Family and favour at the court of Jacob Zuma
Jacob Zuma’s role as both state and party president is significantly underpinned by those who pay court to him on the basis of personal loyalty, patriarchal fealty and hope for personal gain, his formal authority buttressed by political patronage and protection which extends to those close to him. However, Zuma combines his role of tribal patriarch with that of his role at the head of a shadow state, his ‘family’ extending beyond close relatives to include business associates with shady connections. Zuma is an accidental president who ascended to the office because he was not Thabo Mbeki. He may not be any more inclined to cohabit with the morally dubious than his predecessor (who, notoriously, shielded Chief of Police Jackie Selebi from investigation for linkages to organised crime). Nonetheless, it is difficult to believe that a man deemed by a court to have been in a corrupt relationship with Shabir Shaik (eventually sentenced to 15 years imprisonment for offences committed in connection with the notorious 1998 arms deal) and who was facing some 783 criminal charges involving fraud, corruption and racketeering would have secured the presidency had he not been able to place himself at the head of a ‘coalition of the aggrieved’ who wished to bring Mbeki’s rule and influence to an abrupt end. That this coalition was broad-based is generally accepted, receiving strong backing not merely from the organised left within the Tripartite Alliance but ethnic support from within the ANC of his home province. But in addition, he received strong support from black business interests. Mbeki may have been the chief champion of BEE, but his challenger received support from a motley group of business players, some of whom switched their support from Mbeki to Zuma when they identified him as the rising man; from established business persons from KwaZulu-Natal who had long been close to him; from those who had lost out or had felt disadvantaged under Mbeki; and not least, from major figures within the Indian business community (again, significantly rooted in KwaZulu-Natal). In addition, he was backed by powerful figures within the ANC who had either been convicted of criminal offences (such as Winnie Madikizela-Mandela) or who were under investigation for criminal acts, some of these for alleged involvement in tendering scams (such as Ngoako Ramathlodi and Angie Motsheka) (Southall 2009). In Zuma, powerful elements within the party saw a man who would not be overly troubled by ethical or legal concerns when it became time to cash in their cards for supporting him in his conjoined struggle for political survival and to stay out of jail. The evidence laid before the court in Shabir Shaik’s trial of Zuma’s heavy
Introduction: Understanding the ANC at sub-national level
The political entrenchment of the African National Congress (ANC) as the ruling party in South Africa over the last two decades has given rise to an extensive literature focussing upon negative internal trends such as factionalism, the manipulation of internal electoral processes, the pursuit of individual wealth, internal disorder, and increasing tensions within the tripartite alliance. Such trends, along with growing levels of popular protest, suggest a decline in the party’s legitimacy and long term prospects. Such organisational deterioration has occasioned an extensive reflective literature, yet there has been little detailed research into how the ANC operates on the ground. Overwhelmingly, predominant paradigms - of the ANC as a national liberation movement; as a party that has fallen victim to neo-patrimonialism; as a dominant party; and as a vehicle of neo-liberal capitalism - are all illuminating, yet simultaneously entrench key weaknesses in analysis, focussing upon over-arching narratives rather than encouraging careful analysis of causal practices. Much of this flows from the fact that academic analysts lack practical and intuitive knowledge of the ANC’s institutional life, complexity and informal networks. The present collection seeks to correct that balance by presenting a set of papers which focus upon the dynamics of the ANC at sub-national level, pointing the way to a more critical engagement with party processes than is usually presented.
Urban Identities and Catastrophe: Izmir and Salonica at the End of the Ottoman Empire*
Two huge fires dramatically influenced the urban development of Salonica and Izmir, in 1917 and in 1922, respectively. These catastrophes occurred after the Ottoman Empire fell, and Salonica and Izmir had shifted into new national contexts. The fires mainly destroyed the districts that were transformed during the late‐Ottoman period. These districts became the cosmopolitan façades of modern Izmir and Salonica. The post‐fires' tabula rasa provided an opportunity for Greek and Turkish politicians and European planners to change the urban identity of both cities. Moreover, the Lausanne Treaty of 1923 transformed their multicultural societies also. Reconstruction plans had been thought to de‐Ottomanize and remove the previous idea of the towns and their multiplicity, interpreting new cultural and nationalist feeling. Here, I emphasize how modernity was interpreted before and after the fires, and point out contradictions between ideological aspects of planning and how the first urban districts were built during the 1920s.