This rests on the  poor performance by the current ruling party in opinion polls indicating its will lose its overall parliamentary majority. This that has fallen from  62% when Nelson Mandela led it to power in 1995  and to 57% at the previous election in 2019 

Dirk Kotze, a lecturer in University of South Africa, who widely quoted as an authoritative commentator in South African media says the ANC would be loathe form an alliance with the breakaway uhMkonto WeSizwe led by disgraced former President Jacob Zuma or the far left Economic Freedom Fighters led by former ANC youth leader Julius Malema.

He believe the ANC is more likely to turn to the Democratic Alliance or the Zulu-dominated Inkatha Freedom Party to make up its majority in the legislature.

“Who this is will largely determine South Africa’s foreign policy,” says Kotze.

“President Cyril Ramaphosa wants to adopt a more non-aligned centrist approach. This is not the classical Global South posture.

“As a member of BRICS, South Africa  will maintain good relations with Russia and China.

“This will not, however be to the detriment of relations – particularly economic  ties with our traditional Western trading partners.

Kotze says the United States is a good example.

“Washington might be angry with South Africa  because of its tough stand against Israel’s attacks on Gaza and its refusal to condemn Russia’s operation in Ukraine but it remains one of South Africa’s top three tradition partners and regards South Africa ss the gateway  to Southern and Central Africa: Namibia, Zimbabwe, Zambia and the Democratic Republic Congo.

“Africa is a highly contested economic market. I am told by sources in the Department of Economic Relations and Cooperation that he five major summits between Africa and the U.S., Japan, China, Turkey and the EU will grow to nine next year.”

Kotze says Ramaphosa’s desire to play to meditating role in international conflicts will not be affected by the ANC’s poor political performance.

“South Africa remains more favorably regarded abroad that it does at home where corruption, failure of service delivery and poor economic performance have whittled away at ANC support.” 

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The German leader stepped all over Ramaphosa’s  careful explanation of why South African abstained in a United Nations General Assembly vote condemning Russian aggression.

Ramaphosa carefully added that his German counterpart had understood South Africa’s wish for negotiation, dialogue and engagement to end what hecalled “the conflict”, carefully avoiding taking any sides.

“I don’t see any other way,” said Ramaphosa.

“Sanctions against apartheid were different to the sanctions imposed on Russia.

“What really ended apartheid was negotiation.

“Our position will be to end the conflict through negotiation and Chancellor Scholz understands that.”

Without hesitation Scholz countered: “We agree that the war in Ukraine is a war of aggression by Russia to conquer territory that does not belong to it.

“Ukraine must be give the ability to defend its territorial integrity and sovereignty.

“There must be no new delimitation of the Ukraine border,” he said, adding for his host’s benefit that the Kenya’s  President Uhuru Keyatta had acknowledged this at the United Nations.

“We are giving financial support and humanitarian assistance to Ukraine along with other European countries

.” said Scholz

“Ukraine must be able to defend itself and this is why we though sanctions against Russia are necessary.

“We discussed South Africa’s action in the UNGA and how this differs from Germany’s position .

“We are doing our utmost  to stop the war and get Russia to withdraw its forces from Ukraine.

“We want to see the restoration of Ukraine’s territorial sovereignty and integrity.

“We also discussed the global implications of Russia’s aggression in Ukraine.  Many countries in Asia, Africa and America are affected.”

Scholz confirmed Germany was supplying weapons, along with other countries, to enable Ukraine to defend itself and said he supported excluding Russia from the G20 summit and inviting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Scholz said Germany  intended stopping oil imports from Russia by the end of this year and also finding alternative LNG sources to those currently coming from Russia.

Germany intends having  a carbon neutral economy by 2045.

In this regard he and Ramaphosa will be visiting Sasolburg, south of Johannesburg later today for the launch of a green hydrogen project 

ends

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The over-achingly  ambitious Tourism Minister Lindiwe Sisulu is standing by an incendiary article she penned criticizing South Africa’s world renowned constitution and black judges.

The article is seen as an opening volley in her bid to win the presidency at the elective congress of ruling African National Congress in December.

