ANC no longer 'people's party'

Tradition remains dominant, boosted by breakaway parties.

- Roger Southall

I have studied the ANC since the days of the liberation struggle and as a party in power.

In reality, any notion of the ANC embodying the people has been creaking for years. Those at odds with its leadership have peeled away to found new political parties.

First there was Bantu Holomisa, who fell out with Nelson Mandela in 1996. More recently, in 2012, Julius Malema was expelled after supposedly bringing the ANC into disrepute. Malema founded the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) to fight the election in 2014.

Only the EFF was to gain much political traction. But the message was clear: the coalition on which the ANC was based was becoming ever more fragile and could not last.

Hence the historical significance of the electoral eruption of the uMkhonto weSizwe party (MK) of Jacob Zuma, former president of both the ANC and South Africa.

Prior to the 2024 election, Zuma's party was widely recognised as representing a threat to ANC hegemony, both nationally and provincially in KwaZulu-Natal.

But the strength of its performance has taken South Africa and the party itself-aback.

Within six months - and with only the rudiments of organisation stolen from the ANC itself it has taken 14.5% of the national votes and 45% of the KwaZulu-Natal votes in its first election.

Few can dispute that its rise is the most dramatic stage in the dissolution of the coalition which gave the ANC a claim to being a liberation movement.

The ANC's claim goes back to its foundation in 1912.

It was a reaction to the formation of the Union of South Africa by white politicians and their exclusion of the majority black people from the right to vote or participate on equal terms with whites.