Can This Outsider Topple Mandela’s Party?

Zibi, 47, grew up in a small, impoverished village in the country’s southeast. Brought up by his grandparents, not far from Mandela’s birthplace, Zibi would go on to become the editor of Business Day, one of the country’s most prestigious newspapers. Last year, however, he launched the Rivonia Circle, a think tank that seeks to generate research from local grassroots engagements. Named after the Rivonia Trial, which saw Mandela sentenced to life imprisonment in 1964, Zibi’s organization also aims to spur a new generation of South Africans into political participation. It recently facilitated a civil society “indaba” (a South African version of the town hall meeting) to debate the current Electoral Amendment Bill — a piece of legislation which many believe will make South Africa considerably less democratic, distorting the proportional representation system to favor the larger parties.

Zibi’s pathway to politics via journalism is one that has a long tradition in South Africa. From Sol Plaatje, the first secretary-general of what would become the ANC, to anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko, progressive politicians in South Africa have often found their voice in journalistic writing and editing. “I hadn’t thought about it in that way,” Zibi says, laughing, “but there is a writing tradition that I drew from.” Zibi’s recent book “Manifesto” is a bold attempt at re-imagining South Africa — not dissimilar in that attempt to books by Plaatje, Biko and Mandela. But tradition plays an even bigger role in Zibi’s work with the Rivonia Circle.

Throughout the 1980s, while the ANC was banned and survived in exile, a broad anti-apartheid political coalition called the United Democratic Front (UDF) drove agitations against white rule within the country. The UDF was, as Zibi describes, a “very strong grassroots democratic movement.” Its ethos and practices were adopted when it merged with the ANC in 1990, according to experts. Roger Southall, emeritus professor of sociology at Wits University in Johannesburg, says to OZY that, at the time, there was a belief within the ANC “that there would be democratic control from the bottom, because of this [UDF] tradition of decisions being made by local branches.” Many believed a centralized party structure would not be able to dominate the local branches.

Zibi argues that the downhill slide began after the end of Mandela’s term as president in 1999. A different strain of thinking, also within the ANC, took over. Many formerly exiled ANC members, who had been educated in the Soviet Union and East Germany, “had a completely different culture, and very little knowledge of the practices of how decentralized grassroots organizations work,” he says. This influence, Zibi suggests, weakened South Africa’s democratic culture and set the stage for “ANC elites” to carry out “state capture,” a term used to describe the rampant corruption and the degradation of state institutions that has taken place in the past two decades.

Zibi says he wants to revitalize his country’s post-apartheid origins. His Rivonia Circle is attempting to re-enliven the UDF tradition of grassroots democracy through local town halls and collectives that will send ideas and policy plans upwards — rather than the country’s current top-down political system. But Zibi knows that turning his dream into reality won’t be easy at a time when populist and divisive rhetoric is sucking up most of the country’s political oxygen. Major political parties, he says, have largely given up on “trying to figure out what the political soul of South Africa is.”

Zibi believes alt-right and anti-immigration politics that have taken root overlook the reality that South Africa’s “soul is social democratic.” He points to South Africa’s widely acclaimed constitution, a document that took six years to negotiate and draft and that balances the demands for personal freedoms as well as having access to socio-economic rights. These include rights such as government-provided healthcare, education, water and electricity. The thinking embedded in the constitution, he says, “is the same as Ubuntu” — the southern African philosophy that translates as, “I am because we are.”

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Zibi regards the country’s national and state elections in 2024 as a potential breaking point for South Africa. “The ANC has morphed into a criminal organization,” he has said in the past, accusing it of causing the collapse of the economy and state infrastructure. Political commentator Stephen Grootes believes that Zibi could compete for the vote of Black professionals in the national election. This is a group that has been derided by the ANC and has never fit into the largely white neo-liberal Democratic Alliance, the principal opposition party. But several political commentators have told OZY that if Zibi is going to make a run for president, with a coalition of grassroots organizations backing him, he is going to have to move quickly. Some have even suggested that he has left it too late.

When asked where his Rivonia Circle movement is headed, Zibi says, “more and more organizations are gravitating towards us and are speaking to us about solving the democratization deficit.” But challenges remain, he acknowledges. “We need to develop leaders and collaborate with others.” When pushed on whether he will turn Rivonia Circle into a political party and run for president, he says he doesn’t want to create “another party built on personality — it has to have a truly collaborative and unifying sense about it.”

But formal electoral politics and a presidential campaign are beckoning, he suggests.

“There is high potential for that. I do think it is possible.”

Has South Africa’s political elite betrayed Mandela’s vision and does the country need a new leadership?