In coalitions, stability trumps principle

“We are on record that we will never govern with the ANC because you cannot solve the problem by partnering with the cause of that problem. The ANC is the cause of SA’s problems. We can’t partner with them in a coalition. To talk practically, how do you investigate corruption when you govern with the same party that created the corruption?”

These are the words of Michael Beaumont of ActionSA, effectively leader Herman Mashaba’s right-hand man at the party that’s effectively the tail wagging the dog in Gauteng metropolitan municipality politics. That was only 11 months ago during the counting of the votes in the 2021 local government elections.

It emerged this week that ActionSA is considering working with the ANC because, as Beaumont puts it: “…political parties have to start talking to one another … in coalitions, viewing each other as partners or enemies hasn’t done well from a stability point of view.”

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There is nothing wrong with what Beaumont said a year ago about ridding SA of corruption, the ruling party is the cause of the current corruption in SA. But the approach of Mashaba’s newcomers to coalition politics at the time was quite immature.

The Democratic Alliance (DA) tried it in Tshwane and Nelson Mandela Bay by excluding the ANC simply on principle, but those coalitions did not last. The principle they had chosen to die on was anyone but the ANC – and it led them into a coalition with the Economic Freedom Fighters.

The red berets in those coalitions emerged as the tail wagging the dog because they realised that the DA had closed the door to coalition with any other party and they knew if they threatened to walk out, the DA would lose power.

Which is why ActionSA must be commended for their mature stand of wanting to keep all doors open: In coalitions, stability trumps principle.

This is not to say the ANC needs to be included in all coalitions to make governing possible, but it is to say to simply exclude them as a principle is a recipe for instability, because it leaves them as a useful alternative for other parties within the coalition and as has been clearly demonstrated in the removal of the DA mayor in the City of Joburg, those other parties know they can get more out of the excluded ANC because they are desperate to get back into power.

The ANC has been so emboldened by the installation of their mayor, Dada Morero, in the city of Joburg that they have now set themselves a Christmas Day deadline to have taken over the Ekurhuleni and Tshwane metros.

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For the sake of the residents of these metros, it can only be hoped that the ANC knows and has learnt from their short time in the wilderness that what keeps parties in power is excellent service to the residents of those municipalities.

Regaining power through destabilising existing coalitions could be a double-edged sword for the ANC: some of its leaders may see it as a chance for redemption and do right and some of them may see it as a chance to loot more.

Either way, losing the metros in the last two elections must have taught both ANC factions a lesson they are better off heeding: voters do not forget hardships.