Recent polls by the political think-tank Social Research Foundation (SRF) showed that former president Thabo Mbeki is the most popular figure among the public and the ANC faithful.
His score of 57.5% is much better than President Cyril Ramaphosa’s modest 44.4% and Jacob Zuma’s 28.3%. He is also reasonably popular among all racial groups and this support has risen several percentage points since March’s poll.
Mbeki is arguably much more popular than the rest because of the relative success of his tenure as president and his caustic remarks about the state of the ANC of late.
I have always had a mildly positive view of Mbeki myself and he cuts an intriguing figure. He is urbane, intellectual, technocratic, erudite and did indeed capitalise on the tailwinds (such as China’s stellar growth and the commodity boom in the 2000s) to lower unemployment and boost growth. Disavowing his Marxist leanings (and friends) in policymaking, he embraced a mild form of capitalism. He fired Zuma to prove his bona fides in the fight against corruption.
Yet, he had many serious shortcomings. His ostensible aloofness rendered him unpopular and this evidently played a role in his 2008 recall. Although he is most popular within the ANC now, it was not the case in December 2007. His thin skin when it came to even the slightest criticism of him, as well as his race-hued lens, alienated many whites and the business sector. Above all, the drive to racially transform the State at the expense of merit, set the stage for state capture and the current dismal service delivery.
Eskom’s woes started when he was president. Black economic empowerment (BEE) was certainly not broad-based when he was president. Emphatically, Ramaphosa and Patrice Motsepe benefitted greatly from their political connections to score deals. This created a black capitalist class through state intervention, while failing to empower the masses and create a capable state – scourges that have since persisted.
The redistributionist dogma of today’s ANC had its origins in the Mbeki years and his denialism when it comes to HIV/Aids along with tolerating poor and mediocre cabinet members are enduring blights on his tenure. It is, perhaps, his jabs at the ANC that he helped to create that are redeeming features in the eyes of many older respondents in this new poll. His legacy is a very mixed one and romanticising it is not helpful.
The SRF poll is interesting and useful, but flawed. It compares apples with apples and suffers from presentism and the confines of ANC hegemony. And popularity does not always equal governmental success. Mbeki is now compared to a disappointing and unpopular field, and this conceals his many glaring and pernicious failures. Even with mildly appropriate policies, South Africa as a notable commodity-producer would have had decent growth when Mbeki was president.
Just like we should reimagine the future, so should the past also be pondered anew. Sometimes, it is apt to compare hypothetical apples and pears. What if the ANC and Mbeki never came to power? Or if they simply held slightly different worldviews? What if South Africa was ruled by someone (effective, albeit undemocratic) such as Lee Kuan Yew from Singapore or simply a better party and presidents that prized merit over mediocrity, and education over redistribution? The ANC’s modest and expected earlier achievements in improving service-delivery could have been amplified.
Instead, Mbeki chose to follow the less-successful Malaysia’s example of rearranging racial deckchairs and was so devoted to creating a wealthy black elite that the lack of investment in skills to improve the business of government became a sombre footnote. He did this at a time when it was politically possible to do so, and its full impact (especially in government) would only later be felt when he was no longer in office – especially by the black poor and marginalised.
So, while Mbeki is indeed the most popular political figure in the SRF poll, he is simply the lesser living evil of ANC misrule. His popularity in this survey vis-à-vis other contemporary opposition figures could be ascribed to diverse reasons, such as Mbeki being a president and therefore having a national governance track record. Opposition parties have never had this privilege in South Africa. To be sure, they too should raise the bar and endear themselves to various constituencies to lift their support – rather than simply wait for the ANC to shed support that won’t vote for other parties.
However, Mbeki as the lowest common denominator should not be the yardstick, and at 81 years old, he is unlikely to make a political comeback. Nor should he want to. It’s easier to criticise the mess you created from the sidelines. Political scientist Jeffrey Herbst wrote the following in a Foreign Affairs article in 2005: “As for Mbeki himself, it seems very unlikely that he will change his ways before he leaves power in 2009; the man is too much a product of his own and his party's history.
It will therefore be up to his successor to build on the many positive developments that have occurred in South Africa since 1994, while developing a political approach that goes beyond racial solidarity.” The lesson here is not so much hoping for a better past because it will not change anything. It is to be balanced and candid about it, so that the future may be reimagined and changed. Because governance does matter, and so do we. We deserve more than the best that the ANC has to offer.
Dr Brink is an entrepreneur, business consultant and independent political commentator based in Paarl.
