Marianne Merten and Howard Barrell
When the new Western Cape provincial legislature rises on Tuesday, little will have changed, despite the African National Congress having won the biggest share of votes in the election.
This week, the ANC refused an offer of one seat in the 12-seat provincial cabinet. Opposition parties who have agreed on a coalition to govern the province – the New National Party, Democratic Party and African Christian Democratic Party (ACDP) – had offered the ANC the provincial safety and security portfolio.
ANC provincial leader Ebrahim Rasool conveyed his party’s reponse in a letter to NNP leader Gerald Morkel on Thursday: “Gerald, it is not too late. This is not the time for dogmatic behaviour. The election is bigger than us or our parties.”
Morkel will remain premier – a post that was never negotiable, according to those close to the coalition talks.
A senior NNP official said the DP would get education and economic affairs portfolios. He doubted the DP would get health, another key “delivery” portfolio, as this was occupied by NNP politician Peter Marais.
The DP’s provincial leader, Hennie Bester, already holds a key economic portfolio.
The NNP official expects the DP to get one additional portfolio – possibly housing in place of the incumbent, the NNP’s Cecil Herandien – making for a total of four. The ACDP would get one minor portfolio and the NNP would get the balance of seven out of 12, giving it a majority in the Western Cape cabinet.
On Wednesday afternoon legal representatives of the three parties sweated it out over the exact wording of a governance agreement and a mechanism to break any potential logjams.
Talks between the three minority political parties based on a pre-election agreement started after it became clear the ANC would take the Western Cape last Thursday.
This was despite an outcry from the ANC and its alliance partners that such a coalition was a slap in the face for African voters, those who switched allegiance in traditional coloured NNP strongholds and a large proportion of white voters, who supported the ANC.
On Monday evening a telephonic offer was made to Rasool while he was in Pretoria to inform ANC national leaders of the province’s quandary.
Morkel told Rasool, with an apparent “take- it-or-leave-it” attitude, the ANC would get the safety and security portfolio, the position of deputy speaker, and the chair of the public accounts committee.
The ANC was given until Thursday noon to reply to the coalition’s offer. But it had already rejected it on Monday as “deeply insulting” and as a complete lack of respect for the Western Cape’s black voters.
The ANC’s national leadership described the offer as “an indecent proposal”.
Hopes that NNP number two Pieter Marais might persuade his party to go into a coalition with the ANC came to nothing as he was effectively sidelined in the discussions. Once the multi-party government was announced, he lashed out against the ANC, saying it had been unable to broker its own power base.
A senior DP official said that, at one stage during the talks, provision was made to give the ANC three cabinet posts. However, this would have been a bargaining tool should the ANC indicate acceptance of the initial offer of one post.
It has become clear the ANC, despite its victory at the hustings, was effectively outmanoeuvred by minority parties. Rasool called for a meeting on Tuesday afternoon with Morkel, Bester and Louis to try persuade them to restart negotiations.
At 3pm on Tuesday the men dressed in natty suits met. The fact that Rasool arrived with Minister of Justice Dullah Omar led to haggling over the number of representatives. It was only resolved when the coalition partners also appointed a second person for each side.
The meeting lasted less than an hour and never broke through the resolve of the NNP, the DP and the ACDP to form the new provincial government.
The ANC’s argument that there should be inclusive rule was dismissed. Although the meeting was officially described as “cordial”, insiders say tensions bubbled under the strained civility.
Yet Omar remained sanguine: “The Western Cape needs a broad-based government, representative of all the people. That is what the results of the elections called for.”
He added the ANC was not in the game of grabbing posts. Faced with the established multi-party government, Omar said: “It’s a coalition against transformation. It is a negative coalition. It will expose itself as such as time goes on.”
The ANC’s joy at winning the province last week evaporated quickly once news travelled like wildfire the coalition was a done deal by late Wednesday. Words used to describe ANC officials’ emotions were “anger”, “depression”, “disbelief” and a variety of four-letter words. The new government’s stated wish that the ANC would prove itself “a loyal opposition” was scoffed at.
Although the coalition partners have consistently argued they are constitutionally correct in combining their political clout – according to Bester more than 50% of voters did not want an ANC government – observers say the agreement does not bode well for the province.
The coalition partners may well be correct in the letter of the law, but their actions have disregarded the social and economic factors in a province where votes were broadly cast according to race.