Nene-anniversary 
South Africa in December 2015 was much like South Africa now. People were planning to go home or on holiday for Christmas. We were obsessed with the value of the rand and whether it would be an El Niño or a La Niña season.
The temperature of our politics had been increasing steadily since Jacob Zuma won the ANC’s leadership battle at Polokwane eight years before.
But Zuma was firmly in charge. No one in the ANC would move against him. And, through the ANC, he governed the country, despite having weathered several political storms.
He had given a semi-apology for the government money spent on his Nkandla homestead, while questions were being asked about his “friends”, the Guptas. These questions had peaked after Atul Gupta confirmed to EWN’s Barry Bateman that a planeload of his wedding guests had received permission to land at Waterkloof Air Force Base.
On Wednesday, 9 December 2015, there was only one indication that everything was about to change — a report by Sam Mkokeli hinting that Zuma was preparing to move against the finance minister, Nhlanhla Nene.
Even so, while loading my children into the car after a family event that night, I was not prepared for the phone call from the then editor of Daily Maverick.
Branko Brkic knew immediately how important this was. After a brief conversation, I agreed to write a piece, which was entitled The day we realised we’re in serious trouble.
So unexpected were these events, I had to borrow my wife’s laptop to write it, having left mine in the office.
Zuma moves without ANC
While there were many different elements to consider, one simple fact stood out, both then and now.
It was obvious that Zuma was moving without consulting the ANC. For the first time, he was making important appointments while bypassing the party’s National Executive Committee and its top officials.
This was clear because in the ANC’s statement on the appointment of Des van Rooyen to replace Nene, it said it “noted” the appointment. Nowhere was the word “welcomed” used.
This set off an unprecedented series of events.
By Sunday night, Van Rooyen had been removed, and Zuma had been forced to appoint Pravin Gordhan as finance minister.
I remember getting a call from an editor telling me she’d received an email announcing this. But she wanted a further check.
I phoned a government communications official, who confirmed that the email announcing Gordhan’s appointment was legit. I got the impression the official could not believe what had happened.
It took some time for the dust to clear and for a proper understanding of the events of that weekend to emerge.
Senior ANC leaders, under pressure from businesspeople, prevailed on Zuma to relent. The then deputy president, Cyril Ramaphosa, and a pre-Digital Vibes ANC treasurer Zweli Mkhize played important roles in this.
This then set the central tension of the State Capture era, where Zuma in the Presidency tried to put Gordhan under pressure, while Gordhan used the power of the public to defend himself.
Even now, some of the events of that time almost defy disbelief.
Business leaders joined ordinary people, workers, Cosatu and, crucially, the then Gauteng ANC leader, Paul Mashatile, at events aimed at removing Zuma from office.
From mature, middle-class, white women chanting “Zuma must go” to a business leader hauling their cappuccino machine along with them, parts of society that had never taken their politics to the streets were suddenly active.
The chaos and the reckoning
The year 2016 was dominated by this tension, but it was only a forerunner of what was to come on the stroke of midnight of April Fool’s Day 2017.
That was the moment that Zuma decided to finally fire Gordhan and others, and appoint the liar Malusi Gigaba as finance minister.
It is incredible to think that somehow Mzansi survived Gigaba in the National Treasury.
But hours after the reshuffle, something unprecedented happened.
It was ANC Secretary-General Gwede Mantashe saying, “I felt like this list [of new ministers] has been developed somewhere else” — a clear reference to the Guptas.
The deputy president (and deputy leader of the ANC) Ramaphosa said removing Gordhan was “unacceptable”.
His comments were recorded by a GCIS official who ensured that every single radio newsroom got the recording directly.
It was proof that Ramaphosa was in the fight and wanted the nation to know where he stood.
It was a day that should also be remembered for the fact that the government, inexplicably, chose that moment to cancel the official memorial service for Ahmed Kathrada, who had been extremely critical of Zuma.
So much more followed in 2017, leading up to the ANC’s electoral conference at Nasrec in December.
I don’t think I can ever forget the tension of those moments; as I wrote at the time, I woke at 1.39 on the morning of the election result announcement. The stakes were high, and the choices were stark.
Dr Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma’s loss and Ramaphosa’s narrow victory led to Zuma’s forced resignation as President, perhaps ironically, on Valentine’s Day 2018.
Uncertainty loomed over what would unfold, but as it became evident that Zuma would address the nation that evening, I hurriedly left my brother’s house, quickly setting up the TV and my iPad for note-taking — this time, I was fully prepared.
It was my view then and remains my view now that Zuma’s forced resignation was a direct result of his decision to unilaterally remove Nene two and a half years before.
It was the fact that he did this without the full support of the top leadership of the ANC that led to this outcome.
Perhaps that was the lesson drawn from this by Ramaphosa. And maybe it explains his long-lamented reluctance to act and institute real reforms. He had a very close view of how Zuma’s unilateral actions led to his downfall, and would have been reminded of how important it is to move with the ANC rather than against it.
A piece of history
Much has changed since those days and, to a large extent, the sacking of Nhlanhla Nene is just a piece of our history.
But that means we still carry it with us.
Nene himself may well bear the scars. It was never his intention to be such a focal point, and being remembered for something so negative can hardly be comfortable.
On the other hand, he knows that he was fired for doing the right thing.
Pravin Gordhan has died, his death perhaps hastened by the strain he was put under.
Zuma runs an increasingly dysfunctional party, sacking one daughter as an MP one day and appointing another the next.
And strangely, even though we now live under a coalition government, there has never been a series of political events such as we saw in the days after Nene’s removal, and the final days of Zuma’s rule.
Yes, there was the violence of 2021, again as a direct result of Zuma. And there was the drama of the coalition negotiations. But nothing like a president being repudiated by his own party.
It is one of the signs of the success of the national coalition government that since the Budget was finally passed in March, there has been virtually no drama within government.
What drama there has been has been largely confined to the internal situations within the MK party and the EFF, and, perhaps soon, the DA.
This is largely because the ANC has lost its political dominance and no longer has such tight control of South Africa.
No one small group of people has the power over the country through the ANC in the way Zuma and his opponents had 10 years ago.
One of the major reasons for that is what happened on this day in 2015.
So much has changed since then.
But the rhythms of Mzansi in December continue.
We plan our holidays, wonder if the rand will remain below 17 to the dollar and wish the La Niña rain would finally stop. DM