DURBAN - THE ANC’s hope for the “New Dawn” has been dealt a deadly blow after the party was booted out of most of the key municipalities it has been governing in the country since the start of democracy 1994.
After receiving what analysts described as a “vote of no confidence” and a devastating loss of votes in Johannesburg, Ekurhuleni, Tshwane, uMngeni and uMhlathuze metros, analysts have warned of a bleak future for the ruling party before the 2024 general elections.
Political analysts on Tuesday attributed the ANC’s dismal failure to various reasons, including the lack of implementation of its policies, lack of service delivery, backstabbing and factional battles that have led to the demise of the party resulting in it falling from grace.
Independent political analyst and a former career diplomat, Botsang Moiloa, said the ANC had never learnt from the mistakes of the fallen liberation movements on the continent.
“The ANC has governed through patronage, keeping people poor and hungry and, through the money, became corrupt. The party lost its form when it forgot to appease the voter and change people’s lives.
“After the loss of some metros in the 2016 local government elections, the ANC National Executive Committee discussed the loss they had encountered and attributed it to Jacob Zuma. We wait to see what they will say this time around.”
Regarding the factional battles, he said the ANC “clearly failed to manage and underestimated the power of Zuma supporters”.
“They forgot that Zuma commanded strong support in the country. The ruling party also behaved badly when dealing with the issues of the Zulu monarch and failed to unite the Zulu nation when its leadership was needed.”
Political analyst Tessa Dooms said the recent election outcomes were happening under President Cyril Ramaphosa’s watch and drive for the “New Dawn”.
“As a result, voters had decided to stay home because they were unhappy with the direction the party had taken. The ANC got to the point where it had forgotten to assess its policies to assess their performance.
“The voters feel alienated as the party has opted to place factional and internal battles above governance. The ANC needs to reflect and ask if they are still the party of the people as people have begun to walk away from the party.”
Professor Sipho Seepe said it was no surprise that the ANC was losing power.
“The ANC has been given many chances and has failed to take black people out of economic bondage. It was for this reason that its 2017 elective conference adopted radical economic transformation to deal with this failure. But the new leadership elected through the use of money abandoned almost all of the conference resolutions. It behaved as if it gets its orders elsewhere.
“The triumphalist faction has no capacity for reflection. It has mastered the art of deluding itself. Fortunately, South Africans are more discerning. Punishing the ANC is a deliberate and considered act by voters. It is a rejection of what the current leaders stand for. The mainstream would want us to believe otherwise,” Seepe said.
Professor Tumi Senokoane said the ANC had no one but itself to blame and argued that its biggest crime was a failure to liberate the suffering black majority.
“The ANC allowed itself to be manipulated by white interests, ignoring the African black interests. Blacks remain landless, mines are still controlled and benefit a few, there is no intensive programme to intensify industrialisation, unemployment has risen. Above all these, at the local level, electricity and water are very expensive.”
Meanwhile, the ANC in eThekwini awaits its fate on Wednesday as the council will reconvene to elect its mayor and deputy mayor after it was forced to adjourn on Monday following disruptions from ANC supporters who stormed the venue.
Newly-appointed Speaker Thabani Nyawose said he would only disclose to political parties the plans put in place to avoid disruptions. He said he had changed the venue to ensure that no uninvited individuals access the venue.
ANC provincial spokesperson Nhlakanipho Ntombela reassured the public that no ANC councillor would be allowed to disrupt the proceedings.
“It is the responsibility of the municipality to protect the precinct of the meeting, they must answer. Where were the metro police and SAPS when that crowd invaded the venue? The ANC will investigate who those individuals were, where they came from and who transported them to the venue to disrupt the sitting.”
Ntombela said those who had disrupted the sitting were against what the ANC stood for as an organisation.
Daily News