SA’s gambling Houdini rolls the dice of populism
Even at the best of times, it is difficult when dealing with politicians to sift the wheat from the chaff. At election times, it is well nigh impossible.
For all the political parties, the primary objective in the closing stages of the local government elections of August 3 is now less to win new voters than it is to reassure the faithful and rally the hesitant. For it is only masochists or ideologues who would schlepp to the polls if they thought that the result was a preordained drubbing of the party they support.
That’s why the politicians of all the parties duck and dive, exaggerate and lie, with the goal of getting to polling day with the maximum momentum of favourable publicity and supporter optimism, so as to maximise the turnout of their own voters. At the same time, they will do everything possible to dispirit the supporters of their political foes.
There are limits imposed upon such chicanery and opportunism by decency and tradition. Normally, the president of the nation, while not remaining aloof from the fray, would be careful to ensue that his party political involvement was appropriate to the stature of his office and has within the ambits of his constitutional obligations as head of state.
This is a concept that President Jacob Zuma has always had trouble with. He is not a man for moral and ethical boundaries. In Zumaland, Number One is Zuma, then comes the African National Congress, then comes South Africa and its people.