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Understanding the ‘Zuma Tsunami’
Roger Southall
Jacob Zuma’s defeat of Thabo Mbeki’s bid to serve a third term as the
president of the African National Congress (ANC) at the party’s 52nd National
Conference in Polokwane in December 2007 provoked a torrent of analysis. In
large part, this was because Zuma himself was a highly controversial and con-
tradictory figure. On the one hand, the ANC’s new president was at the time
having to fight against myriad charges of corruption through the courts; on
the other, although highly patriarchal and conservative, he had earned the
backing of the political left within the Tripartite Alliance and, apparently, the
enthusiastic support of many among the poor. This article identifies eight
ways in which the ‘Zuma tsunami’ was represented in the public discourse
in South Africa, identifying their sources, motivations, limitations and over-
laps, and concludes that the confusion around the issue of ‘what Zuma
means’ represents a moment of extreme political fluidity within the ANC.
Introduction
Although South Africa’s constitution limits tenure of office by the country’s president
to two terms, President Thabo Mbeki opted to stand for a third term as the leader of the
ruling African National Congress (ANC) in opposition to Jacob Zuma. The outcome, at
the party’s 52nd National Conference in Polokwane in December 2007, was victory for
the latter, and humiliation for the former. Mbeki, whose term of office was due to
expire at the latest by June 2009, now remained state president while having lost the
confidence of his party. This culminated in his ‘recall’ by the ANC from the presidency
in September 2008 following an opinion delivered in the High Court by Judge Chris-
topher Nicholson that Mbeki had politically interfered with the National Prosecuting
Authority (NPA) and its investigative body, popularly known as the Scorpions, to
ensure the prosecution of Zuma for corruption, fraud and tax evasion. Mbeki was
succeeded as president by Kgalema Motlanthe, elected at Polokwane as party
deputy president, Zuma not wanting to become president until after the forthcoming
election in 2009.
Although the ANC claimed that party tradition did not allow for formal campaigning,
the battle between Mbeki and Zuma had been visceral. The two men were fighting not
only over power, but also over the ANC’s ‘political project’, Zuma drawing much of
his popular backing from the ANC’s allies, the Congress of South African Trade
Unions (COSATU) and the South African Communist Party (SACP), which had long
registered objection from the left towards Mbeki’s pro-market economic strategy.
Zuma was also fighting to stay out of jail because for a considerable period he had
been fending off attempts by the NPA to prosecute him. These had come to a head
in September 2005 when it was indicated in the High Court that he had been in
CREA421246 Techset Composition Ltd, Salisbury, U.K. 8/24/2009
ISSN 0305-6244 Print, 1740-1720 Online/09/121317-17
DOI: 10.1080/03056240903210739
Review of African Political Economy No. 121:317-333
#ROAPE Publications Ltd., 2009
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a corrupt relationship with Mo Shaik, upon whom he was financially dependent, and
whom Judge Hilary Squires proceeded to convict upon charges of corruption relating
to the arms deal which the government had concluded with European arms compa-
nies in 1998. Mbeki proclaimed this situation as one which required him to ‘recall’
Zuma, then deputy president, from his state office.
Mbeki was widely hailed as striking a blow for constitutional propriety. Yet Zuma’s
dismissal was far from being unanimously popular. Within days the ANC’s National
Working Committee was to slap Mbeki down by confirming Zuma as party deputy
president. Nonetheless, the NPA launched a high profile campaign to pursue Zuma
through the courts, only for his lawyers to throw up one legal obstacle after another
to moves to bring their client to trial. Zuma also received the vigorous support of
the party’s left, notably COSATU, whose secretary-general, Zwelinzima Vavi, had pro-
nounced previously that efforts to stop Zuma from succeeding Mbeki as president of
South Africa would be ‘like trying to fight against the big wave of the tsunami’ (Mail &
Guardian Online, 7 March 2005).
Central to the left’s campaign was that the NPA’s attempts to prosecute Zuma were
politically motivated. When Judge Nicholson backed this allegation in September
2008, the Zuma camp was triumphant. Zuma himself proclaimed that Mbeki should
see out his second term, but the forces behind him were less conciliatory. Although
the ANC’s National Executive Committee (NEC) was divided, the majority that the
Zuma camp had enjoyed on that body since Polokwane decided that Mbeki should
be ‘recalled’ from the presidency.
The NEC was following the line that the party had ‘deployed’ Mbeki to the presidency
and therefore had the right to recall him, although it recognised that constitutionally
only Parliament had the authority to end a president’s tenure of office before its
legally constituted end – either by passing a vote of confidence, requiring a simple
majority (which would necessitate the calling of a general election), or by a complex
process of impeachment. Mbeki could have challenged the ANC to a battle in parlia-
ment. However, either steeped in the ways of the ANC, or reluctant to risk humiliation,
he acceded to the NEC’s instruction.
Even as spare an outline of the political drama as the above is likely to be contested.
Certainly, there is widespread agreement that Zuma’s ascent represents a watershed
in South African democracy. In particular, Mbeki’s dismissal triggered a significant
defection from the ANC of those either loyal to Mbeki or offended by Zuma, and
their formation of a new party, the Congress of the People (COPE), which sought to
pose a significant electoral challenge to the ruling party. Nonetheless, apart from
such generalities, there is a remarkable diversity of opinion about how Zuma’s rise
should be interpreted. This article is therefore devoted to identifying alternative
interpretations of the ‘Zuma tsunami’, the extent to which they are compatible and
the extent to which they clash.
Interpretations of the ‘Zuma Tsunami’
Any interpretation of the ‘Zuma tsunami’ is perilous. Considered academic assess-
ments are few, in contrast to a mega-flow of media analysis. Nonetheless, some
eight perspectives appear to have taken root, some striking out clearly along branches
of their own, others distinctive yet intimately entangled.
