Two weeks after the election, South Africa still has no government, but could choose a ruling coalition – and its next president – during a parliamentary session on Friday.
As the country moves into unknown territory comes political unrest. For the past 30 years, the African National Congress (ANC) – the party of freedom fighters and former president Nelson Mandela – has ruled the country. But during this year’s elections, the ANC failed to win a majority amid concerns about its leaders’ ability to defeat the effects of apartheid and create real economic equality among them. Black and white South Africans. Voters have also expressed frustration over the years Corrupt politicians Plundering the nation’s resources and failing to meet people’s needs, such as providing jobs, tackling climate change and providing safe housing – hence the rejection of the ruling party.
All this has forced the ANC to seek a coalition government – which it calls the Government of National Unity, or GNU – for the first time. The ANC, which won 40 percent of the vote as a party, the largest share of any party, invited 17 other political parties to join a GNU. Many parties refused to go into coalition for ideological reasons, a sign of the wider fracture in South African politics that this election has revealed.
The current ANC leader, President Cyril Ramaphosa, could win a second term in power, but that is not a given. Other parties that have signed up to the coalition may put forward a candidate, although the majority-Zulu Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) has pledged to support Ramaphosa. The Democratic AllianceNor has the DA, which is the main opposition party, indicated its willingness to enter a coalition, but is yet to be confirmed.
A major spoiler makes a new entry with a familiar leader — the uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK) party, led by former president Jacob Zuma and named for the apartheid-era militant wing of the ANC. It is a Zulu-majority party, seemingly reinforcing the trend of identity-focused political parties.
Zuma cannot run for president again or become a member of parliament He was found guilty of contempt of court in 2021 Because he will not testify before the Anti-Corruption Commission. But he has been very vocal in this year’s campaign and tried to shut down Friday’s parliamentary session over allegations of vote rigging. (South Africa has a history of free and fair elections, and MK’s court case to stop Friday’s session was dismissed.)
The formation of a GNU and the election of a president did not mean that South Africa’s political problems were over; Rather, this election has been a signal that the country’s democracy is not working for its people and they want a significant change. But it’s anyone’s guess how that will be come Friday.
What happened to the promise of the ANC?
Although the ANC has existed in some form for over a century, it is most closely associated with Mandela and the anti-apartheid struggle of the 1990s to 1960s.
The victory of Mandela and the ANC in South Africa’s first democratic elections in 1994 represented a moment of possibility for the then, racially diverse and less stratified country. The promise of more justice after centuries of brutal apartheid policies and deadly struggles for liberation and dignity was deeply moving and inspiring.
Mandela in Parliament a Truth and Reconciliation Commission in 1995, which sought to bring to light the crimes of the apartheid regime and the liberation struggle, and in some cases hold the perpetrators of those crimes accountable.
Recommendations and implementation of the TRC has been stunted though; The government has, in many cases, refused to prosecute those found to have committed gross human rights violations during apartheid, and the compensation offered to victims of those violations and their families is inadequate. Thirty years after the formal end of apartheid and despite a multiracial government, conditions continue to worsen for most black South Africans.
South Africa is One of the most unequal countries in the worldVery few are high earners and about 55 percent of the population Living in poverty. Unemployment is 33 percent overall, and sits at 45.5 percent For the youth. approx 24 million people need welfare assistance from the government. The ANC was founded Affirmative action programs To help reverse the systemic discrimination black people face in access to housing, land, education and employment. These programs are popular, but they can only do so much to help when the overall economy is struggling — and have been for years.
The government is unable to provide some of the basic necessities of life for millions of South Africans – incl flowing water, Decent accommodationAnd even electricity – never mind planning and managing the crisis that will come with climate change.
Race and access to education are the two highest drivers of this inequality. According to the 2022 World Bank report. Political corruption is partly responsible for all these problems. Zuma, for example, has faced multiple corruption scandals and been accused of bribery Control of business partners State assets worth billions of dollars. Its advantages are found Illegal transaction Between the state-run Eskom power company and those same business partners, which resulted in hundreds of millions of dollars in losses and power blackouts that still plague the country. And it’s not just Zuma – other leaders, Both in public and private sectorsAllegations of corruption have also been raised.
Given the dire situation — and despite the apparent corruption — it is not hard to imagine the appeal of groups like MK, which advocate policies such as redistributing land from white farmers to black South Africans.
What happens if democracy is not given?
Even with hopes of forming a coalition government, what the future holds is unclear.
Despite concerns about the rise of other parties, particularly the MK and the Economic Freedom Fighters, a Marxist faction, Sizwe Mpofu-Walsh, a lecturer in international relations at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, sees the potential for some positive change.
“South Africa’s new coalition era may provide an important opportunity for institutional strengthening, particularly within the parliamentary system,” Mpofu-Walsh writes for Foreign Affairs. “The dominance of the ANC allows it to speed decisions through parliament, often subject to vigorous debate and scrutiny. During its corruption scandals, the ANC shielded its presidents from accountability. While not controlled by a single party, South Africa’s parliament, its apex court and other accountability mechanisms could be more effective and robust.”
Political competition and direct opposition are positive for democracy, as is the strengthening of political institutions. But the government still has some of the same players — especially Ramaphosa and Zuma — who helped get South Africa to where it is today, raising questions about how much change South Africans can expect under their new government.
South Africans have made it clear that the ANC is not delivering for them. But so far, it is not clear what a coalition government can do to improve the lives of ordinary people, ensuring their ability to eat and access to water, housing, jobs and electricity.
Part of the answer lies in the plan to grow the economy, which is the center-right DA Said hope to do so. But many South Africans see it as a party Mainly serving white interestsAnd it opposes affirmative action and Redistribution of land, which is at the core of efforts to repair the wrongs of apartheid. That perception is indicative Identity politics According to Michael Walsh, program director of the Center for African Studies at Howard University, although “identity politics, the potential for apartheid politics in South Africa existed throughout the post-apartheid period” and senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, are beginning to take hold in South Africa.
“The lesson from all of this is that identity politics can actually capture a significant percentage of the vote in a very short period of time,” Walsh told Vox. “And in a world where you no longer have one-party-dominated states, and you have very divided votes among many, many parties, even getting percentages of the vote. […] Enough to give you a seat in the government.”
The job of the next government – whatever its makeup – is to deliver decent jobs and grow the economy in a way that aims to make real material change for South Africans, and quickly, to preserve coalitions and maintain a stable government.
But that will be challenging in a political landscape where journalist William Schockey is wrote a recent New York Times op-ed: “The question of who we are trumps the more programmatic questions of what kind of society South Africans want to live in.”
