A great time in politics: President Cyril Ramaphosa has skillfully assembled a broad coalition to maintain the political center. Photo: Buda Mendez/Global Citizen/Getty Images
President Cyril Ramaphosa has long struggled to prevent a split in the ANC, frustrating critics and even allies with compromises to keep the party healthy.
The KwaZulu-Natal Fault in May, when ANC members loyal to Jacob Zuma worked shamelessly to help his Umkhonto Wesizwe (MK) party win 45% of the vote in the province. It finally split along the line. This is more votes than the ANC can muster at the national level. .
This left Ramaphosa with the legacy of leading Africa's oldest and proudest liberation movement to the point where it lost an electoral majority.
The president is no stranger to suffering self-doubt and regret, and came close to resigning six months ago after the Ngcobo Commission recommended that he be impeached over the Phala Parra scandal. Some might have expected similar ruminations to follow after the humiliation of May 29th.
Instead, as the words were displayed on the wall of the National Results Management Centre, Ramaphosa found grace and resolve in defeat.
He told then Chief Justice Raymond Zondo that he really wished his gaffe had not happened in an election year and quipped that the results that were about to be announced were indeed from 15 years ago. By then, his aides were undoubtedly informed of his intention to pursue a coalition that would preserve the political center.
That meant convincing the Democratic Alliance (DA) to come into power on terms favorable not only to Democratic party leaders and donors, but also to ANC skeptics such as Paul Mashatil and Gwede Mantashe.
The skills Mr. Ramaphosa honed over years of negotiating the transfer of power from the apartheid regime came in handy in engineering a process that allowed the MK party and economic freedom fighters to be taken out of the equation.
He even borrowed the term Government of National Unity from the 1994 transition period, although it hardly applies here precisely. The insistence on inviting eight other parties into the coalition is calculated to counter the proposals he has pitched to the DA and reduce the numerical burden on the ANC in the event John Steenhuisen withdraws from the deal. Ta. It's vintage Ramaphosa and was a relatively easy part.
The cabinet appointed by the president on July 1 showed that careful consideration had been taken in allocating portfolios to opposition parties, rather than filling those left to the ANC.
In sending Mr Steenhuisen to agriculture and Siviwe Gwalbe to basic education, Mr Ramaphosa placed them in important policy areas for his party's constituencies while placing the blame on them for his party's past failures. I set it.
With the exception of Parks Tau in the Trade and Industry Department and a few others, his ANC appointments were not very exciting. In the words of one of the president's allies, leaving Pemy Majodina in charge of the water issue was a “disaster” that can only be described as a reward for faithful service in parliament.
There was no good reason to appoint Thembi Simelane as Minister of Justice, and no reason to hesitate for six months to move him aside after the public learned what was by no means a complete secret to the President and his party.
There was an untenable conflict of interest in having ministers with ultimate political responsibility for the National Prosecuting Authority being stakeholders in the same organization.
This casts a cloud over Ramaphosa's coalition government, with International Relations Minister Ronald Lamola and other ministers pitching it to foreign investors as a new start for the country.
And it served as a reminder that the president remains a prisoner of the party he leads, its populist faction, and an ongoing negotiation with reality and integrity.
The interim agreement reached last week to resolve the impasse over the Fundamental Law of Education Amendment Act is a case in point. A breach is not only possible, it was hinted at months ago.
There was no need for President Ramaphosa to suspend the implementation of sections 4 and 5 of the Act. This is because the law cannot be enforced without regulation and budget allocation, both of which impose lead times.
That it took months for the Cabinet Clearinghouse to essentially come to this realization is as much the president's fault as it is the attorney general's office. But he has a bigger responsibility than his predecessor in the opposition. As one analyst recently put it, now is the time for “President Ramaphosa to be the adult in the room and lead the people who want to make this happen.”
History may allow Ramaphosa to fail to salvage the ANC's electoral fortunes even if he were to successfully implement a government of national unity and begin to rebuild the economy.
Barring an early challenge from the deputy prime minister, he has three years left in his term, and ministers close to him have expressed a real sense of urgency to tackle the country's worst ills during the remainder of his final term. He is voicing his concerns.
Mr Ramaphosa is seeking to overcome weaknesses in his cabinet by centralizing more powers in the presidency and expanding the mandate and possibly staff composition of the Vrindlela operational team.
He wisely ignores criticism on this point. The water crisis in particular requires the same determination that ended load reduction.
The president similarly ignores the dignity of his biggest coalition partner, keeps his cabinet stable, and leaves it to his press secretary to badmouth members of Congress who claim credit that isn't their own.
The movement to be effective in the time remaining is also spreading to the international arena, and President Ramaphosa plans to maximize the effectiveness of South Africa's G20 Presidency, which was assumed at the beginning of the month, to strengthen the multilateral cooperation system. It is clear that they intend to use it for reform movements. Horizontal institutions and fairer conditions from international financial institutions for developing countries.
His foreign policy lacks the elegance of Thabo Mbeki's chimerical but seductive vision of an African renaissance. Instead, President Ramaphosa spoke in terms of principled multilateralism and respect for international law, accusing the UN Security Council of failing in its mandate with “disastrous consequences for the African continent and the Global South.” He never missed an opportunity to criticize someone for doing something.
What Ramaphosa achieves in this area will depend largely on how shrewdly he can negotiate with Washington once Donald Trump returns to the White House, and he seems to know it. The head of state has made it a point to invite President Trump to the G20 summit, moving the date up a few days to November 22 and 23 next year so as not to coincide with Thanksgiving.
Mr Ramaphosa's second term in office, particularly since May 29, has been marked by a number of moments of clarity of purpose like this, which were largely absent in his first term.
A continuation of this focused thinking and action during President Ramaphosa's final three years would be welcome. President Ramaphosa will become president and serve the country.