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The Overthrow of Mbeki as a Restoration of Democracy
The first interpretation celebrates the triumph of South Africa in dispensing with a
sitting president through political rather than unconstitutional means. At one level,
this is located in a comparative African framework, contrasting Mbeki’s fall with
the obduracy of Kibaki in Kenya and Mugabe in Zimbabwe, both of whom clung to
power in 2008 in the face of adverse elections (Southall 2008a). At another, it points
to the saliency of the constitution, not least in the manner in which the fate of
Mbeki was significantly determined by the courts (Southall 2008b).
The perspective is sustained by two further dimensions. First, there is the insightful
portrayal of Mbeki’s end as constituting a political and a personal tragedy. This interpret-
ation is most stronglyassociated with Mark Gevisser, who has suggested that in updating
his biography of Mbeki (Gevisser 2007), he will be writing ‘a fifth act, perhaps of a
Shakespearean tragedy, in which a courageous and very brilliant man has been unable
to overcome his fatal flaws’. Q1Mbeki had come to the presidency with a mission ofmoder-
nising both South Africa and the ANC. Furthermore, he had come to believe that a Zuma
presidency would be disastrous, and that it was his duty to stop it. Yet in his psychological
insecurities he had alienated many within the ANC, and surrounded himself with
sycophantswho had weaved together an‘edifice of bad intelligence’ that glued denialism
together. He had therefore ignored the signs that, in the build-up to Polokwane, it was
time for him to go. ‘Not only because he saw himself as a king ... but [because] the
ANC had made him into a king, ... the only way to move on was by decapitating him’
(Star, 22 February 2008). Polokwane thus constituted ‘a regicide’ (Gevisser 2008a).
For Mbeki, there was a large element of personal hurt because the ANC had been the
only family he had ever really had. At Polokwane, he was to feel that he had not only
been fired, but ‘cast out’ (Gevisser 2008a). Hence when he was ‘recalled’ from the pre-
sidency, his resignation speech proclaimed his dismay that he had been treated in
an undignified manner not befitting the traditions of the political family he knew
(Gevisser 2008b). There was also irony, for unlike his hero Coriolanus, who after his
banishment from Rome had raised an army to vanquish his enemies, Mbeki would
never want to be remembered for having collapsed ‘the old struggle hegemony’ of
the ANC. However, his authoritarian rule had done precisely that, and had created
the conditions for the emergence of COPE, presenting a real choice other than the
ANC for the majority of black voters.
The second dimension, proffered most strongly from within the Zuma camp, stresses
the freedom that has come from the overthrow of a dictator. Not many would go as far
as Malegapuru Makgoba, the erratic vice-chancellor of the University of KwaZulu-
Natal, who has condemned Mbeki as no better than Idi Amin, Robert Mugabe and
Mobutu Sese Seko (Sunday Independent, 13 July 2008). Nonetheless, they exult in the
idea of the restoration of internal democracy within the ANC. Gevisser (2008a) cites
Cyril Ramaphosa, notoriously sidelined by Mbeki, as proclaiming Polokwane ‘a
breath of fresh air’. Equally, struggle veteran Mac Maharaj has presented Polokwane
as having ‘breathed life’ into South African politics. Bystanders were transformed into
participants, fear was gone and people were now saying what they liked. For his part,
Zuma was a victim of Mbeki’s machinations and ‘a symbol of those who felt margin-
alised and isolated’ (Star, 22 February 2008).
Polokwane is also presented as a return to the more open ANC of Mandela. For
Ngoako Ramatlhodi (former premier of Limpopo), the move away from this
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halcyon state was orchestrated by Mbeki, finding its most vicious expression in the
open attack made upon the movement’s iconic former president at a meeting of the
NEC in 2002, at which Mandela had complained about fear pervading the party.
Those who had attacked Mandela had been genuinely fearful of Mbeki, who ‘had
become larger than the movement’. Eventually, ‘it had become our revolutionary
duty to defend the revolution’ (Ramatlhodi 2008).
The problem with such approaches is that they miss so much out: Gevisser’s focus
upon the person of Mbeki subordinates the wider context, while the latter approach
is too partial. For example, while Ramaphosa has long standing grievances against
Mbeki, Maharaj and Ramatlhodi have themselves received the attention of the
National Prosecuting Authority concerning allegations of corruption. In other
words, while Mbeki’s overthrow may indeed herald ‘a second transition’ (Gevisser
2008a), the motive forces behind it appear to be more ambiguous than this interpret-
ation suggests. However, the article now turns to a related narrative which, if not
heroic, is at least cautiously optimistic.
The Tsunami as Rebellion from Below Led by COSATU
and the SACP
A second perspective views the overthrow of Mbeki as principally a triumph of the
poor and dispossessed, specifically via mobilisation of support for Zuma within
ANC structures by COSATU and the SACP. From this standpoint, the organised left
has not only asserted itself but stands to exert significant influence upon a Zuma Gov-
ernment in favour of a more collectivist, pro-poor programme.
The argument has been most unambiguously put forward by Webster, who has
depicted COSATU and the SACP as ‘the elephant in the room’ at Polokwane, exerting
a determining influence over events, but never formally visible. ‘Neither had voting
rights, but both organisations were at the centre of the challenge’ (Webster 2008,
p. 7), both having felt marginalised within the Alliance from as far back as 1996.
Webster locates COSATU and the SACP as having placed themselves at the head of
a rebellion from below. It was through Zuma, who had proved able to articulate mul-
tiple and often contradictory leanings that appealed to a range of groupings, that a
social movement of the excluded had expressed their shared sense of moral indigna-
tion about the neoliberal modernisation project of Mbeki.
Depth to Webster’s argument has been provided by Ceruti (2008), who identifies three
nodes of support behind Zuma. The first features an ethnic dimension, revealed by a
survey of Zuma supporters in Soweto, whereby support for Zuma was strongest
amongst people whose mother-tongue was either Zulu or Ndebele (Ceruti 2007,
p. 47). The second revolved around a sense of exclusion that came to a head prior to
the local government elections of 2005, when township residents all over South
Africa took to the streets in protest against failures of service delivery (Ceruti 2008,
p. 110), and translated into pressure upon ANC local councillors. The third challenge
came from the unions, which were bearing the burdens of retrenchments, unemploy-
ment and wage restraint, expressed by a COSATU stay away from work by 2 million
people in June 2005. This was preceded by 14 days by Zuma’s dismissal as deputy pre-
sident. ‘Vavi perceived the suspension as a direct attack on the unions’, and although
Zuma’s worker credentials were thin, when COSATU highlighted him as another of
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Mbeki’s victims, his name became synonymous ‘with the imagery of resistance to
inequality’ (Ceruti 2008, p. 111).