Her early appearance over the parapet is entirely in keeping with this 58-year-old member of the iconic Sisulu family’s  desire to lead the ANC and thereby the country.

She has held no fewer than six Cabinet positions, including the defence and foreign ministry portfolios.

Her first bid for the presidency was a decade ago when she was beaten by the incumbent Jacob Zuma.

In 2017 she contested the deputy presidency where she was beaten by the David Mabuza.

Her opinion piece says apartheid was legal, as were the Jim Crow laws in the United States, colonialism and even nazism.

“So does that mean we have the rule of law?” she asks. “And whose law is it anyway?”

She asks how poverty can exist in a judicial system and under a constitution that is admired by the world.

She charges that South Africa is being “mentally colonized by black judges settled with the view and mindset of those who have dispossessed their ancestors.”

Embarrassingly, she is accused of plagiarism for using several hundred words without accreditation from a speech by former British Attorney General Dominic Grieve.

The ANC, of whom Sisulu is a member of the executive committee, has distances itself from her remarks.

The presidency calls the article recklessness of the highest order.

Minister in the Presidency Mondli Gungubele points out that  the constitution of which Sisulu is suddenly so critical was never forced upon her.

Acting Chief Justice Raymond Zondo says Sisulu’s article is an insult to judges of the Constitutional Court, the Supreme Court of Appeal and the provincial High Courts.

He strongly disagrees with his submission that the rule of law does not serve the interests of the black majority of South African.

Judges must be prepared to accept  factual criticism and analysis, says Zondo,  but none of this is contained in Sisulu’s article which is simply insulting.

Craig Watt-Pringle the chairman of the General Bar Association says the timing of Sisulu’s piece can be interpreted as an attack on the Zondo Commission into State Capture.

He says President Cyril Ramaphosa must act against a member of his cabinet who has crossed the line.

Her criticism of unspecified judges and unspecified rulings serves to undermine the judiciary and intimidate judges.

Former ANC chief whip, who served a prison sentence for fraud after being appointed to defence review committee by Sisulu accused Zondo of being a cry baby and says judges must get used to being criticized.

Sisulu says she will respond to the criticism in an appropriate forum at an appropriate time.

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President Cyril Ramaphosa calls this a mark of respect for a predecessor.

A State memorial service for de Klerk will be held a date to be determined.

The former president’s family has opted to have the 86-year-old cremated after a small funeral service for family on Sunday.

It is a wise decision given the mixed feelings expressed since de Klerk died of lung cancer last Thursday.

There are those who say he does not deserve any honour because of his active involvement in the apartheid system.

His unqualified apology,  recorded near his demise, to those hurt by apartheid would indicate that he was regretful about this.

His critics say he released Nelson Mandela and other political prisoners and unbanned the African National Congress and other political parties because he had to.

No-one has suggested that de Klerk acted altruistically at the time.

He realised, as previous leaders of the National Party must have done, that the system was untenable.

By the time he took the helm of the ruling party, the Soviet empire had fallen and the game was up for the apartheid system that was only allowed to survive as a Cold War bastion against Soviet imperialism at the foot of Africa.

In short, his was a classic piece of pragmatism.

If one is to castigate a politician for pragmatism, there would be virtually no public representatives – proud exponents of the art of the possible – left to admire.

De Klerk’s move was indisputably a courageous one. It spelled the end for himself as leader and his party as the instance of power.

Happily, this was realized by leaders at home and abroad. 

It was why he got to share the Nobel Peace Prize with Nelson Mandela.

That the overwhelming majority of black South Africans retain a sense of suspicion, not to say bitterness, is hardly surprising.

Where would one hear open appreciation of any system universally and rightly denounced as a crime against humanity?

However De Klerk’s role in dealing a fatal blow to that system is self evident.

The ANC is right: “De Klerk’s legacy is a big one. It is also an uneven one, something South Africans are called to reckon with at this moment.”

The sooner we get around to this, the better we will be able to move on.

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Thousands of people looting with impunity in Durban, Pietermaritzburg and Johannesburg.

Police, under equip and outnumbered, have been reduced to spectators.

President Cyril Ramaphosa is obliged to draft the military in to help try to contain the anarchy.

