Will Zuma’s attempts to Zanufy South Africa backfire?

For Zuma, land reform is clearly a political instrument to be used for ulterior purposes – as indeed Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe used it in 2000 to radicalise politics and the economy when he lost a critical constitutional referendum that had become a test of his support.

There, too, the elites and cronies benefited more from land redistribution than the landless poor.

And Zuma’s call for “radical socio-economic transformation” apparently aims to serve the same purpose, echoing Mugabe’s radicalisation of the Zimbabwean economy by mobilising Zimbabweans against a common enemy of “Western imperialists”, allegedly seeking to destroy or control their country.

But South Africa is not Zimbabwe.

It’s no coincidence that the PAC, which has always staked its political fortunes on land, enjoys minuscule political support.

South Africa also has a much larger economy than Zimbabwe; much harder to manipulate, not least because of far stronger political and economic opposition.

If Zuma does nonetheless go ahead and fire Gordhan, the market response could well be larger and more damaging than his testing of the waters has suggested.

And the political reaction might also be bigger than he has anticipated.

He got a small taste of it from Kathrada’s funeral on Wednesday when former President Kgalema Motlanthe won huge applause when he read Kathrada’s open letter to Zuma last year, urging him to resign.

And Gordhan received a standing ovation.

As Anton du Plessis, Executive Director of the Institute for Security Studies in Pretoria, puts it, Zuma’s attempts to Zanufy the South African economy are the acts of a desperate leader, trying to shore up his waning power and influence – not a strong one.

A buffalo, hunters say, is most dangerous when it is wounded.

By Peter Fabricius. This article was reproduced from ISS Today

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