GARETH VAN ONSELEN: The ANC feels the pain
But the party remains self-absorbed, and blind to the pain of the people it is meant to represent
Power has many effects on political parties. One of them is that it tends to encourage unity. And, with that, a sense of immortality. The ANC knows both well enough. A decade ago, during what one might call the "glory days", it strode SA like a colossus, and it knew it too. At its hegemonic zenith, Jacob Zuma said for the first time in 2004, "the ANC will rule SA until Jesus comes back". It was symptomatic of the arrogance a feeling of immortality engenders, and of the power the ANC wielded. Zuma has said the same, or something similar, many times since. But, as time has worn on, the idea has lost its bite. Before the 2016 local government elections, he said of his party’s prospects in Nelson Mandela Bay, "It’s crystal clear that we are taking this metro. You saw the traditional leaders here praying. It means our ancestors are with us. It means that God and Jesus are with us. Then who can defeat us?" But defeated the ANC was — leading, remarkably, to the president offering this obse...
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