The destruction and lawlessness by black South Africans apparently unconcerned about being stopped let alone apprehended brings to mind the apartheid-era fears of their white counterparts that they will leave their country of birth on the first available flight with nothing but their pajamas.

The looting continues as Ramaphosa addresses the nation. Indeed, it is shown in a little window on his television backdrop, giving the lie to his assertion: “this is not us!”

The looting was initially ascribed to “righteous anger” about the incarceration of disgraced ex-President Jacob Zuma for contempt of court.

It soon becomes clear that it is about much more. There are ethnic tensions involving the Zulus. There is the desperation of people rendered jobless and hungry by the protracted COVID pandemic lockdown. But most of all there is enthusiastic criminality embracing an opportunity to grab something for nothing.

With television covering moving to and fro from KwaZulu/Natal to Gauteng the anarchy seems to have become terrifyingly unstoppable.  

Ramaphosa does nothing to alay those fears.

His assertion that the looters will face the full might of the law rings hollow.

South Africans who eschewed revenge for apartheid to build a greater peace are revealed to be as venal and short-sighted as their fellow Africans.

They no longer have a  claim to the moral hight ground.

This morning Police Minister Bheki Cele, who was invisible yesterday, briefs the media.

He speaks of more than 700 arrests and a death toll approaching 50.

Incredibly he advises South Africans to sanitize and regularly wash their hands.

This is a reference to the pandemic and the fact that the violence and the looting and destruction of trucks traveling between Johannesburg and Durban has stopped the already botched and tardy vaccination programme in many centers.

Again, his briefing takes place against the backdrop of persistent looting in both KwaZulu/Natal and Johannesburg.

It is briefly stopped in Alexandra around lunchtime by the arrival of a few dozen of the 2500 troops dragooned into restoring order.

The mob that was minutes earlier taunting police runs from the soldiers who carry neither teargas nor rubber bullets. Their assault rifles are loaded with sharp point ammunition.

Visibly shocked as the destruction he sees after looters have stripped a shopping mall in Alexandra, within sight of salubrious Sandton, Cele says the emphasis must now be on prevention. Flanked by both police and army brass, the minister says: “It is better that this did not happen. But just because it did does not mean that it cannot be prevented from happening again.” Cele says police are investigating a dozen people believed to be instigators of the looting.

Are we meant to be reassured?

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Waiting for the sms from the vaccine authority seems rather like standing in an orderly queue for a lifeboat on the Titanic. Admirable, but unwise.

Completing the process at the DisChem headquarters in Midrand took five hours.

Sure it was a Ben Hur, but without exception every Dischem employee I encountered – from the guard who showed us our place in the queue to director Stan Gates who walked into the “recovery room” to ask recipients how things were progressing  – was obviously bent on being helpful.

It was one of the seminal new South African experiences: along with the first democratic election in 1994 and hosting the Football Word Cup in 2010.

We were in this fight against COVID together, and determined to beat the lurgy.

On social media I learn that many friends have received their vaccine must quicker and more efficiently. Good luck, I say to them. We are in this fight together.

It seems that all of us now have to wait 42 days to get the second jab.

There is a bid to tell us this is the most efficacious application of the vaccine. I don’t believe it.

We are being made to wait so that more people can get the first dose of the limited supplies of  vaccine available.

Remember the people now telling us about the need to wait are the same people whe were telling us 14 months ago that we did not need masks because they were afraid we would gobble up the available masks to the detriment of the health workers.

So wait I will.

Not at all sure where I will go to get the second jab. It would be great to avoid the five-hour process at GenChem, even if this means missing another chance to see  my new-found pandemic friends.

Discovery boss Adrian Gore has written a letter saying members should try the sites being set up by his medical aid society.

He seems confident there will be enough Pfizer to dispense the second injections.

From his mouth to God’s ear!

President Cyril Ramaphosa just tightened a band of cold steel around my testicles – metaphorically speaking, of course – telling us that South Africa would chuck out two million does of Johnson & Johnson vaccine.

He’s blaming a contamination scare at its source in the the United States.

To his credit, Ramaphosa acted swiftly, decisively and courageously locking down South Africa early on in the pandemic.