COSATU’s strategy has been further analysed by Sikwebu (2007), who traces how the
federation campaigned to influence the outcome of Polokwane from the time of its
own national congress in September 2006. At that occasion, having recorded that
the ANC had shifted from an earlier working-class bias ‘as adopted in its Morogoro
Congress in 1969’, COSATU resolved that Polokwane presented an opportunity for
the working class to reassert its leadership of the National Democratic Revolution
(NDR). This required first developing a programme to unite the liberation movement;
and second, identifying an ANC leadership that could best pursue the interests of the
working class. Thereafter, and notably around the ANC’s policy conference in June
2007, COSATU produced detailed responses to draft ANC documents, and dispersed
these to its members to promote in ANC branches. These featured a return to the
demands of the Freedom Charter, an end to commodified service delivery, and pro-
grammes aimed at ending unemployment and poverty. In addition, they demanded
that a political centre drawn from the ANC, COSATU and the SACP should determine
policy and deployment to government and the state.
Sikwebu, writing before Polokwane, was uncertain as to the outcome, yet was doubt-
ful as to its long-term viability. In particular, he claims that COSATU has failed to
develop an understanding of the role of political parties in post-independence situ-
ations. Rather than adopting policies that would significantly empower voters and
democratic institutions, COSATU opted for resolutions that would work to reinforce
the status of the ANC as a ‘cartel party’ whose principal role after 1994 had been to
manage voter expectations and pass policy making to regulatory bodies insulated
from the electorate. In short, Sikwebu implied that COSATU’s capturing control of
the ANC would change little or nothing.
In contrast, Webster, while acknowledging dangers of populism, suggests that Polok-
wane opens up the possibility of greater social inclusion and popular participation.
His optimism has in some measure been endorsed by Butler (2008), who interprets
Polokwane as the ‘second communist coup’ of the post-apartheid ANC. The first, in
1991, had seen the edging out of a hard-line exile faction in control of the organisation
by a new left axis, comprising leaders of COSATU and the United Democratic Front
with certain exile cadres from the SACP. The successes of the left axis included the
National Union of Mineworkers’ Cyril Ramaphosa’s election as Secretary-General of
the ANC, and the ousting of Mbeki from centrality in the transitional negotiation
process. However, the exile right reconstituted its hold on power through new alli-
ances with internal conservatives, while Mbeki’s rise marginalised popular constitu-
encies and instituted a sharp division between ‘insiders’ and ‘outsiders’. It was the
latter who linked up with wider constituencies, inclusive latterly of the former
Mbeki ally Jacob Zuma, to achieve the triumph of the left at Polokwane. Thus it was
that this ‘second communist coup’ saved the ANC from itself, from the exclusive
authoritarian tendencies of Mbeki. Even so, Butler presents the left’s triumph as
ironic, for rather than launching South Africa upon a path to socialism, historians
are likely to look back at Polokwane as having rescued liberal democracy.
This second perspective as a democratic thrust headed by COSATU and the SACP
offers considerable historical and sociological insight. However, it is lacking in at
least three regards. First, it provides little in the way of evidence of how COSATU
and the SACP managed to secure control of the ANC on the ground. While it is
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assumed that militants battled their way into office from the ANC branch level
upwards, we as yet await detailed case studies. Second, there is something of an
unwarranted assumption of COSATU and SACP internal unity, when it seems that
there was considerable dissonance within both organisations. Third, there is a
failure to elaborate the actual relationship between COSATU and SACP, rendering
their distinct roles in the making of the tsunami opaque.
The Tsunami as a Communist Putsch
This next perspective constitutes a right-wing variant of the preceding one, distin-
guished by its assertion of the role of the SACP. Thus according to Ken Owen
(2008a), Polokwane saw ‘2,300 disciplined cadres organised mainly by COSATU and
the SA Communist Party’ impose a party oligarchy upon the country. ‘Henceforth,
policy was to be set, and political control exercised, by 80 apparatchiks meeting in
secret conclave’, even though they still needed Zuma ‘naive and pliable’, to head
the government. Polokwane was thus
a putsch in which a gang of communists and criminals imposed on the country an overween-
ing vanguard party ...the SA Communist Party’s long-planned “second stage of revolution”
is now close to being accomplished. (Owen 2008b)
This takeover features the closure rather than re-establishment of internal democracy
within the ruling party, for the communists ‘have succeeded beyond their wildest
dreams in embedding themselves in the innards of the ANC’, with Gwede Mantashe,
the SACP chairman, now running the day-to-day affairs of the ANC as Secretary-
General, Blade Nzimande, SACP Secretary-General, sitting on the ANC’s highest
decision-making body and destined for greater influence, and Ncumisa Nkondlo,
another SACP stalwart, appointed as chairman of the ANC caucus in parliament. In
short, the SACP has now regained the influence over the ANC that it had in exile:
‘Not since Militant Tendency tried to take over the British Labour Party has this sort
of entryism been so successful’ (Mthombothi 2008a). In other words, ‘The Zanuifica-
tion of the ANC is complete’ (Mthombothi 2008b).
The ‘communist takeover’ is seen as having two major implications. First, it is viewed
as presenting threats to the constitution. The most immediate issue post-Polokwane
was whether there was to be just one (the ANC) or two (the party and the state)
‘centres of power’, the substantive issue being whether Mbeki, as president, retained
autonomy, or whether he had to take instructions from Luthuli House, the ANC’s
headquarters. His ‘recall’ from the presidency was, by this token, evidence of the
party having imposed its supremacy, with Motlanthe replacing Mbeki as ‘just
another poodle’ (Mthombothi 2008b). Inherent in this interpretation was the notion
that the ANC had vanquished the supremacy of parliament, with the ANC caucus
simply processing instructions from the top (this ignoring the fact that government
leaders in parliamentary systems who lose their parties customarily resign without
taking their fate to the legislature). Meanwhile, the putsch thesis also fed into wider
concerns that the post-Polokwane ANC was determined to go to anti-democratic
lengths to protect Zuma from prosecution.
