LETTER: A government of national disunity

In a government of national unity (GNU) consisting of 10 ideologically different political parties — not to mention the SACP and Cosatu represented behind the scenes by the ANC — and a cabinet of more than 60 members with their own personal and political agendas, it is hardly surprising that bitter tensions and conflicts are rapidly increasing. This will render the seventh administration even more indecisive, ineffectual and prone to procrastination than its predecessor.

GNU is a misnomer and doesn’t reflect the reality of the disunity and divisiveness between its members. Despite the so-called inclusive transformation of the executive, the dominance of the ANC and its insistence that members remain subservient and ultimately beholden to President Cyril Ramaphosa and ANC policies renders the GNU nothing more than an absurd charade.

To jerk SA politics out of its stagnant and directionless state, all non-ANC ministers, or at least the DA, IFP, FF+ and Rise Mzansi representatives, should resign from the GNU and force the ANC to stand or fall on its own as a minority government, albeit with a few insignificant sycophantic stragglers hanging onto its tail.

It is unlikely that the parliamentary parties in “opposition” would collectively enable a stand-alone ANC to sustain a position of stable governance. They would suffocate it with unpassed bills and motions of no confidence, forcing it to resign and call a general election late in 2025 — hopefully contested by a strongly competitive, reunited multiparty charter political establishment

This may cause some negative short-term stock market or currency knee-jerk reactions, but as always they will recover and thrive when the reality of potential positive political progress — even a new sensibly constructed functional GNU — and economic recovery become apparent.

Having allowed the DA and so many other parties to share his executive bed it’s highly unlikely Ramaphosa could stomach a new invitation to the EFF and MK to become his bedmates. The charade would become a ghastly political dogfight.

David Gant
Kenilworth

JOIN THE DISCUSSION: Send us an email with your comments to letters@businesslive.co.za. Letters of more than 300 words will be edited for length. Anonymous correspondence will not be published. Writers should include a daytime telephone number.​