, and the party seemed headed to win one-quarter or even one-third of the vote in the upcoming parliamentary elections.  Though Zille has a hold on Western Cape province, party leaders hope to make breakthroughs in Eastern Cape and Northern Cape provinces, as well as in Gauteng province, where former Johannesburg mayoral candidate and city council member Mmusi Maimane has helped transform the party’s local (and national) image. 

That won’t necessarily change because of the tumultuous courtship with Ramphele and AgangSA, but it doesn’t make Zille look like an incredibly strong leader to hand her party’s presidential nomination to someone who flaked out within hours of receiving it.  South Africa’s election must be held before July 2014, and if it takes place closer to July than, say, to April or May, the Ramphele breakup stands a good chance of receding into the background.  But it also means that, barring a major turn of events, Zille will have to recalibrate expectations from ‘historic breakthrough’ back down to incremental gains.  Continue reading Ramphele debacle leaves South African opposition reeling →

South Africa

DA announces Ramphele to lead South African campaign

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ramphele

In a move designed to maximize the opposition to South African president Jacob Zuma, Mamphela Ramphele will join the Democratic Alliance (DA) to contest the spring elections as its presidential candidate. south africa flag

That will pit Ramphele (pictured above), the widow of one of South Africa’s most well-known anti-apartheid fighters in the 1980s, directly against Zuma, who leads the ruling African National Congress (ANC).

Ramphele founded AgangSA, (‘Agang’ means ‘to build’ in the Northern Sotho language) in February 2013 as a center-left alternative to the ruling ANC.  Little did she know at the time that she would ultimately lead South Africa’s main opposition party into this spring’s parliamentary elections.  Voters, sometime in April or May, will elect the 400 members of the National Assembly, the lower house of the South African parliament, which will indirectly elect South Africa’s president.  Zuma’s ANC currently holds 264 seats, and it’s still expected to win the next elections, which means that Zuma — for now — remains an almost certainty for reelection.

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Ramphele’s decision to join forces with the Democratic Alliance is a strategic gain for the party, whose leader is Helen Zille (pictured above, yesterday, with Ramphele), the premier of Western Cape province and former mayor of Cape Town.  Under Zille’s leadership, the Democratic Alliance has made steady, if slow gains.  It won 16.66% and 67 seats in the April 2009 elections, its best-ever national result.  In the May 2011 municipal elections, it won 23.9% of the national vote and started to gain more notice in South Africa’s top urban areas.

Though Zille, a former anti-apartheid activist and journalist, already seemed set to improve on her 2009 and 2011 performances, her union with Ramphele gives South Africa’s opposition hope that it really might find a way to break open the ANC’s two-decade lock on power. Continue reading DA announces Ramphele to lead South African campaign →

14 in 14, South Africa

14 in 2014: South Africa general election

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3. South Africa general election, expected in April.south africa flag

Everyone expects Jacob Zuma’s African National Congress (ANC) to win the spring general elections that are likely to be held in April or May (but in any event before July), and after winning reelection to the presidency of the ANC in December 2012, no one doubts that Zuma will continue as South Africa’s president for years to come.

But that doesn’t mean Zuma — or even the ANC — are widely popular, as evidenced by the jeers that met Zuma (pictured above) when he appeared at the memorial service for the late South African president Nelson Mandela in December 2013.  Zuma, who has faced criminal charges in the past ranging from rape to political corruption, came to power as South Africa’s third post-apartheid president in the April 2009 elections, when the ANC won 263 of the 400 seats in the National Assembly, the lower house of South Africa’s parliament.

With Mandela’s death, it may become even harder for the ANC to maintain its unity, which means that the 2014 vote could be the last in which the ANC’s victory is virtually guaranteed.  A major splintering of the ANC could result in the advent of a new two-party era in South African politics, especially with Zuma hoping to establish as his successor businessman Cyril Ramaphosa, who comes from the same aging generation as Zuma and former president Thabo Mbeki.

In 2014, watch for former journalist, anti-apartheid activist and former Cape Town mayor Helen Zille to lead the main opposition party, the Democratic Alliance (DA), to its best-ever result, though it’s still plagued with the image as the party of white elitists from wealthy Western Cape province.  Also keep an eye on Mamphela Ramphele, the widow of murdered anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko, who has formed a new party, AgangSA.

Former ANC Youth League leader Julius Malema, who was exiled from the ANC after his conviction for hate speech, is running under the banner of a new ‘protest movement,’ the Economic Freedom Front (EFF), which espouses the kind of radical, redistributive positions that the ANC embraced in the 1960s and 1970s.  Malema, in particular, could give voice to a new generation of impoverished black South Africans for whom economic gains have failed to materialize under the ANC’s nearly two-decade rule.

Photo credit to AFP / Odd Andersen.

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