I have never had confidence in President Zuma’s administration when he was first elected as party president in Polokwane in 2007. I didn’t expect any miracles to come out of his term in office. Zuma has remained consistent and I didn’t expect any less based on what has happened between 2009-2012.
Having said that I don’t mind having him in office for a second term. If we need to have him in office longer before the ANC leadership can see that it isn't/wasn't 'personal' when we said “Zuma must go.” The ANC needs to go through the process of having Zuma in power for 10years so that they learn a valuable lesson from this experience.
Also to me it doesn’t make any sense at all to bring Kgalema Motlanthe as we don’t even know what he stands for. 2012 was a very tough year for South Africa and Kgalema was nowhere to be seen hence he doesn’t make a better leader than Zuma.
1. Where was Kgalema during the Marikana tragedy? Did we hear him speak out or do anything?
2. Where was Kgalema during the Limpopo textbook crisis?
3. Where was Kgalema when people were taking to the streets and the courts regarding the e-Tolls?
4. Where was Kgalema during the truck drivers strike that crippled our economy?
5. Where was Kgalema when South Africa was downgraded by international credit rating agencies?
Kgalema is part of the Zuma mob that the served under the corrupt administration and he did nothing to speak out against that. So in my eyes, he doesn’t make a better candidate than Jacob Zuma.
We need Zuma for another term in office so that the ANC learns and bleeds further for its mistakes. In 2004 under Mbeki, the ANC had 69.71% of the vote, in 2009 the ANC has 65.90% under Zuma which was a drop of roughly 4%. The ANC will bleed further in 2014 and I suspect that it might dip into the 50s zone under Zuma.
This will teach them a lesson and they will stop taking voters for granted and they will start delivering once they see that they are under threat especially if they slip below the 60% zone. So I say Zuma is good for democracy. Let us allow him to build his ‘palace’ and watch the ANC suffer at the polls in 2014. Thereafter we might see delivery as this will be a huge wake up call.
Having said that since Cyril Ramaphosa will be Zuma’s deputy, Ramaphosa will act as a “Prime Minister” in 2014 and play the same role that Thabo Mbeki played when Nelson Mandela was president between 1994-1999 and run the country while Zuma act ceremoniously as president but Ramaphosa will be pulling the strings and running the show so to speak.
Cyril Ramaphosa will take over the reins if not beaten by Zweli Mkhize and be president of the republic in 2019. But it will be too late by then. The ANC would have already felt a major blow and they would have to re-group and consolidate their support base.
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