However his government’s record in dispensing the vaccine this year as been less than impressive. Plainly speaking it has been marked by dithering and, by all accounts, corruption.

That is the antithesis of the British experience where Boris Johnson fiddled at the start of the pandemic, costing thousands of lives, but has done a sterling job of getting vaccine into Britons’ arms.

Could the G7 come to our aid?

At their summit in Cornwall last weekend, the leaders of Britain, France, the United States, Germany, Japan, Canada and Italy committed themselves to providing a billion doses of vaccine to poorer countries within the year.

Critics say this is a drop in the ocean for the developing world that needs at least ten times that amount.

We can talk about lifting the intellectually property rights to allow vaccine to be manufactured in South Africa, Senegal and other countries ready and able to do it.

If successful, that would be months away.

We need a quicker solution if we are to achieve the much vaunted herd mentality and avoid the plethora of variants to which we no longer may attach a national appellation.

Away with the political correctness and down with the blame game, I say with unashamed selfishness as I prepare to line up for my second dose.

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Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed says the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam will be filled with or without an agreement with the riparian countries Sudan and Egypt who view the dam as an existential threat.

They rely on the Nile for more than 90% of the water needs in their largely desert countries.

Ahmed recalls that Ethiopia was left out of negotiations on the use of the Nile waters between Britain, as the colonial power, with Egypt and Sudan.

He maintains that building the dam, which will make Ethiopia a hydro-electrical-generating power, is its sovereign right.

His predecessors warned that they would go war to protect their access to the Nile waters. Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi subsequently ratcheted things down in favour of negotiations.

Recently though, both he and his Sudanese neighbour have resorted to bellicose language.

Egypt would not allow a drop of Nile water to be stolen from it, he said.

Sudan’s Irrigation Minister Yasser Abbas warned “all options are open” in safeguarding his country’s access to the water.

Both the riparian countries and Ethiopia have in turn gone to the United Nations Security Council swapping accusations of negotiating in bad faith.

As African Union Chairman last year, President Cyril Ramaphosa attempted, without success, to mediate an agreement on the filling and operation of the GERD.

Current AU chair, Congolese President Felix Tshisikedi had a bash at mediation earlier this month that also ended in deadlock.

Al Sisi has taken yet another diplomatic initiative, sending his Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry on a six-nation African safari, hoping to win support from continental partners.

Shoukry visited the Comoros, South Africa, the DRC, Niger, Senegal and Tunisia.

In South Africa, the minister engaged in some fence mending.

He thanked President Cyril Ramaphosa for his mediation last year.

It is no secret that Egypt was highly suspicious of these efforts, suspecting that Ramaphosa was biased in favour of Ethiopia

Shoukry’s trip will be viewed favorably by African leaders who hold fast to the principle of African solutions to African problems.

However Al Sisi maintains his wish to see the United Nations, the European Union and the United States involved in trying to get Ethiopia to take a more understanding view of Egyptian and Sudanese fears.

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President Cyril Ramaphosa is in an urgent meeting with his Defence Minister Nosiviwe Mapsia-Nqakula today following his announcement that he’s sent troops to Mozambique to evacuate South Africans trapped there by ISIS-affiliated jihadis fighting government forces.

At least on South African died in the Islamist attack on the town of Palma in the north of Mozambique earlier this week.

The palm-fringed fishing town was regarded as a safe zone in the violence plagued Cabo Delgado Province  which has one of the largest liquified natural gas projects on the planet.

subhead Total staff withdrawn

The French energy company Total, which has a primary involvement in the development, has withdrawn its staff from Palma.

Ramaphosa spoke about detaching the troops while attending a wreath-laying ceremony for the late Winnie Madikizela Mandela.

He did not specify how many South African soldiers had been sent into Mozambique, nor did he say how many South Africans were still in Cabo Delgado.

The terror campaign which began in 2017 with machete-wielding fighters claiming they had been marginalized in the search for gas riches, has become a sophisticated, foreign-financed operation that has seen more than 1500 local villagers killed and more than half a million displaced.