The second fear was that the ‘putsch’ would lead to ‘a sharp turn to the left’, notably
by increasing state intervention in the economy and undermining Mbeki’s fiscal disci-
pline. Although it was recognised that, as president, global pressures would force Zuma
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to perform a balancing act between conservative and radical positions within the ANC
(for support for Mbeki’s macro-economic caution had not melted away), ‘Nzimande’s
and Mantashe’s influential roles’ would now be in ‘stark contrast with their virtual
isolation from the levers of power under Mbeki’s presidency’ (Naidoo 2008).
COSATU and SACP were seen as attempting to formalise their greater influence
through their conclusion of an ‘alliance pact’ backed up by their direct ex-officio rep-
resentation on the ANC’s NEC where they would not be bound by ANC decisions. In
addition, both bodies would put up individuals for the ANC’s election list who, after
election, would be accountable first to COSATU and the SACP, and only after that to
the ANC (Paton 2008a). Zuma had become a ‘prisoner’ of the left (Mothombothi 2008c).
The problem with such analyses was that they were based upon conjecture. Indeed
they were to be contradicted by Mantashe himself, who was reported as insisting
that the ANC, not the Alliance, would remain the centre of power. In any case,
COSATU and the SACP would be limited to sharing only 20 per cent of the places
on the ANC’s election lists with bodies such as the Youth and Women’s Leagues.
Clearly, analysis of the actual extent of left influence within the Zuma ANC cannot
be presumed by the mere presence of COSATU and SACP personnel in high places.
Even so, for all its exaggeration, the ‘communist putsch’ does raise legitimate ques-
tions about the relationship between the SACP and COSATU, and their role in
making the tsunami. In addition, it also demands clearer specification of their relation-
ships with other elements of the pro-Zuma coalition.
The Tsunami as a ‘Coalition of the Aggrieved’
The ANC has always been conceived of as a ‘broad church’ spanning the different
classes among the racially oppressed in league with other elements committed to
non-racial democracy. Within this context, party documentation pays obeisance to
the leading role within the NDR of the black, especially African, working class, yet
care is taken, nonetheless, to promote the idea of the ANC as ‘a home for all’. It is there-
fore unsurprising that, while the tsunami can be presented as a ‘revolt from below’, it
can also be portrayed as a ‘coalition of the aggrieved’. From this perspective, there is a
significant sense in which Mbeki brought his fall upon himself. At one level, his
‘responsible’ economic policies were never going to appeal to the left and the poor.
More particularly, his rule had consistently alienated his power base: ‘He isolated
various powerful individuals to the point of victimisation; insisted on appointing pre-
miers and directors-general from the centre; and refused to reshuffle his cabinet, thus
shutting out new blood and sheltering incompetence’, as well as treating backbench
ANC MPs as ‘voting cattle’ (Financial Mail, 26 September 2008). In consequence, ambi-
tious ANC members who remained outside his favoured circle looked around for
other avenues of advancement. No wonder that they congregated around Zuma in
a loose coalition for deposing Mbeki!
As already noted, COSATU and the SACP are consistently viewed as the leading
elements of the Zuma coalition. But Gumede (2008) identifies three other groups as
crucial. First, the ANC Youth League; second, pro-Zuma black economic empower-
ment (BEE) oligarchs hoping to secure future patronage; and third, ANC leaders
under investigation for corruption who hope that if Zuma’s case is quashed, theirs
will be too. Friedman (2008) throws in for good measure ‘part of the KwaZulu-
Natal ANC elite, former intelligence operatives who served under [Zuma], and
politicians who were sidelined by Mbeki’. Diverse elements can also be added, such
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as veterans of Umhonto we Sizwe, and the new leadership of the ANC’s Women’s
League. Suffice it here to focus upon the three groups identified by Gumede.
Traditionally the ANCYL has modelled itself upon the Young Lions of 1948 who
replaced the then conservative ANC leadership with the radical generation of
Tambo and Mandela. They are therefore regularly presented as ‘king-makers’ in any
change of national ANC leadership, their leaning being towards the most ‘militant’
and ‘revolutionary’ candidates. Consequently, in the build up to the ANCYL national
conference in April 2008, the Youth League was viewed as being divided between not
Mbeki vs. Zuma factions, but two pro-Zuma factions, the one being more stridently
behind him than the other. The so-called Mbalula faction, named after outgoing pre-
sident Fikile Mbalula, wanted the organisation’s provincial secretary, Julius Malema,
to assume the leadership; the alternative Zikalala group, named after the outgoing sec-
retary-general, wanted the league’s national organiser, Saki Mofokeng. The latter
group was said to be more diverse, and to include people who ranged from those
who supported Mbeki’s bid for a third term to business people (the ANC’s definition
of youth extending up to 30 years of age). Ultimately, it was Malema who emerged as
victorious and whose slate achieved a clean sweep-out of Mbeki supporters from the
League’s national executive (Mail & Guardian, 20 – 27 March, 4– 10 April, 4–10 July
2008). Subsequently, Malema was to repay the refusal of Luthuli House to re-run
the elections (following protests about irregularities by the losing faction) by the mili-
tance of his pro-Zuma statements. Whilst attracting outraged comment from the
media and various established figures within the ANC, Malema is said to be
popular with working class (The Weekender, 22– 23 November 2008). Malema has
also played a key role in forging linkages with, notably, MK Military Veterans.
