BARNEY MTHOMBOTHI: Ramaphosa is haunted by the ghostly politics of Bell Pottinger
'Ramaphosa leads a party that's pulling in a different direction from where he wants to go'
With the country basking in Cyril Ramaphosa's much-vaunted new dawn and Jacob Zuma's reign slowly receding from memory, one important aspect of our politics seems to have been forgotten: Ramaphosa may have won the mantle of leadership, but he's actually lost the battle of ideas within his party. It is the radical economic transformation narrative that won the day at Nasrec. Bell Pottinger may have been hounded out of existence, but it seems to be having the last laugh after all. Its racialised message of radical transformation and so-called white monopoly capital, crafted to disguise the looting by the Guptas, has endured and seems to be part of the paraphernalia of the ANC's reigning ideology.This new stance has drawn the ruling party closer to its problem child, the EFF. The new romance culminated in last week's parliamentary vote to seize private land without compensating the owner or occupant. It was a stunning victory for EFF leader Julius Malema, with his take-no-prisoners typ...
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