Political parties start preparing for re-election the next day after taking office. Election manifestos are based on what has been achieved. The longer the time an incumbent has to implement their policies, the likelier it is to have tangible results by the next election. Such results, in turn, become the basis of an election message, which also lends credence to the campaign.
In other words, a party can only campaign on that which they have demonstrable evidence. This earns them the trust of the electorate that they’ll fulfil their promises in the next term.
That said, not all that the incumbent has achieved is effective campaign material. New concerns arise, which can easily erode the significance of what the incumbent has achieved.
Take the ANC’s phenomenal record, for instance, on social transformation. Delivery on housing, infrastructure and access to health, just to mention a few areas, is possibly unparalleled in the post-colonial world.
That hasn’t been enough, however, to retain their electoral peak of 69% in 2004.
Rather than remain uncritically grateful to the ANC government, their traditional supporters have increasingly been discontent about lack of employment and rampant corruption. Every credible survey identifies these two issues as uppermost concerns of eligible voters. Service delivery no longer has absolute traction as a campaign message. Instead, voters want to know what politicians have done to fight corruption and create jobs.
Creating jobs is a long-term objective, while malfeasance can be tackled immediately.
I’m saying that the only available route open for the ANC to stem its electoral decline in 2019 is a platform of ethical leadership and renewal.
The credibility of the electoral theme, however, is not established during an election campaign. One needs to prepare the ground for the electoral message to have traction. Eligible voters should be able to verify the message through what they’ve seen happening. Without demonstrable evidence ahead of an election, an electoral message rings hollow and voters dismiss it as opportunistic.
This is even worse where a party suffers from a lack of popular trust, such as the ANC does.
To his credit, Cyril Ramaphosa has correctly predicated his candidature on ethical leadership and renewal.
Speaking at the South African Communist Party’s 14th Congress on July 12,the deputy-president of the ANC said: “There is not a day that passes that we do not gain greater insight into a network of illicit relationships, contracts, deals and appointments designed to benefit just one family, and their associates.
“We know without any shred of uncertainty that billions of rands of public resources have been diverted into the pockets of a few. These are resources that rightly belong to the people of South Africa”.
Ramaphosa reiterated the urgency to institute a judicial commission of inquiry into state capture and also called for the arrest of the culprits and recovery of the stolen state funds.
Ramaphosa’s candidature must now gain substance. This not only depends on arresting culprits and recovering the loot, but also on timing. The judicial inquiry will most probably start in November or December after the Constitutional Court has decided on whom, between the president and Chief Justice, must appoint the judge to lead it.
That leaves about 18 months to the 2019 national elections. This is insufficient time to build the requisite base for Ramaphosa’s electoral message.
To be credible, Ramaphosa’s promise of starting anew must be backed by convictions.
The belief that politicians act with impunity is deeply engrained in our society. Zuma’s evasion of a trial, for instance, has been going on for so long that people doubt that he’ll ever be prosecuted. They even call Jacob Zuma phunyuka bempethe - a Houdini of sort.
But, we’re unlikely to see convictions by the end of next year. The inquiry will only complete its work after June 2018, after which prosecutions will commence, going on for a period of no less than a year before delivering conclusive verdicts of guilt.
That takes us beyond the 2019 election. That’s why Ramaphosa cannot wait until January 2018 for the judicial inquiry to get under way. In the light of this delay, parliamentary probes have a better chance of uncovering wrongdoing quick enough to yield conclusive trials by the 2019 elections.
They’ve already started. It’s possible that Shaun Abrahams will be leaned on not to prosecute, but that will be difficult in the face of irrefutable evidence of corruption and public outcry that will have been generated by public revelations at the parliamentary hearings.
A threat to remove him through a parliamentary process may even add impetus to the prosecutorial process. If Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma wins the ANC presidency, which is also likely, the party faces an even bleaker electoral prospect.
One can’t think of any credible message from Dlamini Zuma that can convince 40% of the electorate to vote for the ANC. Her chief campaigner and ex-husband, Zuma, hasn’t acted against ministers implicated in state capture.
This is despite her party resolving that members who bring the party into disrepute must resign. It’s not surprising given that Zuma himself is refusing to resign. Spawned by a Zuma presidency, what can Dlamini Zuma possibly say that is trustworthy?
Dlamini Zuma’s election campaign will spend most of its time trying to convince the electorate she’s not a Gupta proxy. No party ever wins an election preoccupied with fending off accusations, instead of defining what it stands for. In any case, a possible split, in the wake of Dlamini Zuma winning the ANC presidency, will weaken the party’s campaign in 2019.
Ramaphosa’s supporters will have no reason to remain within a Dlamini Zuma-ANC. She represents the opposite of what they stand for, and her victory would mean the ANC is impervious to reforms. A Dlamini Zuma-ANC in 2019 will be organisationally crippled and morally bereft, making it a perfect candidate for a thorough whipping at the polls.
That’s what has emboldened the SACP to take the historic decision to contest elections independently. They’re preparing to jump ship. But, they’re not fully prepared to mobilise a broad electoral front of progressive forces. Blade Nzimande is not the ideal person to lead the party into that new journey.
His association with Zuma is inescapable, making him come across more as an opportunist critic of Zuma, than a genuine agent for a new beginning.
The new allies he wants to make are unlikely to warm up to him. He crossed swords with some of them while defending Zuma, not long ago.
The party should have elected Solly Mapaila as the new general-secretary instead. Mapaila’s outrage against state capture is easily believable and he enjoys credibility, if not respect, within civil society. He’s the man to lead the party into coalition talks with other organisations.
A serious reconfiguration of the country’s party system is certainly beckoning. Whatever the outcome of the ANC’s elective conference in December, South Africa’s political outlook next year will certainly be different to the preceding year.
* Ndletyana is an associate professor of politics at the University of Johannesburg.
** The views expressed here are not necessarily those of Independent Media.