Mbeki is celebrated as the principal champion of BEE, yet Zuma has attracted signifi-
cant support from this constituency. To understand this, it is necessary to appreciate
that black business is by no means homogeneous, being made up of large-scale
moguls and more modest entrepreneurs, and those with closer and more distant
ties to the ANC. It is therefore important to be wary of blanket statements that a
Zuma presidency will see one set of business people who are at present politically con-
nected replaced by those with better contacts with the new ANC leadership (Johwa
2008). Although this has a kernel of truth, it proffers too sharp a distinction between
‘ins’ and ‘outs’. Business typically displays a willingness to deal with the ruling
powers whoever they may be. Today, there is evidence that black moguls who rose
to prominence under Mbeki are switching their support to Zuma. Principal amongst
these is Tokyo Sexwale, chairman of the major mining company Mvelaphanda Hold-
ings. Prior to Polokwane, Sexwale had thrown his hat into the ring, hoping to emerge
as a compromise candidate for the leadership.
When this bid failed, he switched his support to Zuma. Other openly pro-Zuma
moguls include Johnny Copelyn and Marcel Golding of the multi-billion rand trade
union investment company Hoskens Consolidated Investments, while co-funding of
the ANCYL conference by Patrice Motsepe, chairman of African Rainbow Minerals,
with Sexwale (and others) suggests someone keen to sustain his political credentials
(Paton 2008b, Mail & Guardian, 19 – 25 May 2008).
There are four other overlapping groups. First, there are those businesspersons who
have always been close to Zuma, some of them (such as Don Mkhwananzi, a key
player in the Black Management Forum and Sandile Zungu, Chairman of Zungu
Investments) who have their roots in KwaZulu-Natal soil. Second, there are some
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who, although having initially prospered during the Mbeki era, subsequently found
themselves excluded from the circle securing government-related deals. These
include Jayendra Naidoo and Jay Naidoo, former trade unionists who distanced them-
selves from GEAR (the latter having previously held ministerial responsibility for the
implementation of the RDP). They had gone on to form the J&J group, a broad-based
empowerment group, which in 2005 had lost out on the purchase of 15 per cent of
Telkom when US and Malaysian shareholders sold their stake to a consortium
packed with ANC heavyweights. Sandile Zungu similarly lost out when Transnet
backed out of a deal to sell its large holding of shares in MTN to a consortium of
which he was a member. Third, there are those who, while having done well
enough without close connections to government, felt disadvantaged by the Mbeki-
era pecking order (Paton 2008b). Fourth, Zuma is reaching out to the Indian business
community, with Vivian Reddy, a Durban-based tycoon with major interests in
casinos and shopping malls, a key financial backer (Business Day, 9 March 2008).
Collectively, these groups constitute formidable business backing for Zuma,
expressed by significant financial backing for the ANC election campaign: R30
million was raised at a dinner in Johannesburg and R11 million from local business
in a Zuma tour of the Northern Cape (Business Day, 6 November 2008, Star,17
November 2008).
Gumede’s third major group is that of the criminal and corrupt. He would seem to
be pointing to a number of the post-Polokwane ANC NEC who have had serious
criminal convictions upheld against them (Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, Tony
Yengeni), inclusive of the notorious ‘Travelgate’ scam whereby MPs defrauded the
parliamentary travel scheme (Ruth Bhengu, Ndleleni Duma). Others are under inves-
tigation for criminal acts, some of these for alleged involvement in tendering scams
(Ngoako Ramathlodi, Angie Motsheka, Sibongile Manana) (Mail & Guardian,18–25
January 2008). While it is difficult to argue that Zuma is any more inclined to
cohabit with the morally dubious than Mbeki (who, notoriously, shielded Chief of
Police Jackie Selebi from investigation for apparent linkages to organised crime),
this category nonetheless poses awkward questions about the moral character of a
new party leadership headed by an individual who was facing some 783 criminal
charges involving fraud, corruption and racketeering. It would seem to suggest
that the Zuma-led ANC is unlikely to move beyond the decline in its financial
probity which was openly deplored by Motlanthe when still general secretary
(Southall 2008c).
Overall, the notion of the ‘coalition of the aggrieved’ argues a more politically fluid
backing behind Zuma than those interpretations highlighting the primacy of the left.
From this perspective, the coalition is not merely disparate but incoherent, united
less in policy terms than in its desire to get rid of Mbeki. While Zuma is perceived as
performing a balancing act, he is also seen as the glue holding the alliance together.
The Tsunami as Populist
The notion of the Zuma tsunami as ‘populist’ is characterised first by suggestions of a
personality cult around Zuma, his appeal to the poor, and his efforts to appeal simul-
taneously to diverse elements of the population, regardless of contradictions this
might embody; and second, by concerns that the mobilisation of support behind
him holds inherent dangers to constitutionalism and democracy. As this second
thrust suggests, the use of the term ‘populist’ is overwhelmingly negative in its
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connotations, implying that those susceptible to populism are driven by emotion,
attracted by demagogic promises that are unlikely to be fulfilled. From this perspec-
tive, populism is not only likely to serve as a ploy by manipulative elites, but also
likely to veer off in a politically authoritarian direction (Sitas 2008). Q2
The ‘populist’ approach builds upon the notion of a coalition of ‘the aggrieved’, yet
emphasises Zuma’s capacity to breach the gap between ANC elites and the poor
that opened up under Mbeki. In part, this is ascribed to the marked contrast in style
and personality of the two men. Mbeki is portrayed as intellectual, aloof, uncomforta-
ble in anything but a dark suit, and awkward amongst ordinary people. In contrast,
Zuma is presented as ‘charismatic’, open, uncomplicated and as happy in a leopard
skin as in the trappings of the elite. While Mbeki aspires to being ‘pan-African’,
Zuma, the polygamist, is more uncomplicatedly ‘African’. Zuma is also viewed as a
master of political theatre which appeals to ‘the masses’, his rallies a colourful
mixture of homilies, parables, dancing and song.
