It’s a big year for elections — and pre-elections — from Africa to Europe and the United States.
France creaks at the seams, yet Nicolas Sarkozy, the French mirror to George W Bush’s neocon agenda and the man most likely to fan the flames of social unrest, leads the opinion polls ahead of the April 21 ballot. In the United Kingdom, there will be a new prime minister perhaps as soon as the end of June, and his name will mostly likely be Gordon Brown. In the US, the jostling ahead of the all-important presidential primary elections at the start of next year is fast approaching its peak. In Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country, the outlines of the government that will take office after the April 21 poll are impossible to predict, in large part as a result of the factional battles being waged within the presidency.
Twelve years of Jacques Chirac, 10 of Bush, 10 of Tony Blair, eight of Olusegun Obasanjo — all of it will soon come to an end — and some of it not soon enough. Now the focus is on transition and, from the outgoing leaders themselves, an obsession with ‘legacy”.
South Africa faces its own leadership transition. The ANC is in the midst of its own ‘primary”, albeit one that is determinedly, though not comprehensively, secretive in character.
There have been calls for greater openness and wider public participation in the process. But political parties are private clubs, with their own culture and rules, and only members of the club have a formal stake. Those outside the club can apply to join, or holler at will from without.
Fair enough. But the secrecy about the process is not especially helpful. Unless Thabo Mbeki persists with the poorly conceived notion that he can stand again and win the ANC presidency, the ANC election will essentially be a ballot to determine the identity of the country’s next president.
A formal primary system would require candidates to set out their stalls in public. Candidates would have the opportunity to test their views — and their mettle — against the full spectrum of public opinion. A more profound debate about the appropriate attributes needed by the next president than we are currently having might be possible.
What are those attributes? Are we clear? Is the ANC clear? There are a variety of dimensions to this. First, the internal: the ANC lies at the heart of South Africa’s political system; it has to hold together, and this requires not only tough and resourceful leadership and the ability to command the respect of different constituencies, but also the capacity to bridge the ANC’s two great traditions — African nationalism and socialism.
Second, the domestic policy imperative: a commitment to the values of democratic accountability, transparency and human dignity that lie behind the Constitution’s exposition of social transformation, and an ability to harness the state’s power for the ‘best traditions of social democracy”, as the ANC’s draft Strategy and Tactics discussion document puts it.
Third, the intellect and experience to grasp global political economy and apply the analysis to South Africa’s international public diplomacy. If South Africa is to continue to play a leadership role in Africa and the developing world, it needs a president with the breadth of vision to do so.
Fourth, personal integrity in the face of a complex cobweb of interlocking corporate and political interests.
Whether it is South Africa, Nigeria, the UK or the US, there is also the question of what is needed most: a more-of-the-same, ‘smooth” transition, with the succession for instance of a man who has held the economic policy tiller for more than 10 years with admirable steadiness, such as Brown? Or a fresh broom, someone completely dissociated and thereby untouched by the misjudgements and misadventures (think Iraq) of the current regime?
As Mbeki’s policy on Zimbabwe moves dangerously close to appeasement, running the risk of eclipsing his historic accomplishments elsewhere on the continent, which of his lieutenants are tainted by association and which are untouched, free to claim credit for a gradual acceleration of poverty alleviation here?
Trying to impose a positive legacy on the tides of history is an exercise in futility. Perhaps the biggest lesson from the around the world is that the most constructive thing an outgoing leader can do is to help create the best conditions for a thorough, public debate about the nature of the transition. That may be the real limits of a ‘positive legacy”.