“Zuma must fall” has become a popular slogan since demonstrations against corruption and unemployment gathered pace in 2015.
Even many members of Zuma’s African National Congress (ANC) party have turned against him.
Removing Zuma, however, may not be a panacea to solve South Africa’s problems.
The ANC is so dominated by people with ties or an outlook similar to Zuma’s, and the country’s economic problems are so intermingled with inequalities inherited from the apartheid era, that his ouster might in fact not change much, analysts say.
Zuma’s reputation has been tarnished by a string of corruption scandals, including one involving the use of taxpayers’ money to upgrade his country home, and his close ties to an influential business family.
Millions of South Africans meanwhile live in illegal settlements with hardly any services, while economic growth slowed to 0.3% last year and more than a quarter of the workforce is unemployed.
The country’s economic woes were worsened by Zuma’s decision to sack respected finance minister Pravin Gordhan, which sent the rand into free fall and prompted two ratings agencies to downgrade South Africa to junk status.
While the economic stagnation is partly due to external factors such as a drought and a slump in mineral prices, it is also seen as being due to erroneous policies.
“Wastage and corruption together with the bailing out of a series of unproductive state-owned companies have squandered very precious tax resources that should have gone into infrastructure development and service delivery,” said Frans Cronje, CEO of the think tank South African Institute of Race Relations (IRR). The problem is not only slow growth, but also the “gigantic inequality” between the rich elite and the poor masses, said Nicolas Pons-Vignon, senior economics researcher at Johannesburg’s Witwatersrand University.
South Africa has one of the highest inequality rates in the world, with the top decile accounting for 58% of the country’s income, while the bottom half accounts for less than 8%, according to the World Bank.
The whitewashed villas surrounded by security walls in Johannesburg’s leafy suburbs stand in contrast to townships with unpaved roads and shack dwellings.
More than two decades after the end of apartheid, the inequality still largely overlaps with the black-white divide, despite the emergence of a black middle class.
More than 70% of South Africa’s top managers are white, despite blacks making up 80% and whites only 8% of the 56-mn population, according to IRR.
Nearly all white children graduate from secondary school, compared to 67% of black children, IRR has said.
The liberation movement that gave the world the iconic Nelson Mandela and has ruled South Africa since the end of apartheid in 1994 saw its support dwindle in the August 2016 local elections.
It is, however, still expected to win the 2019 national elections, which Zuma can no longer contest after serving two terms.