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RAMAPHOSA WINS: SOUTH AFRICA’S BLESSED MOMENT

20/12/2017 08:12:00 The Editor

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SOURCE: Peter Bruce
The ANC has miraculously given the country a Get out of Jail Free card.

The thieves and crooks are in trouble, but for the most part we can breathe again. At the end, it seemed it would never end; the company running the African National Congress elections dithered over final numbers, desperate to avoid conflict. But Cyril Ramaphosa came through, defeating Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma by a slender 179 votes. Ramaphosa is the new President of the ANC and unless the combined opposition in Parliament pull their fingers out, he will be the next president of South Africa. In fact, the opposition might not have to wait until the 2019 election to have to start calling him ‘Mr President’ when they attack him. It seems almost impossible that President Jacob Zuma will survive long in office at the Union Buildings. He got some supporters into the Top six, notably Ace Magashule as the new Secretary General. But even though Ramaphosa would have preferred a deputy other than Mpumalanga Premier David ‘DD’ Mabuza, and must have groaned at the return of Jesse Duarte as Deputy Secretary General, they will quickly get behind him.

There is absolutely no mileage in any of them fighting for Zuma to stay in office. Ramaphosa takes the lead of a party at odds with itself but the possibilities for renewal are there. A new national executive committee will defenestrate Zuma just as Zuma’s NEC did to Thabo Mbeki in 2008, after he lost the party race to Zuma in Polokwane 10 years ago. What goes around comes around and with a Ramaphosa rather than a Dlamini-Zuma victory, the ANC is much less likely to split. The Dlamini-Zuma camp was always the more opportunist. For most of its leaders a life outside the party is unimaginable. Ramaphosa, being the gentleman he is, will be torn between making some sort of magnanimous gesture towards her or burying her completely, though that may be easier said than done. The leadership elected around him has some ambitious people in it, not least Mabuza, who appears to have handed victory to Ramaphosa by backing him when it had been widely assumed he was backing Dlamini-Zuma.

It would be a significant break with ANC tradition if Ramaphosa does not make him deputy president of the country whenever he assumes office. Ramaphosa could do that, nevertheless, without much risk to himself until 2023 when the ANC next elects a leader. Ramaphosa has to move quickly. He is by nature a conciliator but he may quickly discover the virtues of total power. The markets cheered his victory with the Rand rising fast and bonds yields falling (that’s good) equally fast. The political calendar though is unrelenting, with the traditional January 8 statement on the anniversary of the ANC’s founding less than a month away. Ramaphosa will have to make a significant statement of policy and intent then and it is less than a month away. Then it is on to the State of the nation address and the budget in February – huge moments for the country as Moody’s, the last remaining big ratings agency not to have downgraded our sovereign debt to junk, waits to give its verdict. Ramaphosa will be desperate to avoid that. He may even call Pravin Gordhan back into the Treasury.

It goes without saying that the moment Zuma goes, Ramaphosa will institute a judicial inquiry into State Capture or a kind of State Capture Truth Commission. The Guptas have been fatally rude about him and arrogant generally about their access to power. That stops now. They prospered under a particular set of circumstances in South Africa, most important of which was Jacob Zuma’s weakness for money. Those circumstances have dwindled for months now and they too are officially over. If I were the Guptas, I’d get out of South Africa immediately. Ramaphosa, despite his incomplete victory, suddenly has great power but he will be judged harshly if he hesitates. The mood of the country is easy to read. It wants justice. A judicial inquiry will spare no-one. Ramaphosa will draw former Public Protector Thuli Madonsela into his administration for a start, and his big test will be who to prosecute once the inquiry is done. Zuma could face imprisonment, Ramaphosa would probably pardon him but he could only do that once he had been found guilty of something. He will institute a process, with the enthusiastic help of the rest of the world, to bring back money stolen under the State Capture project.

The Dlamini-Zuma camp will quickly fall apart. It has no patronage to offer. But the biggest job now, politically, is for the opposition. Once Ramaphosa starts doing what obviously needs to be done, where will it find political space? The Economic Freedom Fighters are vulnerable. Zuma was such an easy target.