In the early 2000s a number of analysts predicted a split in the ruling ANC/SACP/Cosatu alliance. This scenario was along the lines that Cosatu and/or the SACP would split to form a new political movement. At Polokwane in December 2007, something very different happened when, instead of splitting from the alliance, the ANC's partners appeared to capture it. But events since the April 2009 election suggest that theirs was a pyrrhic victory and that the split may yet happen.
The reason is that the ‘leftists', as they are inadequately labeled, never really captured the ANC. What actually took place at Polokwane was a palace coup perpetrated by the ANC against their leader. The reasons for the coup revolved mainly around leadership succession in the party. Many in the ANC realised that Thabo Mbeki's authority in the party was directly tied to his control of patronage in the party. Unseating him, despite his widespread unpopularity, would be difficult considering the many vested and financial interests linked to his retaining leadership of the ANC.
Those seeking to dethrone Mr Mbeki therefore came upon the strategy to create a fictional leftist-centrist ideological split in the ANC itself. The alliance's leftist partners, long starved of serious recognition in the alliance, needed no prompting to play their appointed roles. The ANC Youth League, equally maligned under Mr Mbeki, proved just as eager. On key they strode onto South Africa's political stage, shouting all sorts of rhetoric about revolutions and literally waving their bare behinds at those in the party who questioned their behaviour. The Mbeki-ites in the ANC were no match for their rabble rousing. Once the first few Mbeki supporters had crossed to the Zuma camp the dam broke and Jacob Zuma was elected president of the ANC by a majority of six to four.
The rest should have been history, but for the leftist alliance partners not sticking to the script. Post-Polokwane, and led by Zwelinzima Vavi, they continued to shout the odds in the same style that had characterised their earlier statements. The newly appointed Zuma-led ANC hierarchy tolerated this in the knowledge that there was still more than a year to go before the 2009 election. But the cracks in the façade were already visible. A Fast Facts report published by the Institute found no identifiable leftist sympathies in the policy positions of most of the ANC's senior leaders. The Institute issued further statements that macro-economic policy would not change under a supposed future leftist Zuma administration. It also forecast a post electoral fallout within the alliance.
Only a few newspapermen and journalists picked up on these forecasts. For the majority of South Africa's press and its analysts the story of a left-wing coup in the alliance was recycled verbatim over meters of column space until it was universally believed. For the coup leaders in the ANC this media coverage proved a welcome cover for the events that were set to play themselves out after April 2009.
Some of the more tuned-in leaders in the SACP and Cosatu appeared at times to wonder whether all was in fact as it appeared. It is possible that leaders such Mr Vavi were increasingly aware that they were again being played by the ANC. Hence their loud reminders to all who would listen that it was ‘the left' that had recalled Mr Mbeki and it was ‘the left' that would lead future leadership decisions. Even when it became inevitable that Mr Zuma would assume the presidency some of the alliance partners were still going to great lengths to emphasize that they had set the terms and conditions upon which Mr Zuma would lead South Africa. Even on the day of his inauguration it was left to the ANC Youth League to remind Mr Zuma that he was a party deployee and could easily be recalled. If there had been a genuine coming together of minds and ideologies at Polokwane all those warnings would have been unnecessary.
On assuming power, Mr Zuma knew that one of his first priorities had to be the weakening of the same ‘leftist' power base that had carried him to victory in Polokwane. Being a considerably more adept strategist than Mr Mbeki ever was he set about appointing his Cabinet. It proved to be almost twice as big as necessary. While businessmen and many analysts tried to find polite explanations for why the government had chosen such a cumbersome structure to manage its affairs, the truth was obvious. Mr Zuma had in addition to the ‘first cabinet' tasked with running South Africa appointed a ‘second cabinet' of leftists and trade union leaders. These were given duties and responsibilities that amounted to a selection of open ended planning portfolios or poisoned chalices.
The result was to significantly weaken the alliance partners as these, now jointly with the government, would carry responsibility for the consequences of the policy they made. The results have been predictable and perhaps even more impressive than the ANC could ever have supposed. Take an example from this week of the minister of economic development, Ebrahim Patel, who prior to joining the government was perhaps the most effective trade union leader in South Africa. It was left to him to break the news that despite the many election promises of ‘decent work for all' the ANC would for now focus on short-term, poorly-paid, ‘work opportunities'. Or consider the sight sure to play itself out in January 2010 when it will be left to Blade Nzimande, now the minister of higher education, but also a head of the SACP, to explain to protesting poor black students on South Africa's campuses why university fees have been increased.
Even if the alliance partners had not realized it earlier, it is now becoming increasingly clear that they have again been conned by the ANC.
Hence the wide extent and reach of desperate labour and strike action by Cosatu aligned unions. Such action is the last asset in ‘the leftist' arsenal in South Africa. But it is not nearly as formidable a weapon as it once was and the alliance partners know it. Trade union membership today reaches only 3.5 million employees. This makes for only 40% of formal workers and an even smaller proportion of the ANC voter base of 12 million people. Arguing for increases at almost twice the rate of inflation in many sectors is a very short term strategy for unions in a country facing continued shrinkage of GDP growth.
This is also a strategy that has come to embarrass Mr Zuma and his new government. The alliance has become an obstacle standing in the way of the ANC delivering on its election promises of a better life for all. As a result the ANC's patience is waning with its alliance partners as the growing number of recent angry exchanges between ANC and SACP/Cosatu leaders are starting to show.
The tensions are also growing within the SACP and Cosatu. Some leaders and members of those two organizations are now at each other's throats over their roles in the Zuma government. There was the wonderful exchange this week of some ‘leftists' calling critics within their movements ‘ultra-leftists' and arguing for their suspension. What will be left of the left when the ultra-leftists have sought greener pastures is a question that must be on the minds of many in the ANC's alliance partners.
On the minds of the ANC must be another question of what Cosatu and the SACP could possibly do if the ANC shows them the door. Strike? They have already overplayed that card. Mass action? It is unlikely that standing on their own feet Cosatu and the SACP could get such a campaign together without resorting to their usual tactics of violence and intimidation. That is the only concern that the ANC need have in deciding on the fate of its poorer relatives in these two movements. Standing in an election on their own, Cosatu and the SACP would find it tough to beat Helen Zille's DA and would probably follow the example, most recently of COPE, that has been the fate of all movements that have ever stood up against the ANC. It may be wise for the ANC to delay any decision until after the 2010 World Cup to mitigate against the risks that Cosatu and the SACP may disrupt preparations for this event. Thereafter the reasons for dumping Cosatu and the SACP begin to outweigh the reasons for retaining them in the alliance.
[Read the ANC response here]
This article by Frans Cronje, Deputy CEO of the South African Institute of Race Relations, first appeared in SAIRR Today, the Institute's weekly online newsletter.
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