With Zuma Out, Are the Fires Coming

Under normal circumstances the Independent Electoral Commission’s announcement that effectively disqualified Jacob Zuma of the uMkhonto weSizwe Party (MKP) from standing as a candidate in the 29 May elections would’ve been a non-issue. IEC chairperson Mosotho Moepya had hardly switched on the microphone when the country knew exactly what was coming.

And the entire thing might’ve been blown off the papers overnight were it not for one kink: the man who’d been barred from standing was Jacob Zuma. In its ranks his MKP numbers personalities who’ve been accused of stoking the fires that would engulf kwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng leading to the death of 354 people, a razed economy and an unforgettable sentiment of a lawless country in what is today grimly remembered as the July Riots.

This followed Zuma’s 11th hour arrest at his Nkandla homestead for contempt of the Constitutional Court for refusing to appear before the State Capture Commission of enquiry in 2021. On that evening, milling outside his gate were armed supporters wielding belligerent vocabulary, who looked poised to prevent – seemingly with their very lives – Zuma’s imminent incarceration. As various media houses teleported the tense scenes to our living rooms, a nation breathed a sigh of relief when Zuma did the right thing – ultimately handing himself in to police.

But few anticipated what would come barely a day later. It began with trucks being torched along major highways in KZN, crowds running amok in the CBDs of Johannesburg and KZN a prelude to the utter bedlam that was to come. The rest is today the stuff of court processes, a concluded commission of enquiry and scores still reeling from the massive loss of life. With a massive twitter following, Zuma’s daughter, Duduzile Zuma-Sambudla would find herself embroiled in the havoc – albeit as an armchair critic – when she allegedly sent tweets openly supporting the rioting. Comments from public figures later concluded that this was less a spontaneous uprising than a well-orchestrated incitement to violence. In the midst of the chaos, law enforcement looked helpless as scores rammed down shop doors, made off with their illicit bounty, burned buildings and killed people .

Duduzile Zuma-Sambudla. Image: X

With Zuma being barred from contesting the upcoming elections, fears to a reoccurrence of similar violence abound. Historically, KZN has been a hotbed of grotesque political bloodletting. And with the MK seemingly having a strong foothold in the region, such fears – the pundits warn – could potentially spill over into a bloody reality. Despite that section 47 of the constitution clearly disallows any citizen who has been sentenced to prison for longer than 12 months without the option of a fine from being an MP within five years after serving the sentence, the MKP – who’ve punted Zuma as their main ou – plan on appealing the IEC’s decision at the Electoral Court anyway. Clearly, in challenging the decision, the party is prepared to go the whole nine yards to make sure that their candidate of choice returns to parliament, hence raising the question: would they be prepared to go so far as to kill to realise this goal?

In a country with a plausible record of holding free and fair elections, to have to ask such questions says as much about the shifting tides and attitudes as it does about the significance of this particular election and – God forbid – the very death of the packaged, romanticized variant of democracy as we’ve known it since ’94. One cannot dismiss the whiff of fascism lingering in the air. It was easy to not take it too seriously when it was just the EFF and obscure entities like BLF who were seemingly the outlying advocates of such tendencies. But with the emergence of parties like MKP veering extremely to the left now having entered the fray, it’s enough to leave those in the centre a tad unnerved.

The MKP joins the EFF and BLF as radicals. Image: MKP Facebook page.

A strong anti-ANC sentiment coupled by unflattering polls on the party means that the opposition as well as the new entrants are smelling blood. The indomitable ANC is shedding its mane, best the hyenas strike now lest President Cyril Ramaphosa does good on his promise to siff out the rot and start putting people in jail, thereby slowly restoring voter confidence in what has been reduced to little more than a government of thieves.

Just this week, following speculation around the National Prosecuting Authority Investigative Director’s imminent arrest of Parliamentary Speaker, Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula, she has since handed in her resignation on Wednesday. The following day she appeared before the Pretoria Magistrates Court to face twelve charges of corruption and one charge of money laundering. In a country where even nondescript minions are seldom known to face the music, this is seismic. It’s unprecedented.

National Assembly Speaker Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula has been granted bail and faces charges of corruption and one of money laundering. Image: Wikipedia.

