ROAD TO ELECTIONS 2024
Opposition voices alarm as ANC enlists Zanu-PF help for elections campaign
Opposition parties have expressed concern over reports that the ANC has asked Zanu-PF for assistance with its elections campaign, given the Zimbabwean ruling party’s controversial electoral record.
Zimbabwean state media on Tuesday broke the news that the country’s ruling party, Zanu-PF, had been called on by the ANC to assist with its final stretch of campaigning ahead of South Africa’s general elections on 29 May.
The Herald reported that Zanu-PF had “been invited by [its] colleagues in the ANC to be part of their mobilisation process in the last few days of campaigning”.
Zanu-PF Secretary-General Dr Obert Mpofu told the newspaper, somewhat cryptically: “We have been in touch with the South African ruling party. What is happening there is an internal issue which we are closely monitoring. I cannot rule out the fact that we can go and assist if they need assistance from us. There are pressing issues that need to be addressed by South Africans on the political developments taking place there.”
Read more in Daily Maverick: Elections 2024
Neither Zanu-PF nor the ANC responded to Daily Maverick’s request for comment on Thursday.
However, SABC radio news tweeted on Thursday: “The ANC has confirmed that Zimbabwe’s ruling Zanu-PF will assist the party during its election campaigns and will also be part of the observer missions during the May 29 elections.”
On Wednesday, SABC TV news broadcast a clip of ANC Deputy Secretary-General Nomvula Mokonyane addressing journalists while campaigning in KwaZulu-Natal. Mokonyane confirmed that the ANC had called on “African leaders” to act as election observers.
Mokonyane said, “We must also learn from how Zanu-PF has been able to renew itself and even reclaim constituencies that in the past they have not. Same with us, we have to reclaim and prepare a takeover of the lost metros in South Africa.”
Opposition parties respond with outrage
The South African opposition was quick to point to Zanu-PF’s problematic electoral record as news spread of the development on Thursday.
Mmusi Maimane’s Build One South Africa (Bosa) said it was “widely accepted” that the Zimbabwean ruling party “rigs elections in Zimbabwe to favour itself and to continue its misrule of the party”.
Zanu-PF “has presided over an autocratic, authoritarian and repressive regime”, Bosa said.
Maimane’s party had a message for Zanu-PF: “They are not welcome in South Africa.”
The Democratic Alliance (DA), meanwhile, charged that the ANC’s invitation to Zanu-PF to participate in its campaign programme “amounts to political interference with our elections”.
The party did not elaborate on which provisions of the Electoral Act it believed the ANC had violated through this, but said it would lodge a complaint with the Electoral Commission of SA (IEC) over a “foreign political party” actively “pursuing a partisan political agenda on behalf of the ANC”.
The DA noted that after Zimbabwe’s most recent elections in August 2023, which saw President Emmerson Mnangagwa win a second term, election observers, including the regional SADC Election Observer Mission, had raised concerns over the freedom and fairness of the polls.
The ANC, however, endorsed the election results — and considers Zanu-PF a sister party.
Hypocrisy over desire for Western election observers?
Some commentators suggested it was hypocritical to want election observers to monitor South Africa’s 29 May elections only if they are from Western countries.
Rise Mzansi’s spokesperson, Gugu Ndima, said the DA’s controversial appeal to the US and to the European Union in March to send election observers to South Africa was disingenuous when contrasted with the party’s outrage over the Zimbabwean invitation.
Ndima said both the DA and ANC’s appeals were problematic, given that both the Zimbabwean and the US political systems were marked by “elections controversy”, and given that both parties had issued direct invitations without involving the IEC.
She said: “As Rise Mzansi, we fully support the standard practice of having election observers, whether they come from Zimbabwe or the US, but this must be managed by the appropriate authority, that being the Electoral Commission.”
IEC should manage observer process
The IEC itself has expressed a similar sentiment.
IEC CEO Sy Mamabolo said the DA’s appeal to Western governments was procedurally unorthodox.
“The commission believes that elections must be observed because observation gives us credibility,” Mamobolo was quoted as saying at the time.
“Nonetheless, we are alive to the fact that the letter by the DA is directly to an executive in another country. That is not how ordinarily the observation process works. Often the observation works at a multilateral level: AU, SADC and so on.”
At the time, ANC president Cyril Ramaphosa condemned the DA’s invitation to Western powers, saying: “For a non-state entity to do something like that is basically saying we are mortgaging our democracy.”
The ANC is, of course, also a non-state entity. DM
The IEC regulations require election observers to be non-partisan.
So how can Zanu-PF be allowed to both campaign and observe?
And the hits keep on coming. When you think you have finally sunken as low as you can go as a country, the ruling party then does this. They point fingers at the DA for the symbolic flag burning advertisement, all the while the ANC actually burns the country on a real level. Naledi Pandor runs to the ICJ pointing fingers at Israel for genocide and yet here we have the ANC enlisting the help of a political party that itself committed genocide against its own people and have held sham elections on countless occasions. The hypocrisy defies reason. Doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see where this is going? I have long believed that the ANC would not give up power through the ballot…
Good comment.