Furthermore, Zuma is presented as appealing to diverse constituencies. At one level,
this is viewed positively. In contrast with their perceived political exclusion under
Mbeki, Zuma is celebrated for his courting of Afrikaners and poor white people. Simi-
larly, his direct appeals to African indigenous churches are seen as seeking conserva-
tive backing to counter the left. Against this, he is also portrayed as both a ‘chameleon’
and not fully in control of his own coalition: Zuma, ‘has neither the finesse to pretend
that he has any principles, nor the Machiavellian understanding – necessary in any
cynical politician – that insincerity can only be sustained by consistency’. In short,
‘he’s an empty shell, an opportunist. ... prepared to do or say whatever his minders
or paymasters [i.e. the left] want him to’ (Financial Mail, 7 March 2008). Such a man,
not surprisingly, now heads a party which is ‘fast sinking into a morass of sycophancy,
cultism, populism and hooliganism’ (du Preez 2008).
Such analysis rests heavily upon the notion of the collapse of the values of the ‘old
ANC’. Traditionally, the strength of the party was that it had been able to hold populist
tendencies in check (Paton and Mabanga 2008, p. 34). However, Zuma’s ascendancy
has opened Pandora’s box, giving rise to a style and content of politics which is not
merely vulgar and disrespectful of party traditions, but explicitly dangerous to democ-
racy and the constitution. Encouraged by Zuma’s praise song Lethu Mshini Wami
(‘Bring me my machine gun’), this most notoriously surfaced in statements by both
Youth League and COSATU leaders, notably Malema and Vavi, that they would
‘kill for Zuma’. Even if merely a metaphor, these were widely deemed politically irre-
sponsible. Yet most concern has been aroused by attacks launched by leading
members of the ANC against the judiciary following adverse judgements against
Zuma, the most notorious of which was Mantashe’s labelling members of the Consti-
tutional Court ‘counter-revolutionary’ (a slogan backed up by similar statements by
the ANCYL, SACP and COSATU) (e.g. Louw 2008). For all that the resulting uproar
propelled Mantashe and others to claim misquotation, such statements were widely
viewed as evidence of the ANC’s preparedness to go to unwarranted lengths to
protect Zuma from prosecution, as well as of its disrespect for the constitution. With
Mbeki’s rule having already promoted the dominance of party over the state, the
prospects under Zuma are now seen as ‘truly frightening’ (Leon 2008). Meanwhile,
Zuma himself has done nothing to quell such fears by making statements which, in
appealing to conservative audiences regarding capital punishment, homosexuals
and curbing youthful sexual behaviour, appear to contradict the values of the
constitution.
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Ultimately, the overwhelming concern about ANC populism is that it will reap a pol-
itical whirlwind (Sparks 2008). This fear has been expressed most potently by Nobel
Laureate Nadine Gordimer:
To me, Zuma is the ultimate dangerous politician. When you hear him ranting and calling for
his machine gun, I think of Hitler in the Munich beer hall. We have all these poor, unemployed
people and someone who promises you the moon. You believe him because there is nothing else
to believe. Perhaps if he reaches office, Zuma will have learned things. He is a clever man. But
then, the Germans had great intellect and they swallowed Nazism (cited by Bills 2008).
Predictions of the relapse of South Africa into Afro-fascism may be elitist, yet they
strike a chord among those who point to the ANC’s sympathies with ZANU-PF, as
well as those who fear that the brutal attacks which took place against black foreigners
and ‘aliens’ during 2008 were symptomatic of a massive social crisis amongst the poor
which is available for exploitation by ruthless politicians. From this perspective, the
Zuma tsunami represents little more than a vicious struggle for power, privilege
and wealth.
‘A “Loota” Continua’: the Tsunami as the Struggle for Resources
Moeletsi Mbeki views ANC policies under his brother ’s government as having done
little to transform the fundamentals of apartheid political economy. The ANC may
now control the state, but the state is subordinate to white capital. The ANC has
enabled politicians to get into business through BEE, yet the government has very
little power, so people are fighting over ‘crumbs’. The new ANC leadership find them-
selves in a quandary. They want to preserve largely intact the economic system they
inherited which allows them to draw financial benefits; on the other hand, they
hanker for change that will ameliorate growing inequalities. The danger is therefore
that the party will become susceptible to interventions by ambitious individuals
‘such as Zuma’ who, while not promoting social change, will pursue witch hunts
against those labelled wrongdoers. Instability within the ANC will therefore be
from financial rather than ideological motivation, as marginal groups see government
as a vehicle to gain easy access to state finances. Meanwhile, because educated black
people opt for work in the private sector, it is the uneducated within the trade unions
and SACP who aspire to positions within government. It can be predicted that, in
the wake of the 2009 election, there will be an exodus of qualified people from
public positions, leaving the state to those who have no education, reinforcing the
country’s downward spiral (Mbeki 2008).
ANC stalwart Raymond Suttner (2008) agrees. There was no programmatic difference
between the winners and losers at Polokwane: the struggle was ‘a battle for loot’
between those who sought to benefit from continued Mbeki rule as opposed to
those who sought to win out under Zuma. COSATU and SACP leaders dogged
Zuma’s heels to share the applause that greeted him as the ‘deliverer’.
Support for this thesis is offered by multiple battles that have taken place within the
ANC after Polokwane, notably at provincial and local levels. Struggles have been
around deployment of individuals to positions and chains of procurement, and
have involved extensive fraud, violence, intimidation and even assassination. Mbeki
had acquired powers to appoint provincial premiers and municipal mayors, but the
revolt against presidential centralisation at Polokwane had seen these devolve to
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party structures. Henceforth, provincial executive committees (PECs) would put
forward three candidates for premier, one of whom would be selected by the NEC.
Likewise, regional executive committees would put forward three mayoral candidates
for each municipality in their region, one of which would be appointed by the PEC.
The outcome was numerous attempts to eject various premiers and mayors from
office, the immediate motivation being that they were identified as pro-Mbeki.
