SA’s relationship with narcissistic ANC

Torturous and dysfunctional [View this email in your browser]( FROM THE NEWSROOM June 10, 2022 [Mail & Guardian]( [Twitter]( [Facebook]( [Instagram]( [YouTube]( Hi there, We are in a dysfunctional relationship with our political actors and in the main the ANC. It’s as with any relationship with a personality that would closely fit the description of a narcissist, someone who has an excessive interest in or admiration of themselves. It’s clear that the concerns of the almost 60-million South Africans are nowhere near as important as the ambitions of those within its 86-member national executive committee. In the Mail & Guardian newsroom, we talked through this relationship as once again the country was gripped with the latest factional battles. The jostling for power to avoid criminal sanction, as has been successfully demonstrated by its former president Jacob Zuma, has been fierce over the past decade, but this week’s developments may prove a critical turning point. Arthur Fraser, who faces the very real prospect of criminal charges as a result of the Zondo commission, has suddenly found his “greater” civic duty and cast a shadow over the presidency of Cyril Ramaphosa. It will serve as a final death knell to his claims of a “New Dawn” for an exhausted and ever-poorer public. There are questions that Ramaphosa will have to answer as he now faces a political storm that detractors within his own party will look to benefit. The storm will serve to further increase the fissure between the party and the people. As Hugo ka Canham, associate professor of psychology at a Johannesburg university, writes for this week’s M&G: “As a means to government funds, the ANC has lost its self-assigned role as the leader of society and provides more fodder for comedians than it inspires South Africa’s citizens. As a party of jokers who have lost their moral compass, political instability is their preferred stage.” It’s a descent that many with vested interests in the factional battles fail to acknowledge. Many are blinded by a delusion that the ANC is South Africa and vice versa, when it’s clear that the country is moving away. The spoils of war within the party may well end up being a place in opposition benches come 2024, or best-case scenario, in a coalition-led government with a kingmaker in Julius Malema’s Economic Freedom Fighters. In the most recent local elections, the ANC fell to 46% of the national vote, and while the party generally doesn’t do well in these polls, it’s not difficult to imagine the party falling below 50% in two years’ time. This is especially as its “cleanest” candidate Ramaphosa, if he wins reelection this December, will now come with his own skeletons to that electoral race. Which brings us to the realisation that we are indeed in a relationship with a narcissistic governing party so wrapped up in its personality clashes that it’s sleepwalking its way out of power. It won’t awaken to the real and distinct possibility of a future of being a regional power in provinces such as KwaZulu-Natal, Eastern Cape, Limpopo and the Free State and no longer a majority player on the national stage. Were the party about “the people”, perhaps they’d notice their battles don’t address our struggles against double-digit food nflation and record high unemployment. But, instead, like a classic narcissist, they want us to believe that their personality contests are in our best interests. In our relationship with the other big party, the Democratic Alliance, we fall into similar patterns. Its former leader, Tony Leon, who sat in opposition to Nelson Mandela’s administration more than 20 years ago, had a Twitter spat with his own party’s Johannesburg mayor. To whose benefit? We remain a country trapped in a cycle of anaemic growth, an ever-present threat of darkness and falling confidence. Until next time, The M&G newsroom [Subscribe now]( Enjoy The Ampersand? Share it with your friends [Share]( [Share]( [Tweet]( [Tweet]( [Forward]( [Forward]( [Share]( [Share]( Copyright © 2022 Mail & Guardian Media LTD, All rights reserved. You are receiving this email because you opted in to receive communications from the Mail & Guardian either at our website or by taking out a print subscription. Our mailing address is: Mail & Guardian Media LTD 25 Owl St BraamfonteinJohannesburg, Gauteng 2001 South Africa [Add us to your address book]( Want to change how you receive these emails? You can [update your preferences]( or [unsubscribe]( here.