OP-ED: Self-determination Essential Under GNU

Self-determination essential under GNU

South Africa is a large and extremely diverse country. Our collective differences now extend to who should govern us. In the 2024 elections, for the first time since 1994, no political party achieved an outright majority. There is a high probability that this will now become our new normal, just as it has in numerous other countries who use proportional representation to elect their government.

We are once again led by a ‘Government of National Unity’ or GNU, and we have had four months to cast our eye over it. It has been illuminating.

The GNU has received a generally positive reception, not least because it prevented the alternative ‘doomsday coalition’ of the ANC, MK, and the EFF. But its limitations have also been clinically exposed. Horse trading and brinkmanship have become the currency of South African politics and woe betide any whose faith naively resides in the benevolence of others. 

Ramaphosa not to be trusted

During the GNU’s inception we saw President Ramaphosa’s ANC twice deceive its primary partner, the DA. The first time in forming a GNU rather than a coalition in order to dilute the DA’s influence, and the second in adding extra cabinet posts behind the DA’s back to stack the cabinet in its favour.

Over the following 100 or so days, Ramaphosa’s skullduggery has continued unabated. Despite the DA’s protests, he signed the BELA Bill into law. He didn’t sign as the GNU’s president, he brazenly signed as if an ANC president, which since the ANC could not form a government alone, he is not.

Next in his crosshairs were Afrikaners. At the behest of John Steenhuisen, he contacted Afriforum’s Kallie Kriel and Solidarity’s Dirk Hermann who had described the BELA Bill as an ‘act of aggression’ against Afrikaners. Ramaphosa resorted to type and offered up the significant sounding but ultimately meaningless concession of delaying the implementation of clauses 4 and 5 for three months. If he really wanted to renegotiate the clauses, he needed to have done so before the bill was signed. Now that he has signed it, it is law whatever his ‘discussions’ may resolve. Clauses 4 and 5 can now only be amended by an entirely new amendment bill. The BELA Act will end up in court - and so it should. AfriForum will not relent.

Self-determination delivers legal agency

The Western Cape also has issues with the GNU. At the Provincial Parliament’s first sitting, Premier Winde lamented his lengthy list of woes which included an intergovernmental dispute over a partially funded public wage settlement, an unfair provincial equitable share calculation, sizeable budget cuts, and insufficient disaster relief funding. 

By their very nature, coalition governments require compromise, and the GNU is no exception. Since in all probability this is our new normal, the different constituencies which make up the South African population need to adjust their mindset. Coalition government offers up considerable opportunity for minority interest groups to advance their cause, but only when done from a position of strength. Ramaphosa, now the leader of a minority group himself, is currently delivering a masterclass in how it is done. He will walk over the DA for as long as they will let him. By projecting power he does not in reality hold, he has skillfully obscured the fact that he cannot survive as either ANC or South African President without the DA’s support. The DA need to remind themselves of this.

For those not keen to be walked over at will, the unquestionable and inalienable right to self-determination is a powerful tool. Self-determination establishes legal agency to make your own decisions. It allows communities to opt in to the system and cooperate for the common good where that is possible, but it also allows them to opt out and go their own way when the terms of cooperation are unacceptable. As a result of not having formally exercised it, Afrikaners, the Western Cape people, and Zulus are all currently paying a price.

Afrikaners losing out in Tshwane

The largest concentration of Afrikaners in South Africa is in Pretoria. For the last 18 months, Tshwane (Pretoria) has had an Afrikaans DA mayor, Cilliers Brink. Under Brink’s leadership, Tshwane and AfriForum signed a Memorandum of Understanding under which AfriForum members would assist the struggling municipality by maintaining infrastructure, providing security, and even cutting the grass. Brink certainly hadn’t solved Tshwane’s myriad of problems, but there was consensus amongst Afrikaners (and many others) that he was at least making steady progress.

Last week the ANC, with the assistance of the increasingly infantile ActionSA, ousted Brink and just like that, for the first time since 2016, Pretorians are back under the leadership of the same ANC which destroyed the capital in the first place. In the process, ANC Gauteng Premier Lesufi, who has been waging a personal war against Afrikaners for some time, has been strengthened having already refused to form a provincial coalition with the DA in Gauteng.

Had Afrikaners formally claimed the right to self-determination, as I believe they should, they could have taken direct control of their schools, their neighbourhoods, and perhaps much more besides. People may hate Orania, but it is almost certainly the best run municipality in South Africa today.

Winde erred in blocking Western Cape Peoples Bill

In the Western Cape, Premier Winde has much more to answer for. Winde actively blocked the Western Cape from claiming self-determination when he collaborated with the ANC to prevent the Western Cape Peoples Bill from being passed. In doing so, he has rendered the Western Cape powerless in the face of all of the problems he is now perpetually complaining about. 

The Western Cape Peoples Bill asserted the right of the Western Cape people to self-determination without establishing in what way it should be exercised. It was a get out of jail free card and Winde tore it up.

Zulu’s denied their democratic will

I have no time whatsoever for Jacob Zuma, he is an obstinate shyster who knowingly presided over the destruction of democratic South Africa. It is not a compliment to the Zulu people that the majority of them voted for Zuma despite knowing his sins, but it is also a fact that they did. Pragmatically, I am delighted for the people of KwaZulu Natal that the ANC, IFP, and DA were able to put aside their differences and work together to keep Zuma’s band of miscreants at bay. Ideologically, however, I am forced to concede that the Zulu people have been purposefully denied their democratic will.

Had the Zulu people claimed their right to self-determination, they would currently be governed according to their chosen custom. Zuma was ostensibly fighting for traditional African leadership and the return of African values.

All are minorities in South Africa

My preference for Cape Independence is well documented, but self-determination is far more profound than any discussion about secession. Self-determination is now recognised as a fundamental human right. At its heart, it is about ensuring that different communities whose existence may not correlate with existing national borders, are able to be governed according to their chosen custom and democratic will. Where they are at odds with the views of the national government, this right becomes immeasurably more important.

Ironically, race based-policy in South Africa obscures a potent truth; that we all belong to minority groups. Banding us together by skin colour created an artificial majority, but this majority will not survive coalition politics.

South Africa should never have been constituted as a unitary state, we are simply too diverse. That will sort itself out soon enough. In the meantime, if communities want to be able to safeguard their own future, they need to protect themselves from the whims of coalition government by claiming their right to self-determination. 

Those that don’t will increasingly have the decisions of others with whom they may vehemently disagree, forced upon them whether the majority of them like it or not. 

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