There were major struggles for party position within six provinces where provincial
conferences had not been held in the run up to Polokwane. Following the conference,
it was now expected that those elected provincial chairs would become premiers after
the 2009 election. In Limpopo, Premier Sello Moloto, who had rallied behind Mbeki,
faced a campaign to displace him by Youth League-led Zuma supporters and lost
his provincial chairpersonship. In Northern Cape, pro-Zuma Provincial Chairperson
John Block faced down competition from Provincial Secretary Neville Mompati, and
imposed party control over the Mbeki-appointed Premier Dipuo Peters. In Mpuma-
langa, pro-Mbeki Thabang Makweta retained his premiership, but lost out in party
contest to pro-Zuma Provincial Agriculture Minister David Mabuza. Similar struggles
took place in North West State and Free State. For the moment, the majority of Mbeki’s
appointees as premier retained their state positions. However, a major factor keeping
them in their jobs was the fear of the national leadership that if provincial power plays
were allowed to result in their ejection, they would defect to COPE.
Only two pro-Mbeki premiers actually lost their position, in both cases because the
NEC feared that their continuation would endanger the party’s performance in the
2009 elections. In Eastern Cape, Nosimo Balindlela was ‘recalled’ following strong
demands by COSATU and the SACP and replaced by Provincial Minister for Econ-
omic Affairs, Mbulelo Sogoni. In Western Cape, the ANC was deeply divided into fac-
tions under Premier Ebrahim Rasool and Mcebesi Skwatsha which appealed to
coloured and African party supporters respectively. The NEC intervened to forge
unity by appointing Lynn Brown, Provincial Minister for Finance, as premier. Else-
where, even where provinces were strongly behind Zuma, as in KwaZulu-Natal,
there were brutal battles for party ascendancy (Star 15 March, 21 July 2008, Mail &
Guardian, 28 March–3 April, 11–17 July, 7– 13 November 2008, Sunday Independent,
15 June, 20 July 2008).
Numerous battles also took place at local level. In the Western Cape, struggles were par-
ticularly vicious, reflecting the schism between Rasool and Skwatshwa, the two factions
reputedly well funded by supporters in business. In Boland region, for example, the
pro-Skwatsha faction was replaced by a Rasool-supporting one, which subsequently
supplied the mayor of Worcester with names of people they wanted him to appoint,
and instructions to restructure the procurement unit and reverse tenders already
awarded. In Paarl, the mayor was fired from the ANC to unseat her in the council,
only for the pro-Skwatsha PEC to suspend the regional executive. At a meeting called
by the PEC to explain their decision, Skwatsha was stabbed (Paton 2008c). Although
such cases are not directly linked to the major fault-lines within the ANC, they
suggest how divisions around control of resources relate to shadowy chains of influence
and authority (Paton 2008c). ‘People’, indicated a mayor of Kimberley who stood down
for fear of assassination, want municipalities ‘to be their ATMs’ (Paton 2008d).
The extent of resource-driven factionalism within the ANC appears to be far-reaching.
However, having to put out fires across 284 municipalities, 52 party regions and nine
provinces, the ANC leadership would be hard pressed to impose integrity on all. But
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the real problem would seem to be not so much a lack of regulation, as the party’s uni-
fying mission of liberation having been replaced by its turning into an instrument of
office, power, tenders and jobs (Mthombeni 2008d). Yet what happens when the
wells of patronage run dry?
The Tsunami as the Decline of the Liberation Movement
Giliomee et al. (2001) present the ANC as driven by an ‘historical project’ of ‘liber-
ation’, as well as the notion of a party-state whereby cadres are deployed to key pos-
itions in the public service. The combination of these factors has been the
centralisation of decision making, politicisation of the public service and erosion of
the independence of supposedly neutral institutions such as the national broadcaster
and the judiciary. However, a variant of this approach proposes that, rather than the
ANC having imposed a quasi totalitarianism, it has transmogrified from a liberation
movement into a party of patronage. Once centred around ideals, today it revolves
around an internal struggle for jobs, privileges, procurements and perks. Under
Mbeki, it became a party of ‘ins’ and ‘outs’, resentment amongst the latter fuelled
by the President’s personal appointment of ministers, senior civil servants, premiers
and mayors, and by their exclusion from the small circle of cronies who were
favoured under BEE. It was this that shaped the power struggle between Mbeki
and Zuma, and the breakaway of defeated malcontents into COPE (Laurence
2008a, Sparks 2008).
The story is presented as having a peculiarly South African dimension, with the trajec-
tory of the ANC after 1994 akin to that of the National Party (NP) after 1948. The NP’s
demise was preceded by an embourgeoisement of the party’s elite, the decay of its
moral values, a loss of its sense of mission, and the defection of its right wing into
the Conservative Party in 1982. Similarly, today, the ANC elite has become aligned
to large-scale capital, mired in corruption and distanced from the ethos of past
struggles, with the formation of COPE indicating its inability to keep its broad
support together. Furthermore, the ANC’s problems are amplified by economic liber-
alisation alongside the revolution in international connectivity. It took 30 years for the
Kenya African National Union to lose its grip on the electorate, but only 20 years for
the same fate to befall ZANU-PF. In contrast, the ANC is confronting popular disillu-
sionment within just 15 years (Laurence 2008b).
Ironically, the thrust of such interpretations is sometimes optimistic, arguing that the
ANC’s troubles are good for democracy. Major revolutions elsewhere, argues Tilley,
have resulted in human disaster. During its years of struggle, a revolutionary move-
ment needs to confront a ruthless enemy through iron discipline that seals ideological
differences. Slogans, songs and solidarity bind the masses to the movement, which by
posing as the representative of the nation and harbinger of freedom ensures unity
against the oppressor. Yet victory renders this obsolete, for now the party stops
serving its great cause and begins to serve itself. Promotions are made for loyalty
not ability, while corruption soaks throughout the party. In response, popular disillu-
sionment leads to protest and criticism, but this in turn is repudiated as counter-
revolutionary. Fourteen years after their revolutions, blood-soaked France had an
emperor, the Soviet victory had morphed into the gulag, and Mao’s China was in
the grip of the Cultural Revolution. In closer proximity, the promise of national liber-
ation in Zimbabwe has plunged into authoritarianism, economic collapse and huma-
nitarian disaster. ‘In contrast, South Africa is facing this same post-revolutionary crisis
Understanding the ‘Zuma Tsunami’ 329
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merely in the form of a major party split’. It is thus entirely to the ANC’s credit that
COPE is invoking the historic values of the ANC (Tilley 2008).
