It will be business as usual for both the ANC and opposition parties, writes Dumisani Hlophe.
Expect this year to be business as usual. While the socio-economic challenges of unemployment, poverty, inequality, and the snail’s pace economic growth gain momentum, there is no indication of a paradigm shift by the leadership in dealing with these issues.
Despite the ruling party’s pronouncement on radical socio-economic transformation, there is no indication of an ideological or conceptual shift in the strategic leadership or management of society.
Without the ideological and policy shift needed at the ruling party level to effect radical change, the ANC will continue to talk left, do right, and entrench the status quo.
It is increasingly becoming too conservative in its leadership and management of the party and the country.
It will not change in its internal modus operandi any time soon.
It will also not change how it leads and manages society.
After 20 years of being the ruling party, it is increasingly concerned with stability.
Radicalism by nature bears elements of disruptiveness. It inherently disturbs the status quo.
Radical socio-economic transformation naturally implies the disturbance of the socio-economic status quo. In this case, radical socio-economic transformation necessitates the restructuring of the economy.
The ANC will therefore not make any major groundbreaking announcements about change in its January 8 statement and the State of the Nation address by President Jacob Zuma.
If such radical pronouncements are made, they will not be followed by action.
This is primarily because there has not been any radical change ideologically, in policy, and therefore not in how the state apparatus should function.
Prospects for such a radical shift are not even in sight.
This could be informed by a lack of political will by the ruling elite to transform the structure of the economy in favour of the majority.
It could be lack of capacity within the ruling elite. Alternatively, it could mean that an increasing number in the ruling elite are also benefiting from an untransformed economic structure.
Therefore expect that in 2015 the political differences and struggles in the ANC and its labour allies will be more personal and factional, rather than ideological and organisationally strategic.
Most of these internal struggles will manifest themselves through the ANC’s national general council (NGC) in June.
Officially, the NGC is meant to review the party’s performance and policy direction, but in recent years propping up individuals in leadership positions has been the norm.
The NGC is not an elective conference, and yet factions within the ANC have found it useful to test the waters.
That Jacob Zuma is serving his second and final term as state president will add impetus to leadership discussions – officially or not.
The name of Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa will feature prominently in the leadership discourse by the virtue of his being the deputy president of the ANC and the country.
Although this is a policy conference, there will be underhand succession discussions, if not elite lobbying. The relationship between Zuma and Ramaphosa will emerge as a discussion point.
In the main, discussions can be expected to focus on whether Ramaphosa, by virtue of his being deputy president, should ascend to the presidency or whether Zuma should remain as ANC president when his term as state president ends.
So the ANC will, in 2015, remain preoccupied with its internal “regime changes” rather than strategic direction.
Unfortunately, this internal regime change culture also permeates its labour allies.
Union leadership elites have developed factions in association with the elite in the ANC leadership. As the succession projects in the ruling party gain momentum, expect further factionalism in organised labour.
The leadership lacks the unity of wills to generate unity and cohesion in the labour federation.
Cosatu will therefore continue with its disintegration.
It will be business as usual in 2015.
The danger of this organisational culture is that the party and the state could be driven by routine, but without the substance.
That is, the ANC will follow its established calendar events: deliver a January 8 statement every year; and hold an NGC policy conference every five years and a national elective conference every five years.
The ANC may host these timeously. However, the conferences may not have the substance associated with their primary existence.
The January 8 statement has become one victim in this respect. The tradition was established by the ANC leadership to communicate an annual theme that would rally and galvanise activists in the Struggle against apartheid.
In recent years, it has become better known for the after party than for the substance of the purported theme.
The opposition political parties also will not bring much that is different this year.
The DA will continue to protect capital and the rich through the votes it generated from the poor. It will continue to harp on about Nkandla and express its non-confidence in Zuma.
In fact, Zuma has been very good for the DA’s cause.
His Nkandla misjudgment has allowed the DA to steer the public discourse away from the central theme of transformation and the restructuring of the skewed economy.
Thus, the Nkandla debacle, the Guptas’ landing at the Waterkloof air base, and the spy tapes have allowed the DA to generate a public discourse that suggests all the problems of this society start and end with Zuma.
Therefore, for the DA too, 2015 will be business as usual. Press for Zuma to pay back the Nkandla money, and press for his resignation.
But then the DA must – and will – worry about its own position as the official opposition.
While it focuses on Zuma (and not the ANC), it has to contend with the fact that its status as the official opposition is under threat.
There are no elections this year that might dislodge the DA as the official opposition.
However, the EFF has emerged as the unofficial opposition.
Mmusi Maimane, the DA’s parliamentary leader, and his leader, Helen Zille, have both seen a decline in their media appeal.
Much of this media attention has been diverted to the EFF’s leadership in Parliament.
While it is not even conceivable that in the next election the DA will lose its official opposition status, its parliamentary influence has taken a knock. It has declined.
The DA has to contend with the fact that it now has to contest the EFF as a possible alternative to the ANC.
After winning an interdict preventing Parliament from implementing its sanctions on 20 of its MPs, the EFF is likely to return more pompous and arrogant.
It will get worse if it eventually wins the case itself.
Should this happen, it means the ANC will find it difficult to silence the EFF using the rules of Parliament alone.
It means the ANC will need a different strategy in dealing with the EFF.
Meanwhile, the EFF is likely to swing between robust debating and howling.
It will use the Nkandla debacle as a means to embarrass President Jacob Zuma.
It will continue to pressure Ramaphosa over Marikana. There will be more calls to “Pay back the money!”
The Nkandla matter therefore, will remain on the agenda in 2015. The opposition will press the president to pay back the money.
But the president will refuse.
Many ANC members will defend the president publicly, but denounce him privately.
Zuma is in a catch-22 on this one.
If he pays back the money this could be interpreted as an admission of guilt.
This would mean he had misled Parliament and therefore should resign.
If he does not pay back the money, this will be interpreted as disregarding a crucial Chapter Nine institution – the Office of the Public Protector.
It will mean he has undermined the constitution that he has sworn to protect.
Those who are volunteering to pay the money on his behalf are not doing him a favour.
If he accepts such donations, it will amount to a subtle acceptance of wrongdoing. In other words, an admission of guilt.
Moreover, he would have to declare such donations to Parliament.
All this might indicate an error of judgment on his part and raise questions around his ability to occupy the highest office in the land.
So Nkandla, too, will be business as usual.
The president cannot move to either side from his position.
The year marks parallel beginnings: on the one hand, it marks the beginning of a new calendar year; and on the other, it marks the beginning of the second 20 years of democracy.
It is a rich historical moment with much that can be used to galvanise society towards accelerated transformation.
However, despite this historical fertility, indications are that it will be business as usual.
This is the case because the political leadership is largely focused on the “here and now”.
It is driven by events as an end in themselves, without tying them to some long-term strategic direction.
Enjoy 2015!
*Hlophe is a political analyst. Twitter handle: @Kunjalo
** The views expressed here are not necessarily those of Independent Media.
Sunday Independent