At the centre of the tense political developments of the past two weeks is a lack of leadership and a desperation by the ANC to push through an unpopular VAT hike by sidestepping its majority partner in the GNU.
Looking back, it has been farcical.
The ANC, led by its deputy president, Paul Mashatile, and chief whip in parliament, Mdumiseni Ntuli, managed to get the fiscal framework passed by getting the support of ActionSA.
ActionSA voted in support of the framework in its race to outmanoeuvre the DA, which poured its unhappiness over the entire working of the GNU into the budget negotiations.
ActionSA leader Herman Mashaba celebrated its apparent victory in getting rid of the unpopular tax increase — except that his party accomplished no such thing but rather allowed the ANC to simply cross the first hurdle in passing the budget.
It is worth stepping back to take stock of ActionSA’s political orientation.
It is a splinter party from the DA. Its core leadership is composed of former DA heavyweights who were pushed or walked away in the far-reaching shake-up of internal DA politics after its disappointing results in the 2019 national election. Mashaba, chief whip Athol Trollip and chair Michael Beaumont were all part of the DA’s leadership machinery.
Much the same applies to Build One South Africa (Bosa), whose frontman, Mmusi Maimane, resigned from the DA in 2019 after the poor election performance under his leadership.
Both parties are openly competing for DA voters, just as both the EFF and Jacob Zuma’s MK Party are competing for ANC voters.
After realising its mistake, ActionSA retreated, saying it will not support further votes to pass the budget in parliament in the coming month unless the VAT hike is dropped. The party has made a submission to the National Treasury to shore up its coffers by R100bn. The FM understands that the submission contains proposals similar to those made by the DA in its original plan on a far-reaching spending review.
The ANC is back to square one.
ANC secretary-general Fikile Mbalula met ActionSA, the DA and other parties inside and outside the GNU over the past week, including the EFF. DA federal council chair Helen Zille described the discussions as “frank” and “constructive”. The pair have been left to try to bridge the deep chasm between the parties arising from the budget impasse.
Despite the ‘reset’, it is still unclear whether the DA will leave the coalition or ActionSA will join it
The majority of the parties the ANC met indicated they would not support the VAT hike.
While there are indications that the ANC is willing to step back from the VAT increase, it’s not clear whether this can be done before May 1 — but sources say now that if the political will is there, it is likely that it can.
What does all this mean for the GNU? Despite the “reset”, it is still unclear whether the DA will leave the coalition or ActionSA will join it. Talks over the weekend between the ANC and the DA were significantly more productive than they were in the run-up to the vote in parliament two weeks ago, but the broader discussions on the problems with the GNU were parked for now.
The unhappiness over the DA’s stance in the negotiations among senior ANC leaders is deep. Some argue that the DA should be shown the door, while others say it should be pushed to leave of its own accord.
One way to do this is to sidestep the statement of intent, as the ANC did during the budget process, and bring parties such as ActionSA and Bosa into the cabinet. However, the ANC is far from united in its view that the DA should exit the GNU.
There is a view in more pragmatic quarters in the ANC that the failure to keep open the “back channels” developed with the DA over the past 10 months and used to discuss contentious issues long before they spilt over was a mistake. The budget impasse could have been avoided had this been done.
Instead, over the past 10 months, both parties have left GNU matters to President Cyril Ramaphosa, as the leader of government, and Mashatile, as the leader of government business. Both have failed woefully in their responsibilities.
Lawson Naidoo of the Council for the Advancement of the South African Constitution notes there are two fundamental flaws in the way the GNU works. First, Ramaphosa failed to set up cabinet committees that would include at least the largest parties in the GNU; and second, there was no co-ordination or leadership of the budget process within the government.
DA ministers were left to their own devices, as were ANC and Patriotic Alliance ministers. Instead of Ramaphosa and his deputy providing a unifying vision for the cabinet, it was simply business as usual.
Ramaphosa’s complete failure in managing the most important process for any coalition government the world over, the budget, is yet another sign that he is checking out, as he reaches the midway point of his second term as party president.
More than a month ago, he announced a task team to swoop on Joburg to get the city up to scratch ahead of the G20 summit in November. Nothing has been done since.
The GNU was widely welcomed by business and the international community, but it only really exists in name. Ramaphosa has done nothing to build trust or present a unifying figure for his multiparty cabinet colleagues.
A few months ago, as he entered the departure lounge of his ANC presidency, his intended legacy should have been crafting a unity government to catapult South Africa into a new era of mature and pragmatic coalitions. Now, should the GNU unravel, it will simply add another notch to his belt of missed opportunities.
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