It’s sending out alarm bells in the echelons of power that perhaps the State Capture days are yesterday’s gravy train and that nobody will be protected from the wrath of renewal. Of course this may just be precisely part of the plan to make it seem that indeed the NPA has been reinforced with the sting that was removed from the Scorpions, disbanded back in 2009 when they started stinging where the big men didn’t want them to.

However, the impediment with this strategy is how it flies against the workings of a party where misdeeds are often overlooked in exchange for political support. Presidents have been known to rise on the shoulders of tainted men and in exchange look the other way or even pull the plug on the state institutions that would later try to bring these men down.

In an article I published some four years ago on City Press (sadly it’s behind a paywall), I noted how, if the ANC was serious about renewal, ‘unity’ would have to be the first casualty. The article went as far as saying that, under the circumstances, that ‘unity’ was nothing but a myth. This was on the back of a scathing open letter against his own party penned by president Cyril Ramaphosa himself. The article opened thusly: ‘It was always clear that the man who would earnestly brave down the path of fighting ANC corruption would be the one who’d reconciled that if and when he should emerge out the other side, he would also be the one to have destroyed the party he so dearly loved.’

The rationale behind this was how endemic and deeply-rooted corruption had penetrated the party that it was simply impossible to surgically lance it without finding close allies and ‘chomies’ in the contamination. There can be no doubt that the latest developments (Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula’s resignation), there are those who are shaken, holding backdoor meetings asking themselves, ‘now that the Speaker is gone, are we really safe?’ In that light, one can suspect that hard drives are already disappearing, paper trails burnt, hush money being paid.

As for Jacob Zuma, he is obviously redeploying his so-called ‘Stalingrad’ tactics on a different legal matter: to saunter back into the National Assembly as an Honourable Member. Though his battle now may be with the IEC, the intrinsic war is with those in the ANC – many who otherwise would’ve been no more than petty back benchers were it not for his patronage – who didn’t lift a finger as he was unceremoniously dismissed back in 2018. He has a vendetta to square.

Former president Jacob Zuma’s son Duduzane’s All Game Changers party has seemingly been taken off the IEC’s election list. Image: X.com.

A few months ago it seemed that a troika of Zumas; son Duduzane, daughter Duduzile and of course the father of the twins would be headed off to parliament. What better way inflict sweet vengeance on his enemies than to return flanked by his offspring to the benches? But with the recent IEC decision as well as that Duduzane’s All Game Changers party has quietly been removed from the IEC’s list, the only Zuma we might see in the august House is Duduzile Zuma-Sambudla. Her alleged sins of inciting violence means she merely joins candidates across many parties who at one point or another were fingered for one or other misdemeanour.

Nathi Nhleko who recently resigned from the ANC has in just over a month been welcomed into the fold of the MKP where he does duty as their national organiser for the upcoming national and provincial ballot. Sitting comfortably at number 27 on the EFF’s parliament list, Carl Niehaus will likely be the first white MP for the Red Brigades after 29 May. What this subliminally implies is the perception that politicians are a law unto themselves; when you are a politician the rules, even those of unenforceable common morality, simply don’t apply.

It thus comes as no surprise that community meetings even in obscure hamlets or towns like Colesberg often come down to crude name-calling, insults and are sometimes settled with physical blows. That is the message sent to the ground when, for example, the EFF charges the stage in the middle of a president’s address. Violence seemingly becomes the currency towards securing a seat at the table. It becomes an instrument of power.

Moreover, SA politics are tailored around personalities rather than institutions of governance. In countries where voter or democratic education is prioritised, the sheer idea of individuals as flawed as those who are waltzing onto election lists would in all likelihood culminate in massive protests. Here at home those who know better take to the comments sections or social media, sadly, it would seem that everybody else just shrugs and go about their business. Hence there is almost zero pressure on these nefarious elements, no accountability as they get away with all manner of wrongdoing.

Perhaps the only salvation for such hard times is that 63.3% of the country are between the ages of 15 – 34 years of age according to 2020 StatsSA figures. Youngsters who may probe and question the status quo. Sadly, in the previous elections, this crucial demographic mostly chose to sit out the voting. Perhaps in coming years, they will show up and make their mark, for themselves and the rest of us.

Featured Image: Polity.org

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