The ANC desperately needs a single coalition partner to help it govern after its worst poll performance in 30 years.
Two obvious choices for President Cyril Ramaphosa are Julius Malema’s EFF and Jacob Zuma’s Umkhonto Wesizwe (MK) as partners.
But both Zuma and Malema have sworn to get rid of Ramaphosa and put him in jail.
The ANC fell from over 57% to 42% in Wednesday’s elections. It lost KwaZulu-Natal to MK, and the Western Cape (where it never stood a chance, anyway) to the DA. It also failed to win over 50% in the Northern Cape and could lose Gauteng – Mzansi’s financial and industrial heartland.
ANC chairperson Gwede Mantashe has sworn to oppose any effort to remove Ramaphosa from power.
Remnants of the anti-Ramaphosa groupings in the ANC suggest that Ramaphosa could be removed and replaced by his deputy, Paul Mashatile.
Mashatile has good relations with Malema, who is rumoured to have ambitions of being deputy president. The EFF leader previously set out his conditions for a future coalition with the ANC.
“I am prepared to give the EFF vote to the ANC nationally if it does not get 50%, with one demand – make Floyd Shivambu finance minister.
“The problem in South Africa is the finance department, owned and controlled by Stellenbosch.
“You need radical change,” Malema said.
But this week’s main coalition rumour has been about an ANC-DA arrangement.
This would bring stability to the national government and attract foreign direct investment to South Africa, grow the economy and create jobs.
“That would save the City of Johannesburg and Ekurhuleni and improve service delivery.
“At the moment, nothing is moving there. A coalition with a single party with no ambition to undermine our president is the best option,” said a member of the ANC national executive committee.
DA leader John Steenhuisen has changed his language from “no coalition with the ANC” to possibly considering it to avoid a “doomsday coalition of the ANC and EFF”.
This week, Helen Zille, chairperson of the DA federal council, said the DA would do anything to block an ANC coalition with the EFF or the MK party.
“The only definite no we are saying is that we will not let South Africa fall under a coalition of the ANC, MK and the EFF. We love our country too much.
“We told everybody we are here to rescue South Africa, and we’ll look at the very best options of coalitions available that enable us to do that.”
Pictured above: John Steenhuisen and Cyril Ramaphosa.
Source: Facebook
