The changing youth vote is a familiar headache for many political parties, including in the West. Ahead of Poland’s election last year, which unseated the Law and Justice (PiS) party after eight years, exit polls showed that while older voters supported establishment parties, young women increasingly favoured the far-left, while young men flirted with the far-right, even openly misogynistic parties.
The Israel-Hamas war has further radicalised young people, with elite college campuses in the United States erupting into confrontations between pro-Palestine and pro-Israel protesters. Ahead of the November presidential elections, Joe Biden is facing pressure to stop supporting Israel or face the wrath of young voters.
Opinion polls show that young people are broadly dissatisfied with Western institutions and society, and pushing for more radical changes.
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GEN-Z VS GENOCIDE: HOPE FOR HUMANITY?
GEN-Z VS GENOCIDE: HOPE FOR HUMANITY?
In South Africa, opinion polls point to a slightly different picture: the discontent is general and unconfined to any demographic group. It’s not hard to see why.
Aside from older issues of corruption and “state capture” as well as the challenges of being stuck in the so-called middle-income trap, in recent years, South Africa has also seen rising food prices, extremely high unemployment and frequent rolling blackouts. The post-Covid hit to the popularity of most incumbent governments is likely to have affected the ANC too.
The country’s largest opposition party, Democratic Alliance, has also seen an erosion of local support after being challenged by the upstart Patriotic Alliance. The former, which prides itself on being a “non-racial” party, has been accused by the latter of taking its minority supporters for granted, in particular the community previously classified as “coloured” under the apartheid regime (as opposed to “whites”, “blacks” and “Indians”).
This has international parallels: the US Democratic Party is panicking over the possibility that Latino and black voters might abandon it en masse.
Another major reason for ANC’s defeat was the sudden political re-emergence of Jacob Zuma, whose new party, uMkhonto weSizwe (MK), won 14.6 per cent of the vote. Many suspect the return of the former president, who still faces corruption charges, is aimed at taking his fight for justice into the court of public opinion.
A woman wears a shirt featuring former South African president and MK leader Jacob Zuma to cast her vote at a polling station in Umlazi on May 29. Photo: AFP
Comparisons with Donald Trump abound, not least because when Zuma was taken into custody in 2021, his supporters launched the worst riots South Africa had seen since apartheid.
For all its shortcomings, the ANC would say – and even critics from the West would agree – that it has managed the monumental task of leading a divided country out of the shadow of apartheid to form a united and dynamic multiracial democracy.
Sadly, this might no longer be the case. The real election story may be of growing divisions. The rise of Zuma’s party, MK, is based on concentrated support among the Zulus, the largest ethnic group in South Africa, while the upstart Patriotic Alliance is swiftly positioning itself as a platform for minority interests.
Given South Africa’s painful history, these are extremely troubling developments. While the trend of ethnic polarised voting in South Africa is still emerging, the sorting of demographic groups into parties means that each political battle also becomes a de facto fight between ethnic groups – a danger for any democracy. There might yet be more unscrupulous politicians like Zuma to exploit and enlarge divisions for personal gain.
Supporters of former South African president Jacob Zuma, protesting against the court decision to sentence him to 15 months in jail, walk to his home in Nkandla, South Africa, on July 3, 2021. Photo: Reuters
We’ve seen where this could lead, if unchecked. Religious-political polarisation in Lebanon led to decades of civil strife and societal dysfunction, while Bosnia is once again threatened by Serbian separatism. There are counter examples, to be sure, such as the eventual amity between French and English-speaking Canadians, where the answer seems to lie in prosperity and a willingness to compromise.
In South Africa, the only major piece missing for a truly Balkanised political landscape is the formation of more parties catering to black ethnic groups, in particular a Xhosa nationalist party.
Xhosas, the second largest ethnic group after the Zulus, are the support base of the ANC, with Mandela and many ANC elders hailing from the grouping, so a Xhosa nationalist party doesn’t exist. But it’s entirely plausible that this could change as the ANC tries to put out political fires everywhere and fails to centre on Xhosa issues.
For all its faults, the ANC has always worked across the aisle, offering leading opposition MPs seats in the cabinet. The same cannot be said of most opposition parties, which emphasise their refusal to work with certain others.
If South Africa, the country once hailed as the “rainbow nation” and a symbol of racial reconciliation, finds itself going down the path of Lebanon and even Yugoslavia, it would not just be catastrophic to everyone who loves South Africa but also ominous for the idea of diverse, multiracial democracies.
Lee Jersey Wang is an associate with Beijing Club for International Dialogue and an international affairs analyst
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