On June 26 1980, a rally was hosted to mark the 25th anniversary of the signing of the Freedom Charter. On the posters advertising it were the words that started a campaign that would become the hallmark of the anti-apartheid movement and impact on the leadership of post-apartheid SA well into the future: “Free Nelson Mandela”.
Until then, the SA liberation movement was a story of collective leadership. By the very nature of the diversity of views, divergence on tactics and the need for spreading the risks, no one leader had been singled out as the focus on the movement.
There are many things that are significant about the “Free Nelson Mandela” campaign. It became a simple and effective rallying cry for liberation. It gave a face and human story to the Struggle against the apartheid regime and helped intensify the efforts to unify local and international resistance efforts that eventually made apartheid untenable. There was, however, an unintended consequence that lives on in the SA psyche today; the beginnings of a political culture that relies on messianic figures and thrives on the cult of personality.
In politics, when we talk about the cult of personality, it is a phenomenon where a persona is afforded a status so important and iconic that they become a central organising feature of how groups organise themselves. It is people becoming symbols of an idea or zeitgeist that helps people connect with a political call to action.
American politics has always thrived on personality politics. From the notion of the founding fathers to Trump’s Maga moment, the faces, names, sayings and traits of a single leader have become a defining feature of determining who is fit to hold the highest office in a country of now over 300-million people. The status of such a person is amplified in a belief that they, as an individual, are imbued with some special abilities and power that will enable if not almost magically create a better future for the whole of society.
While it has been effective in some cases, personality politics has its limitations. Often when a person is the focus it is their charisma, charm, eloquence or bravado that is centred over the quality and efficacy of the ideas that are needed. People easily lose sight of what the issues are as they become distracted by the adulation or defence of an individual.
In SA, post the “Free Nelson Mandela” moment, the ANC that in word prides itself on collective leadership and being held together by its ideals finds new personalities to centre. With leaders' faces on T-shirts and songs supporting or rejecting leaders a firm norm, it's not surprising that ANC factions are usually more of a battle of personalities than a battle of ideas.
Opposition parties are not much different. The DA cannot seem to shake the personas of Tony Leon and Helen Zille from influencing the party’s ethos and politics, even after spending millions on the creation of Mmusi Maimane as a recognisable figure.
Most people would not be able to imagine an EFF without Julius Malema or the IFP without Mangosuthu Buthelezi, even after he stepped down as party leader. Building political brands on the images and personas of individuals has been normalised in a country looking for its next Mandela. The new messianic figure that we can pin our hopes and dreams to.
But what do we do if the messiah does not come? While we wait for this heroic figure, we are losing a culture of deeply interrogating ideas. We are overlooking people power that leverages on the wisdom and talents of individuals and communities. We have diminished our own agency.
In desperation for a messiah SA collectively fiddles on the question of leadership, while Kagiso burns. We excuse leadership failures in the highest office in the land because we ask: “If not Cyril Ramaphosa, then who?” The bar for leadership is set so low that the DA defends blatant misogyny from its leader, John Steenhuisen. We flock to EFF press conferences hoping to hear Julius Malema’s next explosive utterance. Fiddling while the country yearns for solutions and needs accountability.
Yes, SA needs leadership. If we truly value democracy, we must live it by leading ourselves. Stop waiting for someone to lead from faraway places. Let’s raise our hands in all corners of society to lead daily, valuing the daily acts of kindness, initiative and problem-solving as acts of leadership, however ordinary they may seem.
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