It’s a far cry from those halcyon days leading up to the first free and democratic elections in South Africa on April 27, 1994.
Perhaps for the first time in centuries, the Cape of Good Hope lived up to its sobriquet – “already a witness to history” – only a few years earlier when Nelson Mandela, hand-in-hand with his then-wife Winnie, captivated the world when he walked from the gates of the Victor Verster Prison in Cape Town a free citizen on February 11, 1990, signifying the most striking symbol of the end of apartheid.
Mandela had been incarcerated for 27 years with his fellow political inmates mostly on Robben Island in their Struggle for freedom, justice and dignity.
Madiba, resplendent in his disarming dignity, sense of duty, reconciliation and forgiveness, midwifed a free South Africa expectant with optimism and hope towards its brave new world.
The birth of the new democratic dispensation was the epitome of Caesarean proportions after centuries of struggle, sacrifice and false dawns.
But the founding fathers of the ANC, way back on January 8, 1912 when its antecedent African Native National Congress was established, too had a tryst with destiny that one day, it would unite all black South Africans and other minorities of colour as one nation under the banner of their inalienable rights, freedoms and justice.
As South Africans marked Freedom Day on Saturday, commemorating the 30th anniversary of their nascent democracy and the nation’s first democratic election, to what extent has the ANC, which has governed the country since the collapse of apartheid, redeemed or honoured the pledge it made to its compatriots and destiny?
Freedom Month, this month, is rightly an exercise in reflection, remembrance and taking stock of the past three decades.
While it is important to learn the lessons of the past, honour our fallen heroes and rejoice in the achievements of President Mandela’s tenure, it is equally important not to dwell too much on those.
The optics and real economy impact of the Zuma state capture and the Ramaphosa cash-in-the-sofa and associated scandals continue to reverberate through the South African body politic. They have affected the cost-of-living and life chances of a generation of South Africans through the cost of lost opportunities; stolen money; misappropriated funds, albeit exacerbated by the pandemic; the supply chain disruptions of the war in Ukraine; and an economic stewardship defined by poor decision-making, chronic corruption, policy inefficacy and indecisiveness, and poor services delivery.
Perhaps it is Lady Destiny tempting fate again, for the country goes to the polls on May 29 in what will be arguably the defining post-democracy general election, unleashing three distinct possibilities: the ANC scrapes through with a thin majority, the ANC loses its absolute majority and is forced into the ignominy of coalition government or, in the most unlikely event, the ANC is ousted and a new opposition alliance is elected.
South Africa and its demographics of 2024 are vastly different to that of 1994. There are some 27.79 million registered voters in South Africa, according to the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC).
Given its young demography, there will be a cohort of first-time voters (above 18) and a coterie of Gen Z or “born-free” voters – those who have never experienced the brutalities and indignity of living under apartheid rule, and those being the first beneficiaries of free health care and housing, and access to water and electricity.
Of the 14 889 candidates registered with the IEC, 1 493 are aged 18 to 29 years and of those, 15 who, at 18 years, are also first-time voters – a token of some pushback against so-called youth voter apathy.
The danger for the ANC is that it may be banking too much on its liberation history, the legacy of apartheid and the meagre gains made since the departure of Madiba from politics. The invoking of the fictional South African Tintswalo, the so-called “democracy’s child”, is backfiring because it is inconsistent with the lived experience of thousands of young people, seemingly bereft of the life chances, opportunities, quality education and jobs promised or envisaged under 30 years of ANC rule.
The Madiba magic is receding, especially among a youth cohort in a hurry. Short of a revisionist narrative, they are starting to question the wisdom and acumen of the political icon of their elders and parents, especially in holding back on negotiations for much greater land rights and wealth distribution.
That may be the views of the disaffected youth associated with some of the radical parties. Others look nearer to home at the ANC’s dismal governance and delivery record nationally and at local government level, especially in the past two decades. They refuse to wait another 30 years for the real economic gains and benefits of freedom and justice that liberation emphatically promised.
Perhaps it is a travesty that the ANC be largely defined by its icon, Mandela. The movement, after all, was born from the clarion call by god-fearing social conservatives “to bring all Africans together as one people to defend their rights and freedoms”.
Schisms and factional fault lines are not the preserve of South African politics. It is in the nature of the beast. Pixley ka Isaka Seme, the ANC founding treasurer, rued at the first Congress in 1912: “We are one people.
These divisions, these jealousies, are the cause of all our woes today.”
It is that same lament that reverberates through the sinews of the 21st century ANC. The spectre of an erstwhile and disgraced president and chair of the ANC, Jacob Zuma, abandoning the party to set up the rival uMkhonto weSizwe Party a few weeks before the general election, and the afront of using the sobriquet of the armed wing of the ANC, and winning a court case for the right to do so, shows to what depth the ANC and South African polity have sunk.
In his public lecture at the University of Johannesburg marking “30 Years Anniversary of Democracy, Partnership and Growth”, earlier this month, Deputy President Shipokosa Paulus Mashatile rightly paid tribute to those who perished and sacrificed in the Struggle against apartheid.
But instead of any sign of contrition at the dire state of the economy, the democratic deficits and the social dissonance in the high crime rate and gender-based violence, his rallying cry was the predictable roll call of what the ANC has “achieved” in the past few years and the incessant narrative of the rhetoric of aspiration.
To twist Miriam Makeba’s immortal words in Soweto Blues, GenZ and the next generation of youth are demanding from the ANC leadership: “Where were you, ANC men, when our youth could not find jobs; when our mothers, sisters and daughters were violently abused; when the rich always get richer and the poor get poorer?”
As for the post-election era, irrespective of who wins, what would the Mother City have in store for the future? We know that choppy waters lie ahead, given the state of the nation. Will the Cape of Good Hope metamorphose into the dreaded Cape of Storms, the bane of seafarers and political wayfarers?
* Parker is a writer based in London
Cape Times