The ANC, the historic ruling party in South Africa, meets on Friday to choose its next leader and potential future head of state. But with scandals and a battered economy, the democratic promises of the movement that freed South Africans from apartheid still seem a long way off.
The African National Congress (ANC), in power since 1994, had promised education, water, a roof and a vote to all South Africans, “its historic mission”, regularly remind the elders of Nelson Mandela’s party. .
With unemployment affecting nearly one in five South Africans of working age, growing inequalities and repeated power cuts, faith in the advent of the democratic dream is however largely undermined.
Added to this are cases with hints of corruption involving party members. The latest scandal affects the president himself: Cyril Ramaphosa, 70, is accused of having tried to conceal from the police and the tax authorities the theft of wads of dollars hidden in a sofa in one of his properties. He escaped impeachment this week.
ANC leaders had issued a call and demanded that members “toe the party line” in a vote in parliament on Tuesday, rejecting the procedure with one voice. The impeachment proceedings were rejected by 214 votes, compared to 148 votes in favor and 2 abstentions. But the authoritarian modus operandi is criticized by observers.
“This culture which consists in putting the deputies on track and treating them like cattle to vote is well established” in the ANC, estimates with AFP the political analyst Sandile Swana, who compares the apparatchiks of the party to a “Stalinist clique”.
According to him, the “centralization of power” has increased under ex-president Jacob Zuma. Charismatic and popular leader, he had built an opaque system at the top of the state, masking a vast enterprise of systematic looting of public coffers.
“Betray the Party”
Some voices have been raised against the system. “There are no rules prohibiting the expression of one’s opinion in parliament,” Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, an opponent of Ramaphosa within the ANC, told the media.
She is one of the few voices of the party to have violated the instructions in the Assembly, where each deputy had to vote aloud. Those like her have “betrayed the party”, castigated an ANC executive. They are now threatened with punishment.
“The ANC is struggling to govern a modern society” and wants to “continue to govern as a liberation movement,” said political analyst Ralph Mathekga.
Undermined by internal divisions, the ANC also lacks options. Cyril Ramaphosa, who still enjoys great popularity despite the scandal, acclaimed as a star during his last public appearances, is his best asset for 2024.
The hegemonic party since 1994 has been losing ground at the polls for the past ten years, dropping below 50% for the first time in local elections last year. The specter of a defeat in the general elections haunts him.
The ANC “needs Ramaphosa”, judges Mr. Mathekga. The party “needs it to win”, otherwise it will have no chance in the elections.
“There is a good chance that Ramaphosa will eventually be removed from power, but only by the ANC and when the party decides,” Swana said.
“The ANC is a fundamentally democratic organization. We debate the problems, ”says Tony Yengeni, a veteran of the party. But certain processes “promote divisions and fuel public quarrels”, tarnishing the party’s image a little more, he regrets.