However, this raises the issue of whether the new leadership is capable of implement-
ing necessary reform. Much would seem to depend upon the quality of leadership, a
matter of considerable concern to key party elders.
The Tsunami as a Failure of Leadership
The formation of COPE is an outcome of Mbeki’s removal from the presidency. Yet not
all who deplored his dismissal have departed for the new party. Some are locked into
patronage networks and others are sitting on the fence, yet there are also those bemoan
the party’s present condition and worry for its future. Their concerns have been
expressed by individuals who profess loyalty to the ANC rather than to either
Mbeki or Zuma.
There is amongst this group an acknowledgement of the crisis afflicting the ANC. Ben
Turok (2008a), a long-term party servant, has written of ‘our once proud liberation
movement’ being marked by ‘division, threats and abuse’, with the formation of
COPE by ‘respected leaders’ being a result of ‘deterioration in our democratic
culture and the stifling of dissenting voices’. Similarly, Jabu Molekete, who resigned
both as Deputy Minister of Finance and from parliament after Mbeki’s removal from
the presidency, views the ANC as having entered ‘a man-made winter’ (Forde 2008).
Such internal critics recognise that the thrust behind Mbeki’s unseating was driven, in
part at least, by generational change, just as Mandela and Tambo replaced their prede-
cessors and as the infusion of black consciousness activists into the party during the
1970s brought fresh blood and new ideas. Yet they deplore the crudity of the
present leadership cohort of the Youth League. Zola Skwewiya, the highly respected
Minister of Social Development who stayed in his position after September 2008,
was especially critical. Remarking that a resurrected Tambo would recoil from the
ANC’s present condition, he has spoken particularly upon the disrespect shown to
Mbeki by Youth Leaguers. He has also singled out Julius Malema as an ‘embarrass-
ment’, a ‘child’ and ‘unAfrican’, while the attacks made upon the judiciary he labels
as ‘painful’ (Business Day, 28 September 2008). Skwewiya’s complaints were reiterated
by earlier leaders of the ANCYL who have deplored not merely the behaviour of the
current leadership crop but their replacement of an ethos of service with that of ‘the
pursuit of business and self-advancement’ (Forrest 2008).
Despite their being unenthusiastic about Zuma’s leadership, these critics find them-
selves unable to contemplate leaving the ANC. For some, like Moleketi, disillusion
extends to a decision not to campaign for the party. For Turok, the ANC – for all its
faults – remains the principal locus of progressive tendencies, for which a breakaway
from the mainstream organisation represents many dangers. For Pallo Jordan, who
disagreed openly with the decision to remove Mbeki, COPE is little more than a
vehicle of those who have lost power, patronage and resources.
For these individuals, the ANC’s condition represents a chronic failure of the ‘core lea-
dership’. Jordan blames the NEC (of which he is a member) for failing to contain the
tensions that led to COPE’s breakaway, describing discussions within the party as a
‘dialogue of the deaf’. The ANC was a broad group of people with conflicting interests,
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yet failed to contain the contradictions. Similarly, for Moleketi, the ANC’s capacity for
self-correction has gone, wrecked upon the rocks of self-interest (Forde 2008).
In this final interpretation there are echoes of the first, with Polokwane being viewed
as an assertion of internal democracy (even if the style of its expression was regret-
table). Jordan, for example, has warned Zuma that what happened to Mbeki could
happen to him if he loses touch with the party membership (Mbanjwa 2008).
However, while Turok (2008b) has issued an extended plea for a return to the socially
inclusive economics of the RDP, there is little of anything substantial emanating from
these critics than implied calls for better leadership and a return to established values
if the organisation’s crisis is to be addressed.
Conclusion: Assessing the ‘Zuma Tsunami’
This overview has sketched out eight different ways in which the ‘Zuma tsunami’ has
been presented. Some violently conflict, notably the view of Polokwane as a commu-
nist putsch and those which perceive it as an expression of democracy; some view it as
broadly progressive, while others see it as a danger to constitutionalism; and at least
one is potentially dialectical, a decline of the ANC being heralded as a harbinger of
wider democracy. Yet diverse aspects of these interpretations significantly overlap.
In particular, they share a perception that Polokwane constituted a major turning
point, a ruction to which future historians will look back as a key moment in either
the un-making or re-making of the ANC as well as of South African democracy.
Against this, the simultaneous fluidity, overlap and contradictions of the manner in
which the tsunami is interpreted indicate something of an impasse in our understand-
ing of the class composition, political direction and programme of the ANC after 15
years in power.
This inconclusive conclusion raises yet further questions about Zuma the man and the
tsunami as a movement. In his recent, sympathetic biography of Zuma, Gordin (2008,
p. 306) portrays a figure who, although above all ‘a party man’, is simultaneously an
individual of remarkable agency, who apart from having an extraordinary ability to
attract popular support from diverse constituencies, provokes astonishing levels of dis-
comfort amongst his detractors. Gordin suggests that this is because in Zuma, the self-
image of South Africa as civilised, liberal and forward looking, as represented by its
constitution, is overturned, and in its place, the elite is forced to confront the ugly rea-
lities of inequality, poverty, racism, ethnic sectarianism and male chauvinism. Yet in
this Gordin does not go far enough, because it can be argued equally that in Zuma,
his supporters have a leader who speaks to their own images, fears and hopes,
however contradictory the diverse ideological underpinnings of such imaginings
amongst his support might be: on the one hand, his message is replete with socio-econ-
omic pragmatism and cultural conservatism, on the other his rise can be presented as
the triumph of the left. Nonetheless, Gordin (2008, p. 307) is correct in arguing that
Zuma forces us to look beneath the surface of South African society, to ponder the shift-
ing social forces within its political economy, and indeed, within the ANC. In absence of
any consensus about what the Zuma tsunami ‘means’, and the extent to which Zuma
can or will himself rewrite the scripts presented to him, we will have to await history.
Roger Southall is Professor of Sociology, University of the Witwatersrand, South
Africa. Email: roger.southall@wits.ac.za
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