Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma served as South Africa’s fourth president from 2009 to 2018. This terrorist was arrested in 1963 and sentenced to ten years in prison. In 1975 he fled South Africa and conducted various terrorist activities in neighbouring countries. Jacob paraded himself to be a liberation stalwart, a man of the people. When he came to power his true colours were unveiled and his charade came to an end. He was just your typical terrorist whose sole object was to assume political power and to maximise his personal wealth by thieving the public purse.
There are many opinions as to how much money was plundered from State Owned Entities and central government. Most journalists brandish the number of about R500 billion. And from what I can see this is mostly Gupta and senior ANC stalwarts related. I am not sure if this includes all the local governments and municipalities who are essentially bankrupt due to their funds being plundered by Party big wigs who got mayors and city managers to pay over-inflated prices for items the city probably never needed in the first place. But, assume that R500bn is the right number. If one simply invested that sum of money in a bank account, you could earn about R50bn per year just on interest. Now think how many bursaries could have been provided to deserving poor people. It is widely accepted that education is the way out of poverty.
Many people have said that they believe he is indeed a very clever man in that he manipulated the organs of state in such a way that empowered him to be able to personally benefit though corrupt means, without any fear of consequences. It is my belief that he simply read the famous book “How to steal your country dry” authored by Julias Nyerere and co-authored by Idi Amin and Robert Mugabe. He simply copied their work to enrich himself and his cronies.
What were the political consequences of his plundering ways? According to the IEC website the ANC received just over 62.5% of the votes in 1994. 1999 saw an improvement to marginally over 66%, and under Thabo Mbeki the ANC almost got 70% of the votes in 2004. Things started to go down with the ANC obtaining just below 66% in 2009 and a further decrease to around 62% of the popular vote in 2014. All this time Jacob had carte blanch to appoint any person to a position of power and wield overall power in the country. By the time Jacob had left office the ANC support had waned to around 57.5% of the popular vote in 2019. It is my opinion that the decline in popularity was largely due to a lethargic economy which resulted in increased levels of poverty. Ramaphosa’s inability to decisively tackle corruption and Jacob who stabbed the ANC in the back, saw the ANC popularity plumet to just above 40% in 2024.
What does this actually mean? Why did over 17% of people who voted for the ANC suddenly decide to vote for another political party? Yes, I do believe that many ANC supporters decided to vote for MK. MK garnered a little more than 14.5% of the vote which suggests that another 3% decided to abandon their ANC political loyalty. It has been suggested that Ramaphosa deliberately gave Jacob a “get out of jail free” card knowing that the old man would jump political ship and either support an opposition party or start his own political show – well we now know the answer to that question. Was this done deliberately in order to ensure that the ANC does not gain an overall majority so remove the chances that another Jacob rising to power? Time will tell.
I am no psychologist, but people are creatures of habit. Take, for example, when you have a favourite radio station that is set on your car. Each day you get into the car and loyally tune the radio to your favourite station, but one day maybe the DJ says something you don’t like, or he plays a song you don’t like, it may irritate you, but you try to overcome that irritation and stay loyal. But there comes a day when you get overly frustrated, and you tune into another station. You may be left with a feeling of missing out on something that attracted you in the first place and later tune into the old favourite. The next time its easier to simply change the channel at the first instance of annoyance. That psychological hold has been broken and each time it’s easier to simply find an alternate station more to your liking. There is no difference in loyalty to your political “favourite” party.
The suggestion here is that the 17% of voters who defected from supporting the ANC may not be easily enticed to support their old favourite, leaving the ANC to face the possibility that it will always need to partner with some opposition party in some sort of power sharing arrangement, ensuring that no leader has the same political muscle that was afforded to Jacob.
It would seem that most of the corrupt and incompetent people who were elevated to places of power, and been removed by Ramaphosa, have migrated to the MK faction or their political cohorts. Jacob’s style has always been to rule with an iron fist. The MK party constitution begins with a long-winded diatribe of how indigenous people were subjected to all kinds of social injustice. Section 7 sets forth the organisational leadership structures and describes each office and its powers. In essence, the president of the party commands supreme power in the party and not surprisingly Jacob is just the man chosen to be the president.
But what happens when he can’t be president? Currently he is 82 years old. He is older than Donald Trump and President Biden. Biden has elected not to stand for re-election due to his age.
It is safe to say that in the coming few years Jacob will either pass away or be mentally incapacitated and not in a position to lead. Then what? Who will take over MK? It is my personal belief that some strong leaders like John Hlophe, Busiswe Mkhwebane or Floyd Shivambu will eye the top job. That could easily lead to a power struggle and a dissolution of that entire political grouping. In-fighting has already begun with the strong man in power so how will it pan out with Jacob in his grave or sitting in the political wings? In essence, the political left wing will likely fall into tatters. That can only be good for South Africa as a country.
Jacob not only saw the demise of the ANC power base but has attracted many of the corrupt and inept people to his political alignment with little real future.
Thank you, Jacob.
What can we as entrepreneurs learn from this?
Jacob’s mistakes were to keep incompetent and corrupt people in positions of power and thus ensure their loyalty, but that did not bear fruit as these people effectively orchestrated his, and the political left’s, demise.
Surround yourself with honest people who demonstrate their ability to act wisely and independently and are prepared to criticise you when you are making the wrong decisions. Don’t break them down but rather build them up and encourage them to continue to question and advise you when running your business.
Peter Carlisle CA (SA)
November 2024
