MCEBISI JONAS | South Africa’s road to regeneration

Since last year there have been three important developments that ought to have shifted our perspectives.

First, in October of last year the government of national unity still looked like it might offer a credible path to national unity and effective governance in South Africa. The GNU still represented hope that a democratic centre could be forged.

Today this hope has faded. Instead, national rancour has intensified.

Rather than the presence of a united national executive pursuing a clear programme of change, the GNU appears to be only a fig leaf for the absence of central authority in government. It has been clear for some time that the GNU parties need to agree on a minimum programme and fiscal principles that will ensure an effective coalition for the rest of this “hung” parliament. This is the precondition for an effective government. But the prospects of such an arrangement appear further from view as dysfunction pervades central government.

Part of the reason the GNU cannot agree on a way forward is that the ANC is divided and disjointed. The ANC is not providing credible leadership on critical issues of social and economic policy, nor has it demonstrated any visible path to execution.

This time last year we could have entertained the possibility that the strong message sent by the elections would generate a course correction, a change in direction on the part of the ANC. Instead of producing a wake-up call, however, the last elections have clearly accelerated the party’s decline. The ANC appears more incoherent and divided than ever, and its prospects, both electorally and more generally as an organising force within government and society, appear even dimmer. This situation forces us to rethink the notion of political agency.

International relations have been through one of those moments when decades of change materialise in a week or 10 days. There is a shift towards a new form of globalisation in which fragmentation exists side by side with permanent interdependence. Global relations are shifting as the world economy rebalances away from its historic Western core.

International relations have been through one of those moments when decades of change materialise in a week or 10 days. There is a shift towards a new form of globalisation in which fragmentation exists side by side with permanent interdependence.

Fear and gloom pervade the global outlook. The cause of development, global solidarity and a just climate transition have all suffered historic setbacks. However, seen from the southern tip of Africa, it is clear that beyond the fear and gloom the emergence of a multipolar world presents us with opportunities to assert African interests and break free from old modes of development, trade, investment and solidarity. New spaces for policy experimentation and autonomous development have opened up. New forms of multilateral co-operation and new partnerships for development are on the table.

Unfortunately, these opportunities, and many global threats, are unfolding at a time when our domestic politics and institutions — the ANC and government in particular — face the challenges I have described above. The weakness of the national executive of government, its lack of direction and (quite frankly) openness to capture are alarming in the turbulent global circumstances we face.

Without direction, the democratic movement faces ominous threats. Our own failings are intersecting with the spectre of democratic retreat that is haunting world politics. The idea of “representative democracy” is in crisis, and commitment to constitutionalism is also under strain.

In South Africa, participation in elections peaked at nearly 19-million votes in the 2014 national election. Only 16.3-million votes were cast last year. Remember that the number of people eligible to vote increased between these elections by about 6-million (from 34-million to nearly 40-million).

The collapse in voter support is primarily driven by a dramatic fall in the electoral participation of ANC voters since 2009. In that year, 11.7-million citizens gave their votes to the ANC, but only 6.5-million did so in 2024. The ANC vote has simultaneously fragmented and declined. If one adds the EFF and MKP to the ANC’s tally, their combined total vote in 2024 was 10.3-million, more than a million fewer than 2009.

Voters who have deserted the ANC have, by and large, not turned to other parties. If we look at the fortunes of the DA and its predecessors, these too appear to have reached the limit of their electoral support. The DA peaked at more than 4-million votes in 2009, against only 3.5-million last year, despite the rapid growth of the electorate.

Overwhelmingly, the problem in South Africa is all-round disengagement and nonparticipation in the electoral process. This goes together with other worrying developments: since 2014, the trust and esteem with which South Africans once regarded the institutions of the democratic state have evaporated. A rising number of South Africans — nearly a quarter at the last count — support a shift to military rule or other nondemocratic forms of government.

Alarmingly, research in Europe reveals that supporters of the extreme right and disengaged voters share a common trait. They are both reservoirs of popular preference for authoritarian rule. It is therefore active reactionaries, but also the majority that does not participate in elections, who are the seedbeds of democratic backsliding. But the global attack on democracy and constitutionalism comes from many sources.

In the heartlands of Western Europe and North America, the liberalism of the financial elite has been forced into retreat by the far right, with its toxic mix of cultural reaction and mercantile nationalism. But antidemocratic forces are also on the front foot in the Global South, where authoritarian rule is often based on sectarian, fascist or militaristic ideologies. In Brazil — our close ally in democratic values — the danger of the authoritarian right is by no means defeated.

