By Laurence Caromba
Apparently, this was the year that South African politicians discovered marketing. The major political developments of the past two weeks have occurred within the realm of symbols: names, logos, brands and slogans. The Democratic Alliance sought to rebrand itself with new colours, a new website, and an Obama-esque new logo.
The breakaway "Shikota" party, having struggled for several weeks to come up with a name, eventually settled on "Congress of the People" - only to find itself immediately caught up in another ANC lawsuit that accuses COPE of diluting its brand.
Even the ANC, the largest political party and therefore the one with the most to lose by changing, has subtly altered its advertising. Gone are the sombre portraits of past liberation figures. In their place are photos of smiling young men and women in fashionable clothes, evocative of nothing so much as an MTN advert. Evidently, none of the major parties have resisted the intrusion of corporate-style marketing into politics.
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This is not necessarily a bad thing. Executed correctly, marketing can be a powerful tool. The DA got the formula (mostly) right with its redesign, which replaced the party's old "police car" colour scheme with the colours of the national flag. One of the challenges facing any party in opposition is the patriotism problem: the need to strike a balance between attacking the government and criticising the country itself. Under Tony Leon, the DA tried to fill the role of SA's "loyal opposition", but ended up emphasising the second half of that formulation to the detriment of the first.
By contrast, Helen Zille has worked hard to close the patriotism gap since taking over the party. Her decision to incorporate the colours of the national flag into its logo will not solve the problem by itself, but it is one more sign that she is aware the problem exists.
COPE's marketing efforts have been less successful. The party has flirted with a succesion of names: first the "South African National Congress", deemed too close to the original ANC; then the "South African Democratic Congress", which turned out to have already been registered by someone else; finally, the "Congress of the People".
Since, one imagines, coming up with a name is the first item on the agenda when creating a political party, the saga has done little to inspire managerial confidence in the new party's leadership - especially when the end result is an awkward-sounding acronym paired with a logo that recalls Microsoft's Xbox.
Yet for all its missteps, COPE is at least acting in good faith. The same cannot be said for the ANC, whose lawsuit against COPE makes the absurd claim that the ANC owns the common law rights to the name "Congress of the People" just because the ANC sent delegates to a conference with that name more than 50 years ago.
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