Seven people, including the South African Adrian New were killed in the latest jihadi attack.

subhead Trapped in hotel

At least 180 people who sought shelter in the Amarula Hotel in Palma are believed to be trapped there.

Forty three South Africans who were missing after the attack have been accounted for.

Hundreds have been taken by boat from Palma to the provincial capital of Pemba .

It is not possible to ascertain the condition of those trapped because the terrorists have cut communication lines to Palma. The last telephone contact there was on Wednesday.

The United States has sent a detachment of special forces to Mozambique to provide anti-insurgency training to government forces.

Portugal has made a similar offer to its former colony as has the European Union.

subhead Multilateral military assistance

Mozambique which has shown itself to be incapable of containing the insurrection initially asked neighboring ,South Africa for military assistance. Ramaphosa declined saying the country’s national defence force it was not able to acting unilaterally in conflict of this magnitude.

His hand has been forced by his nationals, mostly involved in the gas project, becoming imperiled.

There is no indication how long the South African troops will remain in Mozambique

Both the African Union and the regional Southern African Development Community (SADC) have discussed providing multilateral military assistance to Mozambique. However, they do not have the financial means to do this without help from the United Nations or Western powers.

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The South African variant of the coronavirus has caused an “amazing and terrifying” infection spike in the country already hardest hit by the virus in Africa, according to 

The United States this week joined countries in slamming their doors on travellers from South Africa, which has itself closed its land borders and tightened lockdown regulations.

But the variant known has N501 Y V2 has already been detected in 32 countries. They include neighbours Zimbabwe, Zambia, Mozambique and Malawi where expatriate workers in South Africa took the virus home when they went to celebrate the festive season with families.

South Africa has not received a vaccine to start an immunisation programme and is unlikely to do so before the second quarter of 2021.

So far, the country has recorded 1,437,798 cases of Covid-19, with 43,105 fatalities.

Doctors this week made the encouraging announcement that the American-made Novavax vaccine was 60 percent effective against the South African variant in tests.

But Witwatersrand University Dean of the Faculty of Health Scientists Shabir Modhi, who directed the tests, added that anyone with mild to low antibodies after contracting earlier strains of Covid-19 were prone to reinfection by the variant.

Another big vaccine news day. J&J vaccine has 72% efficacy in US, which drops to 57% in South Africa, probably due to B.1.351 variant. With Novavax’s similar results yesterday, it’s a wake-up call about viral evolution. Story w/ @noah_weiland & @SharonLNYT https://t.co/iqDpirj5z8— Carl Zimmer (@carlzimmer) January 29, 2021

Not deadlier, but more contagious

Medical experts say the variant is not deadlier than the original coronavirus. However it is 50 percent easier to catch.

Dr Richard Lessels of the KwaZulu/Natal Research and Innovation Sequencing Platform says more than 90 percent of the new cases diagnosed in South Africa are the new variant.

“It is amazing and terrifying how quickly it came to dominate. We are in the beginning stages of watching this and other new variants becoming more dominant around the world.”

This is exacerbated by the inequity of availability of vaccine between rich and poor countries.

No-one safe until everyone safe

President Cyril Ramaphosa has joined World Health Organization head Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus in castigating rich countries for stockpiling vaccines while poor countries go without.

They maintain no-one is safe until everyone is safe.

Ghebreyesus calls it “a crisis of morality”.

California medical specialist Dr Jorge Rodriques puts a more pragmatic spin on failing to vaccinate the global population: “Replication means mutation which means resistance to medication which means variants.”

He notes that the Novavax trials in South Africa showed 60 percent effectiveness against the local variant in healthy patients and 50 percent in HIV positive people who tested.

Hospitals overrun

South African hospitals are overrun by the new wave of infections.

Imtiaz Sooliman of the charity Gift Of The Givers says people are driving six hours to fetch oxygen which is in short supply.

“Some people are dying in their cars while waiting to get into hospital or don’t make it through the casualty wards,” he says.

Specialist Phumla Mayanda says people believing misinformation about the danger of infection in hospitals are attempting treatment at home.

By the time they desperately seek admission, their oxygen levels have decreased fatally.

This article first appeared on RFI. Noteom

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