With the local government elections just a bit more than a week away, the voices one would expect to hear are strangely silent. And if they do emerge, they are defending crass utterances, or floundering around in the wretched power plays of factionalism and internal party squabbles.
They include the usually chipper Fikile (‘We fear fokol’) Mbalula, who became all teary when addressing the media in the Constitutional Court, and then collapsed outside. This was after – to his and the ANC’s massive relief – the apex court had reversed a decision by the IEC, upheld by the Electoral Court, that 181 ANC candidates in six municipalities could not stand because their names had not been submitted in time. As ANC secretary-general – and administrative head – Mbalula was clearly in the firing line.
A subdued Mbalula said the prospect of ANC-governed communities being left without ANC candidates had kept him awake at night, and weighed heavily on him.
“And I’m not afraid of anything; I respect the movement. But the biggest thing that made me not sleep and made me to really cry is the fact that how will I live with a decision that in 2026, under my leadership, as the boss of the ANC, people could not vote. And when I said it’s 3 per cent, I could not take it emotionally,” Mbalula explained.
Nevertheless, the previously brash face of the ANC’s local government campaign has been pushed off his pedestal, leaving a perceptible vacuum for new voices to step up and keep the campaign rolling. Except there aren’t any. When it needs to hold the fort, fort, the party has always looked to its ‘old guard,’ who have come up through the ranks of revolution, struggle and comrade.
Not for nothing that, during his stint as president of the now defunct ANC Youth League, Julius Malema often declared (somewhat dubiously) that his political journey had started in his early teens. Or that the party’s veterans all supposedly did great things in exile, even though some of them could hardly have been born at that time.
The myth and lore of the selfless cadre who sacrificed everything in the fight against apartheid was serious mileage. Having a story about secret meetings, covert arms caches and taking a bullet or a whipping for the cause stood you in good stead, never mind the embellishment.
It all went well for a while, but the tanks started to run dry, and the cadres got older. The once sharp brains started succumbing to the ravages of age. Suddenly the consequences were clear. Except for Jacob Zuma, the dirges became dull, and the speeches were yawning.
And because it seemed more important to cling to power for as long a possible rather than allowing new leaders to emerge, there was no functional youth league from which to pluck fresh voices. It had been disbanded precisely because it had tried to topple the old toppies, and that was simply not going to fly. Among others, that’s why the tripartite alliance has been hollowed out, and and why the same old characters keep popping up whenever one tries to trace the organisation’s post-democratic history and milestones.
Despite his eternal youth leader vibe, it’s the very same Mbalula who, alongside Zwelinzima Vavi, marched Thabo Mbeki out of Luthuli House and into the political wilderness, where the former president is still licking his wounds, coming out every so often to tell his former cadres just how incompetent and useless they are, and how they’ve turned Khongolose (the Zulu term for the ANC) into a basket case. Gwede Mantashe, Paul Mashatile, Blade Nzimande … These are the guys who’ve always been there and are getting older while at it.
And so the silly season has unfolded in a sea of competing colours. Ramaphosa’s dour flirtations with gogos in Gauteng townships have been the most arousing piece of political theatre from the former ruling party. But its competitors are not doing too well either.
Herman Mashaba has been bumbling about on podcasts, on the verge of incoherence. Sounding groggy and ill-prepared, the ‘Black Like Me’ mogul has tried to explain to young people why his party has been virtually absent on university campuses — this while his aversion to BRICS has isolated ActionSA from the progressive black left. Mashaba may well have garnered a reputation as a man capable of fixing things, but he’s an awful communicator.
This is extremely unfortunate when one considers the exceptional oratorial abilities of his right-hand men Athol Trollip and Michael Beaumont. The former is impressively fluent in Xhosa, with far greater appeal than Mashaba in the Eastern Cape.
Beaumont is a logical, tactical speaker, with significant appeal to the middle classes. But Mashaba continues to be the party’s main mouthpiece, endlessly rehashing his anti-immigration posture when talking about local government and service delivery would obviously be more useful.
Julius Malema remains the most impassioned speaker of all, despite the fact that his record has stuck on the same issues since the EFF first came out in miners’ hats and overalls more than a decade ago.
Mantashe has consistently been making one controversial statement after the other, the latest of which has openly pitted the ANC Women’s League against him. He used to be one of the most articulate, tactful aides de camp to any presidential hopeful. Now, like much of the inner circle, these guys are concentrating on putting out real and imaginary fires instead of picking issues that would make a good last-minute impression on the undecided voters.
Why would we expect it play out any different when the people who are charged with these things are way past their sell-by date? The madalas have lost their swag. Mbalula has his hands full. Individuals like Mashatile have difficulty shedding perceptions of corruption, and the ANC Youth League has long been emasculated.
Where does that leave the rest of us? Well, in the unenviable position of watching what used to be an exciting expression of our democracy degenerate into struggling to find anything worthwhile to write about.
Featured image: President Cyril Ramaphosa campaigning in Soweto. . Source: MyANC Facebook page.