Jacob Zuma sought this week to put a more refined spin on his reputation for crudely mobilising Zulu support, arguing that South Africa needs a leader who ‘understands the issues†of ethnicity.
Speaking to the Cape Town Press Club on Tuesday, he attempted to counter the perception that he is exploiting the prejudices of poor and less-educated constituencies. He sought instead to position himself as a mediator between the demands of the constitutional state and those of tribalism and regionalism.
‘It is an issue that needs a very mature leadership who understands the feelings. You mustn’t think, because I am now advanced, those who think ethnically are useless — You need to work at it all the time,†he said.
This approach achieves three things for Zuma. It projects his ethnic mobilisation programme in KwaZulu-Natal as a bid to bring on board people whose grievances could threaten stability. It reinforces the perception that his warm populism is a credible — even necessary — alternative to the perceived sophisticated aridity of President Thabo Mbeki. And it opens up an avenue for him to present himself, particularly to white audiences, as a reconciler in the Mandela tradition, rather than a confrontational Africanist like Mbeki.
‘No group should feel ‘I am being elbowed out’, and if they do feel that, you shouldn’t say they are out of their minds,†he concluded.
The remarks were made under the heading of ‘non-racialismâ€, one of five topics he said all South Africans should be equally concerned about. The others were political stability, crime, economic development and poverty. In each case he was careful to avoid specific policy proposals, while hinting at the differences between Mbeki and himself.
His focus on political stability seemed designed to soothe a largely white audience, sprinkled with journalists and diplomats, as well as liberal elder statesmen such as former Democratic Party leader Colin Eglin.
‘We have worked for a stable South Africa,†Zuma declared, ‘We have established a democracy that is acknowledged by the world as an important system. Whatever we do, we must sustain that belief.
‘I believe political stability is an important element in any society — without [it] everything goes wrong; with it everything goes right. Whoever rules the country, we must have a constitution that guides us.â€
His comments are telling in the aftermath of project Avani, the botched National Intelligence Agency investigation into the impact of the ANC succession battle on South Africa’s stability, which became a vehicle to spy on key Zuma opponents.
Asked if political stability was endangered, however, he insisted that he was ‘not concerned at allâ€.
He was similarly non-committal on the crucial question of his attitude to economic policy and poverty — touted by his union and communist backers as the main factor in their support for him against the ostensibly business-friendly candidates around Mbeki, or empowerment figures such as Cyril Ramaphosa and Tokyo Sexwale.
He deferred to ANC policy positions: ‘When we talk economy we talk mixed economy, we talk the private sector and intervention by the state. What does that mean?â€
He gave no answer, but suggested he was well placed to act as a mediator between more radical constituencies and established interests, and that the tripartite alliance was necessary to keep unionists close to the party in government.
‘If you talk about the problems of the workers and the poor, and you are in an alliance that is close to government, you can address the problems of the workers and the poor,†he said. There have been whispered suggestion from his entourage to senior business figures in recent months that key members of Mbeki’s economic team would remain in a Zuma Cabinet.
On crime, however, he more clearly marked out a space of his own by implicitly criticising Mbeki’s response. ‘We discuss the statistics instead of discussing crime,†Zuma said. Briefly, he seemed to make a policy suggestion: ‘Sometimes I say, why can’t we remove the guns from everyone; start afresh. The very legal guns are the ones that kill people.â€
During question time he gave the one answer everyone wanted to hear: he will not decline nomination for the ANC presidency, even if fresh charges are brought against him.