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Vol 67 No 11

Published 29th May 2026


South Africa

The ANC is running out of successors it can trust

The party is discovering that its patronage culture is disqualifying most of those best placed to lead it as Ramaphosa struggles to shape the unfolding contest

Cyril Ramaphosa has spent much of his presidency surviving political crises without ever fully restoring his authority. The Phala Phala scandal did not remove him from office, as some inside the African National Congress (ANC) hoped it might, but it permanently damaged the image on which his leadership depended: that of a reformist president somehow insulated from the ANC’s culture of secrecy, patronage and elite entitlement.

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