By Phakamisa Mayaba / News items drifting back from the political front are so bewildering, so defying of logic, that it’s hard to take them as anything but fake. Or something you’d expect on one of those free-to-air news channels that nobody who has settled his monthly DStv instalment would bother tuning in to. Except that – coming as they do from the horses’ mouths – these snippets are the real makoya. In politics, we’re told, it’s called the silly season.
That’s the time when it dawns on representatives that they don’t have much time before their fates are going to be decided at the polls. The time when, after four years in a deployment gig they can’t really perform, surrounded by staff scarcely more capable than they are, and drawing fat pay cheques they don’t earn or deserve, they suddenly badger the secretary for a printout of that speech from five or ten years ago — or the time OR Tambo spoke from Lusaka.
Beggared, dispirited Jabu should soon expect to see these silver-tongued spivs when he emerges from his shack in Diepsloot or any other poverty-ravaged settlement. Big cars, tailor-made suits, gleaming smiles, fresh from the dentist’s surgery, and flecked with gold. They might dish out a few blankets. They’ll hug his wife and kiss his children, and after dispensing a food parcel or two, poor Jabu might even be tempted to let bygones be bygones by and vote for them once again. A tale as old as 1994.
When there’s a dry spell in the politics of progress, and you are sitting with a moribund economy, Malema’s populist rhetoric can strike a chord. People want land, economic emancipation and jobs, which makes them lean towards any talk of radical nationalisation.
Indecd, there is little as hysterical and shameless as the jumping of ships and turning of coats when it looks like the gravy train might halt at the next station this time around, and our brave public representatives face the prospect of being left in the cold, where the proletariat languishes disconsolately.
Who would’ve thought that the ardently loyal spokesperson for the Jacob Zuma Foundation would consort with the hostile cohort that was a thorn in uBaba’s side, heckling him in parliament and demanding that he ‘Pay back the money?’ One lives and learns, I suppose.
‘It’s cold outside the ANC,’ Julius Malema once sighed. Back then, the same man who’d famously declared he’d kill for Jacob Zuma (his leader in the ANC) – had just been booted out of party he had vowed never to leave, and swapped the green, black and gold for the red overalls of his newly founded Economic Freedom Fighters. At least one comedian called him a flip-flopper, but the show went on, and today the EFF are commanding massive media attention and packing out stadiums.
When there’s a dry spell in the politics of progress, and you are sitting with a moribund economy, Malema’s populist rhetoric can strike a chord. People want land, economic emancipation and jobs, which makes them lean towards any talk of radical nationalisation. Add to this a virtually infantilised Left, with the SACP and Cosatu little more than toy soldiers of the ANC, and there is nothing at that end of the political spectrum to keep the hopes of even the most ideologically schooled and thoughtful voter alive.
For many Africans, this means thinking about throwing in their lot with parties like the DA, a virtually inconceivable choice for those who remember what life was like before Madiba walked out of Victor Verster Prison. In years gone by, the DA fashioned itself as a liberal alternative with an open mind. Nowadays it uses up its air time debating Critical Race Theory, defending tweets about the ingratitude of those who forget that although colonialism was marred by brutal bloodshed, it also brought the aqueduct to darkest Africa. Sigh! Its internal race wars – which the party would have us believe don’t really exist – are hardly surprising, leaving the voter of colour who’s searching for something different in a miserable predicament.
Thus the cancerous Stockholm Syndrome takes hold; swathes of the African voting majority sticking with an ANC that has flipped them the bird, ransacked the coffers that are meant to feed those very people who are homeless, landless and half-starved. In somewhat opportunistic campaigns aimed at taking advantage of the moment, outfits like ActionSA, the Patriotic Alliance, and Build One South Africa (BOSA), whose collective numbers and ability to reach diverse races could make them the greatest threat the ANC has ever faced, might be wasting this opportunity by striking out on their own rather than joining forces. And that’s just a few. A host of new players have been creeping out of the woodwork; Arise South Africa, Xiluva, and possibly more to come as the race to 2024 intensifies.
Which raises the obvious question: if this is the election in which the once indomitable ANC may not win an outright majority, why are these guys not clasping hands and talking to each other? After all, some of them are old colleagues. In various roles in previous political homes, they read from the same script. Furthermore, some commentators feel that with well-defined policies, such a coalition could be more than a game-changer – a new grouping that could define a new trajectory and write the rules of a brand new political game. Regardless, BOSA is aiming at the small business economy; ActionSA is targeting those disciplinarian voters who think SA is too soft on crime; Arise SA is gunning for the youth with an ingterest in technology.
Not too long ago, the country awoke to Rise Mzansi, a new party chock-full of professionals and other highly qualified people led by former editor and corporate high-flyer Songezo Zibi. In a country where politicians are usually equated with matriculants who’ve been spoon-fed with antiquated socialist rhetoric, this might have been just cause to pop the bubbly. But thee’s a smallanyana kink; if Rise’s goal is to cozy up to the intellectual, erudite black man, they are probably on the right path, but if the stats are anything to go by, this sort of brother makes up a very small percentage of the African demographic.
The ANC of yesteryear tried to live up to the idea of an umbrella organisation, or a ‘broad church’, embracing blue and white collar workers alike in a semblance of mutual development and common purpose. But that was before the cadres learnt to cook the books, and before they realised that their tracks were covered by terms like ‘fruitless and wasteful expenditure’.
For the most part, politics in these quarters are energised bacchanalias with the song and dance that would seem a bit off kilter coming from the likes of a Mmusi Maimane or Phumzile van Damme, who tend to round their vowels like a private school headmaster. It’s not for nothing that Malema’s reference to leading black figures in the DA as ‘garden boys’ serving the ‘white madam’ Helen Zille struck a chord a few years ago. Or that the term ‘clever black’ is far more insulting than it seems. In fact, presumably quite aware of the finicky inclinations of the South African voter, Maimane – during his stint as DA leader — often deployed the ambidextrous technique of switching accents depending on whom he was addressing. Not quite cut and dried, the local campaign scene, and one must always be mindful of the iridescence that colours the post-segregation Rainbow Nation.
Faults notwithstanding, the ANC of yesteryear tried to live up to the idea of an umbrella organisation, or a ‘broad church’, embracing blue and white collar workers alike in a semblance of mutual development and common purpose. But that was before the cadres learnt to cook the books, and before they realised that their tracks were covered by terms like ‘fruitless and wasteful expenditure’.
Anyway, these new faces in the political fray have an opportunity to rewrite history and change the narrative that has grown so dreary and unpalatable, when one assesses the reality of living in a country that can no longer adequately feed its poor or keep the lights on. Whether they may eventually see the need to join forces remains to be seen. But we will seek them out to give you, Dear Reader, a better understanding of their raisons d’etre. To tweak their brains, their motives, and find out how they intend to succeed where the current leadership has failed. That said, welcome to our series of articles titled eParkeni on the 2024 Campaign Trail.
- This is an edited version of an article that has appeared on Phakamisa’s eParkeni website. Used with permission.
Featured image: Tweeted by Rise Mzansi.