Sibusiso Bakana
Three decades ago, in 1994, South Africa was ushered into a highly contested election with snaking queues and buzzing energy among first-time voters.
Some described the event as their most emotional experience since the military veterans returned to the country with a different weapon, to free the people through the ballot.
Among the major players in the ballot was the Democratic Party, which existed during our bloodbath years of colonialism under different names and became the DA in the democratic phase that was ushered in. The Freedom Front Plus was there too, with the same agenda of colonial perpetration.
The IFP, which was formed in the late 1980s on the instruction of former ANC president Oliver Tambo, to organise then AmaZulu as one of the pillars of the ANC to mobilise the Abantu people of South Africa, and, of course, the mighty ANC was there leading as the beacon of hope.
The ANC never won all the provinces, even when former president Nelson Mandela was the face of the the party in those elections. The KZN and Western Cape were in coalitions, while nationally, the ANC governed with a majority.
This year’s national elections are not that different from three decades ago, except that new kids on the block were introduced in the subsequent years and are the main breakaway parties from the ANC.
And the ANC is unlikely to govern nationally with a majority and with some of the provinces also being lost.
Well, with these observations, from the government of national unity to various provincial coalitions, the ANC and its partners came to an agreement because of the paramount need to stabilise the country through social cohesion.
The country is almost stabilised, which could be an attractive policy that can bring the former friends together if one pulls towards the right and left, while now also considering the new arrivals in the bible ballot.
Surely, it has to be strategic and tactical at the same time compared to just a tactical approach used previously.
With ANC’s policies aligned to the left, one will assume it will look for a verse in the bible ballot that is not far away from its policies and will contribute a great number for its dominance. The EFF and MK Party are among the great contenders for such a coalition, and both might bring a two-thirds majority that the ANC has been yearning for.
But some in the corridors of Luthuli House, mostly sensitive to the market reaction, are pro an ANC-DA deal, despite their policies being at polar ends.
As the EFF and MK Party policies are aligned, they are contesting the same constituencies. Those who see the real freedom coming tomorrow, in the means of economic emancipation and transformation among the black people in general and Africans in particular, the only option is now to merge with the two parties to implement the common policies mentioned. The DA, with its multi-party moonshot strategy established among its like-minded parties before the elections to topple the ANC, the EFF was excluded, and the Mk Party was not known yet.
Strangely, former ANC president Jacob Zuma, as the face of the MK Party, when pronouncing his new endeavours five months ago, maintained as an ANC member, he was doing all this to save the ANC. But will the MK Party be the kingmaker that saves the mighty ANC from its disastrous fall? This election presents a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for the ANC and its like-minded partners, from a policy point of view, to come together to ensure a two-thirds majority.
What an irony as the greatest book also says in Jeremiah 30:17: “I will restore health to you and heal your wounds, because they called you an outcast.”
The outcome of these elections gives the ANC an opportunity to clean house and unite all the breakaway parties back to the glorious movement to strengthen the pursuit of the developmental agenda through a capable state.
* Bakana is a PhD candidate in Artificial Intelligence at Beihang University and the representative of The Diplomatic Society in China. He writes in his personal capacity.
Cape Times