![Given what it [ANC] has done to the South African economy, the defeats this Wednesday will be both just and richly deserved, says the writer.](https://www.sundaytimes.timeslive.co.za/resizer/v2/PLVD6R7M3VOWNOJKAC5XCOJRLI.jpg?auth=02bdd256f434af8dfe49e8023732c93bb23b0c53ac2b0c21df8a32dc45ba676d&width=800&height=533&smart=true)
OK, so there’s a lot at stake on Wednesday. Either the ANC, after ruling the country for 30 years, gets a parliamentary majority or it doesn’t. Just one vote on the right ballot could swing it and the polls are no help. A week out, a daily poll from the Social Research Foundation on a (plausible) 60% turnout had the ANC national vote suddenly falling back to 40.8% after a slow rise to 46.3% a week earlier. By the same measures the DA rose to 27.2% from 23.7%.
Both of those numbers look way out, depending, I suppose, on which party has your loyalty. But it is probably safe to assume now that the ANC won’t manage half the vote. The provincial governments in Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal are certainly lost.
Given what it has done to the South African economy the defeats this Wednesday will be both just and richly deserved. Don’t be even a little bit grateful for the end of load-shedding. Keeping the lights on means Eskom is merely doing its job again. Behind it is a trail of destruction from the Post Office to the air force, the health services and children still drowning in schoolyard pit toilets.
The ANC has had literally dozens of chances and it has almost always chosen the paths of neglect and self-enrichment. It simply has no idea how to run a complex economy. We can’t get rid of it entirely this time around but the process of its eventual death is under way.
The fact that there are no parties even remotely challenging the ANC is a frustration, but we must always temper this with an appreciation for our democracy. It really works. Unlike in Russia or China or Iran, the new international partners the ANC seems to favour, our elections are contested. Theirs are not. Liberal democracy may be an endangered species but we care about our own people. Illiberal democracies abuse their own people. Choiceless elections always leave the winners no choice but to double down the next time. Where people cannot be heard, governments are blind and erratic.
Wednesday is finally an opportunity to give the ANC the fright of its life
By this time next week we will be deep in coalition-building territory but we are unlikely to have much idea what is going on. Former DA federal executive head James Selfe, who tragically passed away at a young age this week, made it clear ahead of the 2019 election that it was vital that during coalition talks absolutely nothing was to be communicated to the public.
You can see his point. You can’t have parties trying to score points after an election by splitting on the recent former opponents they’re talking to. But we can guess a few things. Depending on how badly they do, the ANC will choose different partners. At 48% they are going to scoop up a few one or two MP parties, offer them deputy ministries, and get Cyril Ramaphosa re-elected president.
The first sitting of parliament after the election has to elect a president so time is of the essence. If the ANC has 45% then it will need to talk to the IFP and those smaller parties. At 40%-42% it is going to do its utmost to avoid speaking to the EFF, the DA or Jacob Zuma’s new party, MK. That still leaves it the initial smaller parties, the IFP and elements of DA leader John Steenhuisen’s “moonshot pact” — the FF+, the ACDP, perhaps even one or two of the successful independents, if there are any.
It is also perfectly possible to run the country with a minority government. I doubt the DA would try to bring a government it wasn’t part of down at every opportunity, because that simply triggers another election and more uncertainty.
The key now in any serious coalition discussion should not, anyway, be how many cabinet ministers each party gets. It should be rescuing the National Assembly as the core of our democracy. Let the ANC have all the ministers it wants but no coalition agreement that leaves it the speaker and the chairs of the public accounts and finance standing committees, and the foreign relations, energy and mineral resources portfolio committees, should be considered a success.
The last time a South African government was voted out of power was in 1948 and Wednesday is finally an opportunity to give the ANC the fright of its life. The coalition deals that follow should deliver, in turn, a stiff lesson in accountability, for who can tell how the ANC may react to losing absolute power?
Wednesday promises to be a great day for South Africa. We are a conservative people but change is in the air. That’s nothing to be scared of.
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