For the past week or so, my favourite question to ask people is – how did you end up deciding who to vote for?
As they open their mouths in a “my-vote-is-my-secret” way, I interject and say, “I don’t need to know who you’ll vote for. I just need to know how you got to that decision.”

See, I’m a philosophy student and so the process is oftentimes more important than the outcome. Also, I know full well that the process will lead me exactly to the party the person will vote for anyway. I’m clever like that.

A few commonalities were made clear to me.

1. Small parties aren’t even in the conversation.

Unless they were part of a small party (which none of them were), there was really no talk of bypassing the Big 3 and voting for another party. Personally, I applaud that decision. I previously noted that the opposition parties were fantastic in holding the African National Congress (ANC) accountable over the past five years. To strengthen their hold over the National Assembly is a good thing, because it a) swings the ball in the opposition’s court if (God forbid) we need another vote of no confidence and b) it lessens the number of seats the ANC can amass in Parliament.

Both of those outcomes are good.

While I’m not ready to ride that coalition train as yet – and it would be a hard sell to convince me that the Democratic Alliance (DA) and the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) would muster enough votes to bypass the ANC – I am a fan of stronger opposition parties. Especially because of the ANC and what campaign manager Fikile Mbalula termed its “sins of incumbency”.

2. The opposition parties have bad reputations.

The EFF is in third place, so let’s begin there. One person noted that the EFF caused havoc in States of the Nations past, and further brought up the H&M saga where Fighters ransacked shops in shopping malls and completely dirtied the place after a.. erm..problematic sight by the shop.
They gave these examples to show that the EFF was a violent party, and that we don’t need a hothead president like Julius Malema.
One can counter-argue that the SONA havoc was done in service of a discredited president in Jacob Zuma, and the H&M saga in service of overtones of racism.
But a question comes up, one that I’m not sure the EFF can adequately answer: is the EFF capable of solving social problems without rabble-rousing?
I don’t doubt the credentials of the party. Malema, along with spokesperson Mbuyiseni Ndlozi and Dali Mpofu, are three intelligent men. There are many other intelligent people within the EFF, no doubt. But as all politicians know, social problems aren’t a case study one can leave in a lecture hall.
The person I spoke to – and myself – would like to know if the EFF can bring social cohesion in a diplomatic manner.
Another criticism of the EFF I have heard is that of toxic masculinity. I personally believe that the EFF is a patriarchal party.
Yes, I’ve read their manifesto. Yes, I know who Naledi Chirwa is.
But the assaulting of female journalists in the EFF’s name, and their slow attempt to call attention to rampant misogyny, tells me a lot. The assault of a journalist by Floyd Shivambu tells me a lot.
Maybe many can overlook that. Maybe in this case, we can afford to overlook subjugation as long as we achieve “economic freedom in our lifetime”.
To that, I disagree. To that, I ask where the line is drawn. To what extent can we overlook a party’s use of violence to achieve their ends? And what happens when their ends are at odds with ours?

But “speaking of economic freedom in our lifetime” – here’s one criticism I have.
I have read the EFF manifesto which outlines many pie-in-the-sky promises – many of which I laughed at when I read, full disclosure. And when I listen to what economic policies will bring about those promises, I hear the usual socialist rhetoric that bores me to death.
I’m not a cold-blooded capitalist. I’m not in love with the free market.

However, I recognise that any economy needs growth – especially if it will introduce free driving schools at every tertiary institution or double the old-age grant. Lofty goals require lofty strategies, and with poor economic growth on this particular turf, I expect more from Malema and company than “We’ll nationalise”.

That brings me to the DA. [Full disclosure: I’m a DA activist, but I have my political analyst hat on so I’ll pull no punches]
The DA has seen a steady growth rate in every election since 1994, getting 22.23% of the national vote in 2014. But many changes have come the DA’s way since then, not least of all the election of a new leader in Mmusi Maimane in 2015.
The DA has been seen by many as a “white party”, mainly because white South Africans have historically chosen the DA as their political home. In the wake of Jacob Zuma’s sheninegans (which we’ll get to), the DA has grown as a party, attracting more and more voters of colour – one of its biggest challenges in elections past. But damn, they just can’t seem to get the ‘party that will bring back apartheid’ stink away from them.
Despite the material successes of the Western Cape – the only province that the DA controls – people still do not trust the DA. Infighting in recent years has not made matters any easier.
The messy exit of former Cape Town mayor Patricia de Liile serves as just one example. Gwen Ngwenya resigning as Head of Policy is another. I could name many more, but you get the point: there is a lack of order in the structures of the DA. And voters see it.
That, combined with the perennial talk of a DA-led government possibly bringing back apartheid, destroys the DA’s reputation dead.

