I’ve had a chance to study the ANC presidential candidate field from close quarters and it’s safe to say this is a two-horse race, says Dennis Pather.
Yes, I realise the ANC has placed an embargo on any lobbying for the party’s
elective conference in December, but as a humble columnist exercising my God-given right to freedom of expression, I’m exempt.
Anyway, I fail to see how such an embargo can still be valid when every Tom, Dikgang and Harrypersad is flouting it every day.
I’ve had a chance to study the field from close quarters and it’s safe to say this is a two-horse race.
Political theorists, analysts and intellectuals out there might disagree and pontificate about what is right and best in our democracy.
But at the end of the day, politics is the art of the possible.
Or as some sage once said: “We all would like world peace and unlimited cookies. But the universe offers some peace and cookies on special occasions.”
But back to the ANC presidential stakes. Whether you like it or not, there are only two candidates who can possibly claim the ANC crown in December: Cyril Ramaphosa or Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma.
Several other names have been bandied around but they are “also rans”.
South Africans are mostly concerned with runaway corruption. Go check the polls. The party invariably performs far better when it is perceived to be tough on corruption.
Get rid of this cancerous scourge and you will see a cleaner and more merit-based leadership at the helm. Goodbye to jobs for pals, cadre deployments, dodgy tenders, wasteful expenditure and cronyism.
So whichever of the two can clean up will get the prize.
Strictly on those terms, Dlamini Zuma, despite her good track record in government, is going to find it hard to live down the Sarafina II scandal involving R14 million spent on an Aids play when she was health minister. Her other drawback is that she is being backed by her former husband, President Jacob Zuma, whose name has been mired in corruption scandals.
Ramaphosa has had his fair share of blemishes too - haunted by his involvement in incidents before the Marikana massacre and the stink over his outrageously insensitive auction bid for a R20m buffalo.
So here’s the challenge to both front-runners. Go out there and drain that swamp before it swallows all of us.