Battleground Joburg: ActionSA and ANC work in mysterious ways

23 Jul 2024

It appears that the political breeze in Joburg is about to change and that Al Jama-ah’s mayor there, Kabelo Gwamanda, is about to lose office. But the wind may change in an even more fundamental way, with ActionSA working with the ANC.

On Sunday came the first of several reports that the ANC was negotiating with ActionSA about working together in Joburg. It appears the two agreed that they could work together and should remove Kabelo Gwamanda as mayor.

This would result in the ANC’s Dada Morero being elected as mayor.

ActionSA seems confident this will lead to its members getting powerful positions in Gauteng councils.

The ANC would be the net gainer from this. Currently, it is in an “informal working arrangement” with the EFF, in terms of which no one from the ANC or the EFF can be nominated as mayor of Joburg.

With the support of ActionSA, the ANC would once again own the mayoral chain.

This directly contradicts the promise, made repeatedly by ActionSA, that it would never work with the ANC. Its leader, Herman Mashaba, has time and again said he only entered politics to remove the ANC from power.

And yet, less than two months after the elections, ActionSA appears prepared to backtrack completely.

This may well be the strongest indication yet of the power of the coalition in the national government.

An irresistible force

As our politics has almost completely realigned since the end of May, the old dividing lines around ideologies or constituencies are no longer decisive. The only question that now divides parties is whether they are inside or outside the national coalition.

ActionSA’s movements here suggest that the gravity of the national coalition is too strong to resist and that there is nothing for it to gain by remaining outside.

As previously stated, one of the most interesting political questions of the moment is whether the national coalition agreement will spread to other spheres of governance.

Currently, the national arrangement is reflected in KwaZulu-Natal (where the IFP, ANC, DA and the NFP govern), but not in Gauteng (where the ANC governs in a minority administration with several smaller parties, but not with the EFF or the DA).

ANC Secretary-General Fikile Mbalula has said that the national coalition may have to “cascade” to local government in the interests of stability.

However, it may also be possible for these arrangements to “cascade up” — for a coalition relationship to start in local government and then move into national government.

Thus, if ActionSA can work with the ANC in Joburg, then it could, perhaps, end up in the national coalition with the ANC. Especially if it gets positions in Gauteng.

There are many different factors at play.

Gwamanda’s party, Al Jama-ah, is a member of the Government of National Unity. If the ANC removed Gwamanda as Joburg’s mayor, this would go against the national coalition deal.

Deeper motives

There may be deeper motives for some of the decisions made by the ANC in Gauteng and Joburg.

If the main aim of the ANC was to regain the Joburg mayoralty, the simplest option would be to work with the DA, which Premier Panyaza Lesufi’s team would not do, rather opting for ActionSA as a partner.

This would weaken the DA — and not just in Joburg.

The DA governs with ActionSA in Tshwane. The ANC in Tshwane is planning a no-confidence vote against the DA mayor there, Cilliers Brink. If ActionSA were to back the ANC, then the DA would lose power in Tshwane.

For those of a conspiratorial bent, this may indicate that the real aim of the ANC in Gauteng is to weaken the DA where it can. This would be to prevent the Gauteng ANC from being forced by the national leadership to work with the DA in a formal coalition in Gauteng.

This shows how complicated the current situation is.

Al Jama-ah may feel that it can no longer trust the ANC. If the deal with ActionSA and the ANC does happen, then the DA might find it impossible to work with ActionSA in the future, despite the fact they have worked together for several years (and compete for the same votes).

It also shows that this age of coalitions and the introduction of a coalition in national government renders previous promises meaningless

Mashaba has spent almost all of his political life insulting the ANC.

Just three years ago, he said the ANC could wait for his call for “300 years”.

He has consistently said he would not be a part of any coalition that includes the “criminal ANC”, that the ANC is “the devil” and more recently, that the coalition government involves the “criminal ANC”.

And yet, he is now working with the ANC and negotiating positions with them.

While he says he will not be part of a coalition with the ANC, there appears to be no difference between his position and the position of the EFF, which supported the ANC and received positions in return.

This suggests that our politics is about to move into a new phase where it will become even harder to trust our politicians than it was previously.

In a worst-case scenario, sections of the same party could work with different parties — with, for instance, the national ANC working with the DA and the Gauteng ANC working with other parties.

This could lead to much more short-termism where parties and groups within them make more decisions in their short-term interests than they did in the past.

These developments make one thing very clear: our future is here — and it’s much more complicated than our recent past. DM

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An irresistible force

Deeper motives