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Let us allow the ANC DC "to handle the matter, it is a sad chapter..."

 Asked about the disciplinary hearing of Jacob Zuma, one of his former allies, who enjoys the respect of Zuma, former Deputy President David Mabuza, responded by indicating that the process should be allowed to run its entire course. He hints that the evidence and counter evidence at the hearing will reveal the issues, and whatever the verdict, it will have to be faced and respected. This is a vintage ANC response when a leader conceals his/her proper stance. It is a closing-the-ranks response. 

The Mabuza response comes when former top six leaders of the ANC, who have not left the organisation, were fully galvanised to show their support of what Zuma calls a Ramaphosa ANC. The President and Secretary General who presided over the historic epicentre of the current in-ANC turmoil, Thabo Mbeki and Kgalema Motlhanthe, led the charge as the ANC's election juggernaut entered its critical last push stages. Unlike Mabuza, who was measured in his response after a long and loud silence, Mbeki was unequivocal in declaring that Zuma "cannot campaign against the ANC and pretend it belongs to Ramaphosa. He [JZ] knows very well it doesn't belong to Ramaphosa. It belongs to the people, membership, it belongs to the country...there will be a rapture...we can't, there is no way we can continue dealing with a person like that and continue to call him comrade, he is not a comrade,  NOT ANYMORE". Mbeki drew a solid line, and Mabuza drew a dotted line. He confirmed that there is an appetite to hear how the ANC has suddenly become a Ramaphosa ANC... 

 

Since the historic "I have concluded that the circumstances dictate that in the interest of the honourable deputy president, the government, our young democratic system and our country, it would be best to release the honourable Jacob Zuma from his responsibilities as deputy president of the republic and member of the cabinet" in June 2005, Zuma became a node around which the battle for the creation of a post-apartheid establishment was and is still fought. The many dimensions of RSA politics, the geopolitical battles of interests beyond our borders, the interrogation of what is in our national interest, the regrouping of ethno-nationalist interests, the interrogation of the content of the CODESA settlement, the foregrounding of economic freedom in our lifetime, and the unfortunate spectacle of state capture and corruption found a fulcrum in him to pivot as the context of politics to date. 

 

He became the irritant in a tent that was supposed to craft a consensus on consolidating the constitutional order into an economic order the CODESA-designed democratic order envisaged. Zuma became the fulcrum various factions in the ANC could use to tie themselves to the architects of the consensus process of building the establishment. The outcome is the existence of nodes of influence, or factions if you like, constituted by influential elements of the liberal order disguised in sub-grounded policy positions alien to what the ANC stood for. 

 

The cost of the Zuma-centred in-ANC battles started to show in the 2014 and 2016 National and Municipal elections performance when the urban voters started to make clinical choices and ushered in an era of coalition government in RSA's major economic nodal cities and towns. The 2014 and 2016 elections coincided with the CR17 and NDZ17 campaigns that usurped the energies required to consolidate state power at the expense of making in-ANC power more critical. For instance, the Gauteng PEC's call in April 2016 that "the ANC has earned its leadership of society through the struggles and sacrifices of its members and supporters over generations. It is in that context that...Jacob Zuma should reflect deeply and do the right thing to resolve the unprecedented crisis that the ANC currently faces," which effectively asked him to resign, has impacted how Gauteng campaigned in the 2016 elections. Zuma was airbrushed in those elections as the face of the ANC in Gauteng posters. The influential former Transvaal ANC urban machinery which led the charge through the Gauteng PEC statement that "as the ANC, we have to do a deeper introspection and take far-reaching decisions that will repair the damage to our image and to continue to enjoy the confidence and trust of our people", of which David Mabuza was a decisive component, succeeded in placing what the economist call "South Africa's best bet", Cyril Ramaphosa, as a detour on the bumpy path that started in Mangaung. 

 

During all these contests for the soul of the ANC, its leaders have been fighting whilst working hard to show the unity of the brand. Only when the consequences of actions against individuals started to be less about the collective that we see replying affidavits to litigation spilling the beans on the true crisis of leadership and unity in the ANC, the court cases that challenged in-ANC elective conference outcomes exposed the administrative dysfunctions of the ruling party, stating that it is a matter of time before its legitimacy to call itself the governing party might be challenged in court. We have seen how the IEC-MK Party case has been craftily used to reopen the Khamphepe judgement or allow JZ to go for another term. 

 

The David Mabuza response on the Zuma ANC disciplinary hearing might well be a warning that the replying affidavit to the charges might be the beginning of a ferocious succession battle in the ANC, especially with Cyril now being less of a factor given his terminal term as ANC President. The question is, are we seeing stirrings of a succession battle with JZ again in the picture and the ANC DC as the inaugural battleground. The case will be publicly heard and may well be taken for review in the courts of the land where the Zuma discontents, which have thus far been suppressed and 'sealed', will burst in the open. With only his legacy to save, this will be a potentially messy and impactful event for the ANC...!!!

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