The forces attacking democracy and constitutionalism globally have their mirror images in South Africa. On the one hand, there is a revival of white nationalism and nostalgia for apartheid. On the other hand, African populists feed off fashionable tropes about colonels in camouflage uniforms. These are sometimes laced with ethnic stacking and chauvinism.

Very quickly, if we squint into the sun at just the right angle, we might see a future for South Africa where authoritarianism and anticonstitutionalism are the prominent ideological brands. This would be a society marked by conflict, rising inequality and stagnation.

Very quickly, if we squint into the sun at just the right angle, we might see a future for South Africa where authoritarianism and anticonstitutionalism are the prominent ideological brands. This would be a society marked by conflict, rising inequality and stagnation.

The most pervasive symptom of this phenomenon is the destruction of our institutions — the steady breakdown in the government-run departments that are meant to serve all of us.

Break down policing, and private security surges.

Break down education, and private schooling surges.

The state retreats, and a small number of businesspeople benefit.

The rest of the population grows poorer, more disenchanted with the government, and is sent further outside the tent of mainstream politics and economy.

We are faced with the choice between compliance and fighting for who we are.

So how do we restore progressive politics? How do we uphold the tenets under which this country was premised? I would suggest four issues that are particularly important to consider as platforms for progressive politics.

First, we have to listen to our people. The social state must be recast as an instrument to protect South African citizens in a context of well-regulated migration. This does not mean abandoning our constitutional obligations to migrants, but it does mean operating a fair system with proper border control and regulation, and that puts citizenship at the core of access to public services.

Second, we need to restore law and order, prevent the wholesale theft and destruction of public infrastructure, and reverse the capture of state organs by criminal syndicates.

The Zondo and Madlanga commissions have shown us how far out of control we have allowed this problem to grow. Unfortunately, we have had to appoint a second commission, even while overlooking the recommendations of the first commission.

Nevertheless, we must insist on the cleaning up of the police service and the intelligence apparatus of the state, and demand the clear separation of the state’s security functions from party politics.

The third element we need as part of a progressive politics is a clear plan for the reform and reconstruction of the state. The Zondo and Madlanga commissions present us with an opportunity to draw clear lines. The so-called “political-administrative interface” has been at the heart of government dysfunction, not only in the police but in the health sector, local government and a range of other public services. The national mood and the state of party politics may create space for decisive reforms that change this dynamic permanently, and create an effective, professional and developmental state.

We have often warned about the criminalisation of politics. Political parties have been the Trojan horses that enabled the capture of the state. Representative party politics has become increasingly criminalised, and criminal networks operate brazenly across the public sector from policing to health care. Building a professional state that operates at arm’s length from policymakers therefore becomes even more imperative. Fighting corruption means creating a new culture and practice of public service that is professional and loyal to the constitution rather than political office bearers. It means mobilising young professionals into government and giving them the autonomy to execute policy and offer advice.

We also need responsive ward councillors, premiers who care, MPs who pick up the phone and members of cabinet who don’t get seduced by the trappings of high office.

The fourth task is reviving the pace of economic growth and transformation. What we need to do in the short term is very well known. All that needs be done, at least for now, is getting the basics right and fixing the obvious problems. Electricity supply, rail and logistics, ports and other economic infrastructure need to be run effectively, and efficiently. The agricultural sector must flourish to create jobs and exports. We must stop the collapse of manufacturing and strengthen our export engines by diversifying into new markets in Africa, Asia and Latin America. We must restore the pace of mining exploration and investment in the critical mineral sectors of the future.

These may all be good ideas but again we return to the critical question of “political agency”. Historically, at least since 1994, the ANC has been able to galvanise society behind a common vision and encompassed the capacity to convene a broad section of society, including sceptics. When we speak of the “broad church”, this included progressive thinkers, activists, technical specialists, workers, religious leaders, traditional leaders and visionaries, all of whom had trust and confidence in the integrity, commitment and ability of the ANC to push through the fundamental change and transformation that South Africa required.

If anyone believes this to still be the case, please visit the first-aid room.

We need to stop experimenting with the politics of extremes and personality politics. We need to shape the politics of pragmatism that focuses on the tenets that are essential to vibrant, vital constitutionalism.

• This is an edited version of a speech delivered at the Kgalema Motlanthe Foundation Inclusive Growth Conference 2025