Big business and government leaders, including President Thabo Mbeki and Minister of Trade and Industry Mandisi Mpahlwa, agreed on Tuesday that there was ”no need to panic” over the matters of transition from a Mbeki presidency to a new one.
These words were used by Standard Bank’s Saki Macozoma when briefing the media on discussions between business and government about the state of the economy, development issues and obstacles to doing business.
Neither Mpahlwa nor Macozoma — who were flanked at the briefing by transport parastatal Transnet boss Maria Ramos — would be drawn on who brought the matter up of the succession.
Neither mentioned the name Jacob Zuma, the former deputy president of South Africa who now looks increasingly like a potential presidential candidate for both the ruling party and the African National Congress.
They would also not be drawn on who brought up the matter of the transition or whether there was discussion on how such a transition would affect the South African economy or the markets.
Asked if the robustness of the political debate over succession might create a lack of confidence by investors and instability, Macozoma — a former ruling ANC MP now representing business — said: ”No, we did not express a concern of that nature. We don’t think that it is an issue.
We don’t express and don’t intend to express a view that investors will be frightened by this.”
The groups had discussed the democracy, which had been declared ”robust” by the two groups.
But, he added, ”We understand that we need to have a message to the world about our stability.”
Mpahlwa said: ”We don’t live in a perfect world. We have a political process and we don’t believe the political process is in danger. The time will come for a new president to come in place and a new leadership … that should happen through the normal democratic processes.”
Ramos, meanwhile, said there had been a lot of comment when the Mandela presidency made way for the Mbeki presidency. That was perfectly normal, she suggested. Her words were: ”The last time we had a change of presidency was when president [Nelson] Mandela handed over to President Mbeki. At that time there were lots of questions about succession by the foreign investors and all kinds of people. It is just natural. We are getting used to a democratic environment where everyone has a point.”
Mpahlwa said the issues of market and investor sentiment were matters which related ”to a particular moment”. He said the political system was ”sufficiently robust” to deal with the pressures.
Pressed on who had brought up in discussions the matter of succession, Macozoma said that it would not be appropriate ”who asked, who responded”.
Zuma, fired by Mbeki last year as the nation’s deputy president, was recently restored to an active role as the ruling party’s deputy leader — called deputy president — although he faces a corruption trial related to the country’s arms deal in July.
Both the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) and the South African Communist Party (SACP) have been lobbying for him to play an active role, and support for him as candidate to succeed Mbeki for the ANC leadership next year is now viewed as a foregone conclusion.
Succession to be guided by ANC policies
Meanwhile, the ANC’s Youth League (ANCYL) must retract its calls for the party’s next president to be Jacob Zuma, ANC secretary general Kgalema Motlanthe said on Monday.
Speaking on a South African Broadcasting Corporation television show hosted by Tim Modise, Motlanthe said the youth league ought to be guided by the policies of the party, which gave it the same status as each of the nine provinces in terms of nominations.
The next ANC leader is scheduled to be elected through party structures at the end of next year.
Defending President Thabo Mbeki’s statement that a woman should be the next president, Motlanthe said he understood that Mbeki was ”merely articulating the gender policy of the ANC”.
Motlanthe also said the party would seek bilateral talks with its alliance partners, the SACP and Cosatu, on criticisms the two partners had made of the ruling party.
These talks, he said, would be to explain the ANC’s policy position and ”better understand where they are coming from”.
They would also be to strengthen the tripartite alliance.
On statements by Cosatu that it feared the ANC and South Africa was drifting towards a dictatorship, and by the SACP that the Presidency was over-centralised, Motlanthe said they had the right to analyse things publicly.
”No, we don’t [expect them to refrain], but we are concerned about baseless pronouncements,” he said.
Motlanthe said ”succession” was never spoken of within the ANC.
”In the ANC we speak of election of national leadership.”
On Saturday, the National Union of Mineworker’s (NUM) president Senzeni Zokwana said Mbeki should open the succession debate.
Speaking at NUM’s 12th congress at Midrand, he said this would dispel perceptions that some leaders, especially Zuma, were being marginalised.
The union called on the ANC’s national executive committee to come up with a discussion document on the future of the tripartite alliance. — I-Net Bridge and Sapa