PREVIEW
The former President has been expelled from the ANC - the party he once led - after campaigning for a rival party in the 2024 election
The African National Congress’s (ANC) move to pin the blame for its worst results in three decades on ex-President Jacob Zuma risks whitewashing the failures of President Cyril Ramaphosa’s government.
Last week, Zuma was formally expelled from the ANC for leading the rival uMkhonto weSizwe (MK) party, which won 58 seats in the 29 May general elections, leaving the ANC to form a coalition with the centre-right Democratic Alliance (DA) (AC Vol 65 No 13, The ANC stitches together a pro-market coalition).
A post-election post-mortem document presented last week to the ANC’s National Executive Committee (NEC) traced the results back to the party’s national elective conference in 2007, when Zuma was elected and ushered in an era where, ‘ANC ministers saw their personal interest in private wealth acquisition as taking precedence over the national interest’.
It also pointed to the high turnover of ministers and senior officials in government departments during the Zuma years, noting that, ‘around 60% lasted for only 12 months or less’. Pinning the blame on Zuma is politically convenient and reflects Ramaphosa’s insistence of staying on as President (AC Vol 65 No 12, Choices get starker after the ANC vote crash).
Zuma still commands a following in the ANC, and the document’s omission of failures in leadership or policy by Ramaphosa, will be used by his supporters. Zuma is still pursuing a private prosecution against his successor.
Former director-general in the presidency Joel Netshitenzhe has argued in a 17-page election review for the Mapungubwe Foundation, which was also circulated to the ANC NEC, that ‘beyond the persisting black-and-white divide and the hierarchies in-between, the demon of narrow ethnic identity has not been slayed’.
Should Zuma’s MK survive and develop an infrastructure, it could take advantage of the ethnic identity-based voting that was clear in May’s election, notes Netshitenzhe.
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