A comment from one person amounted to: “Mmusi seems like he’s not in charge of the DA. He’s powerless.” And it then becomes a challenge for me. Do I put on my DA activist cap and tell them that the DA is going through internal contestations of ideas like every party should, but is well-suited to govern? Or do I put on my political analyst cap and yes, also tell them that the DA is going through internal contestations of ideas like every party should – but express skepticism whether that means they’re REALLY well-suited to govern?
Mmusi himself knows as well as any politician that perception is everything in politics. Facts – whatever they are in this scenario – matter less than what the electorate is led to believe. Can the DA win the perception game? In a few weeks, we’ll know for sure.

What we do know for sure is that the DA is moving in a new direction, one that many traditional DA voters have named “ANC Lite”. Some have decided to vote for other parties in the upcoming elections due to this, which obviously creates a dent where their goal of getting 25% of the national vote is concerned.

Like I said – bad reputations.

3.The ANC will probably win these elections.

If the EFF and DA have bad reputations, the ANC has a full-on credibility crisis.

Nobody I spoke to trusts the ANC to be the party they would gladly stand with. Nobody.
There are a myriad of reasons why – Nkandla, the SASSA debacle, load shedding, the Guptas, and so on and so forth and things like that.
And yet, they all seek to vote ANC in the upcoming elections.

President Cyril Ramaphosa is a charisma magnet. He’s got a killer smile. He’s relatively untainted by the state capture saga (emphasis on relatively). And he’s the main reason why many will put their “X” next to the ANC’s name.
Of course, I disagreed with this assessment. With others, I said so outright. With others, I kept quiet and respected their choices. To the latter, I’ll give forth a biased reason as to why Cyril Ramaphosa does not deserve anybody’s vote on May the 8th:

Cyril Ramaphosa is part of the ANC. He was Deputy President during a good chunk of the “nine wasted years” that the ANC performs revisionist history on. He was part of the ANC National Executive Committee during the rise of Jacob Zuma. This is not even appealing just to his history within the organisation: within the Top 6 RIGHT NOW, there are dubious characters such as David Mabuza and Ace Magashule who are just as part of the ANC as he is. Not to mention the inclusion of characters such as Bathabile Dlamini and Malusi Gigaba on the party list.
They’re all ANC. And so is he. So to say that a vote for the ANC is merely a vote for Cyril is incorrect. It is a vote to reward shady politicians for their incompetence and greed, and to place them back into Parliament to get five more years of the same.
And yet, we are all poised to see another ANC election victory in two weeks. Which interests me, not just for the psychology played by the ANC on its voters by having only Cyril schmooze the electorate.
I’m also interested in the electorate itself. In the 2016 local government elections, the ANC lost a considerable amount of votes – from 60.98% in 2011 to 53.91% in 2016, to be exact. And yet, they will likely win back those votes this year.

While the elections are similar but different, a theory comes to mind – the electorate loves the ANC. The ANC’s embarassment during the LGE’s was a last-ditch effort to wake the movement from its slumber. And indeed, they have a new party leader and handed us a new president. We have been promised a New Dawn, and promised by many political analysts that a vote for the ANC strengthens Cyril’s mandate and gives him power to oust any and all Zuma-affiliated politicians in the party.
In the voter’s language: they’ve woken up.

I remain skeptical. The growing pains of the ruling party affect us much more starkly than that of opposition parties. Opposition parties have time to introspect while they fine-tune their campaigns and manifestos to be better acclimatised to the masses. The ANC has no such time. To bank on a possibility – especially one that isn’t backed up by historical precedent – is sure to set us up for disillusionment as we await the 2024 national elections, where everything might have gone to hell already.

So when deciding who to entrust with your vote, keep just one thing in mind, if nothing else – the state is in tatters, and the ANC is the main reason it is so. Whatever conclusion you make from that premise.. is your secret.