Excellent Kevin.
Birds of a feather
It now seems clear that Zimbabwe may be the only country to declare our elections “free and fair”; why else would you invite a murderous fox into a henhouse?
This is a red (burning) flag….
RM have it right. International observers are part of a rigorous election process, but the IEC manages that, not one of the parties contesting the election.
The DA need to check themselves first. They are forever popping up in other countries, either to show solidarity with some cause and/or to meet with like minded parties and to exchange ideas. They also asked the USA and the EU to intervene in the electoral process. Too often with them it is not what is done that matters, but who is doing it.
Increasingly RM seem the most sensible party involved in the elections.
Own goal.
It is horrible that they’ve invited Zanu-PF, but the DA’s criticism would have had more oomph had they not invited the US observers.
The DA as it is, is currently fighting a perception battle that prevents it from picking up the votes that the ANC is shedding. Much of the criticism against the DA is unfair. But it is small things like this that they have to think about, and that are preventing many ex ANC voters from drawing their cross there. It can even mean that they express a “protest” vote against poor service delivery, by not voting, or worse, voting EFF or MK. Votes that could have gone to the DA.
Burning the flag does not help. I personally get the message, but it’s about perceptions and throwing themselves out for criticism. What were they thinking? Same with Zille’s loose mouth.
The DA has sound principles which of course I’m aligned with, as should all South Africans be who want the country fixed. But think about it. The ANC has gone from 67% to what now seems like 40% in under two decades. The DA has captured almost none of that, which is a disgrace. Their marketing is extremely naive. Use words like “public money” (so people can understand, money that could have been used to fix schools, police stations), not middle class language like “tax payer’s money” that makes it sound like it should not be the township voter’s problem.
Exactly…………DA should be ashamed that parties like MK and EFF are the ones benefiting from ANC’s fall from grace…..lol
I find it unbelievable that some commentators are equating Zanu PF as an election observer to the US or EU as election observer. While the US and EU have some irregular situations in the past, it surely cannot compare to what happend in Zim with Zanu PF. There is no equivalency between a known election stealing political party and the entire EU or US denocratic countries.
Sadly in our country identity politics trump any logic it seems, and again it is entirely clear that the DA is held to a much much higher standard than most of the other parties.
Couple this with the ANC, EFF and the MK painting the West as this evil neo colonial force while pandering to the likes of Zanu PF, Putin and Al Bashir, all people and organizations with proven record of violence and authoritarianism, the hypocrisy (and dare I say actual arrogance) of the of these parties (ANC in particular) is just insane.
But yeah let’s focus on the outrage of an animation of a burning flag.
Karl before setting the standard for the country the DA must avoid certain traps, the DA except financial corruption is doing everything that the ANC is doing wrong.
The DA carries all the qualities of leading this country to world class level but lack only one critical skill, they just fail to read the room.
The Ukraine approach could have been done with the understanding of the players USA and UK in mind, they support a conflict for different reasons than what they publicly say, it would have worked better to follow the majority domestic sentiments.
Before deciding to support Israel a brief research of the history and the illegal occupation similar to what this country experienced, reading the room will tell you that it is suicidal to say the illegal occupier has a right to defend herself against the people she occupies.
Denouncing Zimbabwe a once occupied state by Britain and crippled by sanctions is just adding in portraying the DA as a party aligned with the west whilst the majority domestic sentiment is pro Zimbabwe and anti-west.
Logically speaking the DA is doing the right thing by avoiding suspected dodgy characters like Russia,Iran,North korea, Zanu PF and the likes, the image and timing is a problem.
Anti Israel ,USA,UK and allies is a majority sentiment domestically and internationally even inside the countries themselves.
Properly reading the room will warn the party and offer the direction towards the majority sentiments because the majority votes lie there.
The new dawn is really starting to pick up speed.
February 2024: DA calls on US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken to interfere in elections in SA.
May 2024: DA objects to Zim interference in SA election.
Comedic!
I think the DA is opposed to Zanu-PF interference not “Zim” interference. And I stand under correction but I think they called for US observation, not to help them campaign, i.e. interfere.
Birds of a feather.
“We must also learn from how Zanu-PF has been able to renew itself and even reclaim constituencies that in the past they have not.”
By fixing the ballot. Next question?
If the Zimbabweans campaign for Cyril … then Zuma’s MK will kill them … and vice versa!
Rather let the Zimcrims stay at
home!
We need clarification here….are we, or more correctly the ANC political party in its own right, inviting ZANU-PF Zimbos to come to SA to work for and promote the ANC party in the upcoming election, or are they being invited as independent election observers? Big difference. Quite frankly Zimbabwe is not a paragon and leading light in the promotion and sustainment of democracy and the rule of law for all its citizens. I’d prefer they stay on the other side of the Limpopo.