There is always room for more parties. Realising that the ANC is an irreparable mess, Cyril will spawn a new party which markets itself as exceedingly good and competent in every way that the ANC is not.
* wraps crystal ball in a red velvet cloth and returns it to its biscuit tin *
Max du Preez has often expressed a wish for the saner part of the ANC and DA breaking away from their parties and forming a new one. Perhaps this will happen.
I can envision far worse scenarios than a series of ineffectual coalition governments, mind you. South Africa is ethnically and politically so diverse that it is perhaps actually the only realistic option for the medium term - the ANC's huge support was perhaps somewhat artificial.
I have also become more supportive of the idea (the idea, not necessarily the parties themselves!) of small ethnic and specialist parties like the VF+, Inkatha and Reverend Meshoe's Christian party. It shouldn't be a problem as long as it doesn't spiral into open ethnic hatred, and there is much to be said for a party that is very homogeneous and can therefore focus all its efforts on one particular part of the population. Such a party tends to also be more resilient against corruption, because it tends to lose all its support virtually overnight, at the slightest sign of scandal or corruption.
Our obsession with "unity" is nonsense. There has never been unity in South Africa and there never will be, and that might actually be a good thing. The ANC, and even more so Zimbabwe, has shown us what comes of unity. So bring on the bazillions of small parties to add to the general clamor, and hopefully prevent one single bunch of corrupt, psychopathic fat cats taking total power.
I suppose the Purple Cow still has my vote, if they run in the coming election. They seem to be the closest thing we have to the RP - the Rational Party. :-)
Incidentally, based on how busy the local mall is, the economy seems to be slowly getting back on track. Well, at least the mostly white middle class economy. And it's true, isn't it? - South Africa increasingly has two different economies. There is the middle class economy, which is a more or less normal economy, functioning like modern economies everywhere do (albeit very heavily parasitized). Then there is the economy of the poor, which produces nothing but gets injections in the form of social grants. A good percentage of it consists of illegal immigrants too, but they don't stay in it long because they work themselves up and out of it to join the middle class economy.
The middle class economy is fairly diverse, and as such also fairly resilient against shocks. I suppose it is too early to tell whether it will survive the Covid shock, but thus far the signs are not too bad, and if it does it will give one some confidence that it can survive almost anything (except, presumably, a communist government).
I don't know what will happen to the poor economy, and to be honest, I care ever less and less. They now mostly have themselves to blame - they have to firstly vote their beloved ANC out of power, and then, once we no longer have a government with a choke hold on the economy, start doing what all those "job-stealing" immigrants are doing, and start to take care of themselves. If they don't or won't, well, then I suppose their social grant will have to do.
