Trump and Zuma — authoritarianism, nationalism and inflammatory populism

The question of rising authoritarianism continues to plague not just South Africa, but the entire world. As far-right nationalist parties gain headway in EU elections and the US presidential election looms on the horizon, South Africa’s recently concluded election becomes an important case study for the future of democracy globally.

The popularity of former president Jacob Zuma’s freshly minted uMkhonto Wesizwe (MK) party demonstrates an increasing desire for populist rule and splintering along ethnic lines. 

Mismanagement and corruption by the ANC have decreased trust in democracy, to the point where 64% of South Africans surveyed by the Human Sciences Research Council’s South African Social Attitudes Survey expressed dissatisfaction with the state of democracy, compared to an all-time low of 22% who were satisfied.

Disillusionment with governing institutions owing to poor service delivery, unemployment rates that peaked at 33% in 2023, pervasive corruption that cost South Africa approximately $26-billion over nine years and State Capture produced an environment ripe for right-wing populist exploitation. 

At first, political analysts focusing on rising populism primarily expressed concern over the xenophobic rhetoric of the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) and the Patriotic Alliance (PA), but in the wake of the MK party outperforming expectations, new attention is being paid to the anti-foreign, militaristic nature of Zuma’s party.

The rhetoric and aesthetic of the MK party indicate an increasingly nationalistic bent to their message. This includes suggesting a return to African customary law and prioritisation of traditional leadership over democratically elected government and campaign posters depicting soldiers with the slogan “We will not hesitate to take our country back by force”. 

Zuma, whose imprisonment for 15 months in July of 2021 set off a series of riots resulting in more than 350 deaths, bears obvious similarities to former US president, Donald Trump, whose election loss precipitated the 6 January insurrection.

Trump and Zuma have both been characterised by election denial, from Trump’s “stop the steal” rallying cry and continuous lambasting of media and government institutions to Zuma’s insistence that MK won two-thirds of the vote in the national election. Both share a distaste for democracy in the guise of populism, threatening to replace their respective countries’ constitutions. 

“A Massive Fraud of this type and magnitude allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution,” said Trump, on his social media platform, Truth Social.

The MK party echoed a similar sentiment, calling for “a referendum to scrap the 1996 Constitution and replace it with a parliamentary system with or without a codified Constitution”, a political structure analysts have likened to apartheid’s unfettered cruelty. MK, claiming to have evidence of election fraud but refusing to provide it, recently submitted an application to the Constitutional Court to have the election declared illegitimate and prevent Parliament from sitting on 14 June. 

The origin point of these two figureheads is the same: dissatisfaction with the incompetence of neoliberal rule emerging in the form of populist nationalism. The prioritisation of one ethnic community, ardent defence of borders from perceived foreign threats and rampant xenophobia are all symptoms of nationalistic rule, a sentiment that has spiked globally.

What makes the violence enacted through this system unique is its decentralised nature; instead of using the state to enforce policy, utilising citizen militias or mass political unrest allows political leaders to dodge accountability.

The US is no stranger to this strategy. In the lead-up to the 2020 elections, incumbent candidate Trump repeatedly urged his supporters to monitor polling locations to prevent election fraud. However, the result of this was what amounted to voter intimidation: poll workers wore Trump masks in Virginia, an armed man in uniform blocked voters from entering in Pennsylvania, and a man in military uniform carrying a gun was arrested in North Carolina.

Though widespread violence did not occur and large-scale intimidation was not reported, Trump’s hold on his base would later culminate in the 6 January insurrection, resulting in five deaths and many more injuries, including 140 police officers. 

Since the violence happened as a result of mob violence and riots, Trump has been able to deny his own complicity while shifting the blame onto others. A similar strategy is used on the US-Mexico border, where migrants are caught in the crossfire between the Texas National Guard and the federal government after Texas Governor Greg Abbott deployed the guard in response to President Joe Biden’s perceived failure to defend the border from an “invasion” of immigrants.

Though state violence was certainly employed, more than 1,000 civilian members of a Telegram channel named “Take Back Our Border” rushed to assist, travelling in an armed convoy through Eagle Pass, Texas, throughout January and February. 

Taking advantage of a legal grey area, approximately 200 unregulated militia members currently patrol the US-Mexico border in a legally ambiguous context, though some estimates have placed their numbers in the thousands. Some groups offer medical care and prayer, while others damage humanitarian aid stations and fly drones to surveil migrants attempting to cross the border.

Others are more overtly violent. In 2009, three militia members murdered a man and his nine-year-old daughter in Arivaca, Arizona, in a xenophobic attack. The perpetrators were tried and sentenced, but as individuals, not as members of an organisation spurred on by the rhetoric of politicians and the tacit approval of police. 

The strategy of stoking hatred towards immigrants and allowing civilians to enact violence in the state’s stead is illustrated in South Africa as well. Zuma has claimed that the primary driver of crime in South Africa is the increase in “foreign nationals”, though the MK party is not the only one to use xenophobic rhetoric. The Patriotic Alliance employs the Zulu slogan abahambe – they must go – while championing mass deportations as the solution to South Africa’s unemployment crisis. 

Poverty, inequality and unemployment were the main drivers of the Alexandra Dudula movement, which sprang up in Johannesburg’s Alexandra township in 2021 alongside Operation Dudula in Johannesburg's Soweto township. Both movements used the Zulu word for “drive back” and carried out patrols, surveillance and violent attacks on immigrants. The number of foreigners killed because of xenophobia nearly tripled in 2021, spurred on by the perceived political inefficacy of the ANC and job loss owing to immigration. 

Though the violence was not state-sponsored, neither did the state adequately defuse the anti-immigrant sentiment that led to it. Despite President Cyril Ramaphosa condemning Operation Dudula after the murder of a man suspected to be foreign, ANC national spokesperson Pule Mabe spoke out in support of it.

Advocacy groups have alleged that the police and Home Affairs Department have acted in collaboration with Operation Dudula to conduct raids, although the police have denied the accusations. Of course, the state doesn’t need to be involved to be complicit; Texas militias operate quietly in conjunction with the National Guard, after all. 

Though the MK party has been criticised for its ethno-nationalism, it’s not the only party that engages in xenophobia. The deputy president of the PA called for mass deportations after more than 70 people died in the Johannesburg fire, arguing that the cause of the tragedy was the state’s inability to evict immigrants living in abandoned buildings. On the heels of Alexandra Dudula’s xenophobic violence, members of the EFF visited Johannesburg restaurants to examine the number of foreign workers employed.  

The pattern remains the same across the US and South Africa: ramp up the xenophobic rhetoric, exploit economic issues and dissatisfaction with the status quo for political capital and let citizen militias and vigilante groups do the rest. DM

Narnia Bohler-Muller is executive director in the Developmental, Capable and Ethical State division of the Human Sciences Research Council.

Robin Koshelev of Duke University is an intern in the Developmental, Capable and Ethical State division of the Human Sciences Research Council.