Agang shakes things up

AS a member of the Msomi clan, I am sometimes the butt of my friends' jokes involving gangs.

This is due to the surname's unfortunate association with a notorious gang that wreaked havoc in Alexandra township, Johannesburg, back in the 1950s.

By the way, did you know that not a single member of this group of hoodlums that ruined our good name was actually a Msomi?

Anyway, having often been at the receiving end of Msomi Gang jokes, I am not about to join in the fun many on social media have been having with Agang, Mamphela Ramphele's newly launched political platform.

I understand why her political opponents would want to ridicule her initiative by pointing out that Agang - Tswana for "to build" - reads like "a gang" in English.

Instead of ridiculing the name, the rest of South Africa should be praising her for at least being innovative enough to give her formation an indigenous name.

Who said South African political parties should only be given English or Afrikaans names?

Since the news broke about the renowned academic's intentions to form a party and contest next year's election, a lot of ink has been spilt as political commentators speculated about which of the current political parties stands to lose as a result of her entry into the political arena.

Two likely scenarios seem to be the most favoured.

Scenario1 is that Ramphele, who has a respectable track record in the liberation struggle, would woo disgruntled sections of the ruling ANC's traditional support base, reducing the party's electoral majority at next year's polls.

The most optimistic of analysts believe that she can win as much as 10% of the ANC's traditional constituency.

As is to be expected, the ANC dismisses this as a flight of fancy by commentators and says Agang is most likely to suffer the fate of other "one man/woman" parties, such as Bantu Holomisa's United Democratic Movement and Patricia de Lille's Independent Democrats.

They entered the political scene with much fanfare only to fizzle out after an election or two.

In an interview with the Sunday Times days before Agang's launch, ANC deputy president Cyril Ramaphosa welcomed Ramphele's decision to exercise her constitutional right to form a party but expressed confidence that she would not have a negative effect on his party's performance come 2014.

"Many people have sought to do so, many people have traversed this route before and the results are there to be seen by everyone, so in the end it is the people who are going to speak ... The ANC is not worried; we are least concerned about parties that are formed from time to time.

"South Africa must have more than 100 parties or so and this party is going to be just another addition," Ramaphosa said.

But the reaction of ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe, in which he sought to portray Agang as possibly an agent of US imperialism, just because Ramphele first revealed her plans to form the party while visiting the US, suggests that the ruling party might be a little more than worried.

The second scenario is that Agang would steal votes from parties such as the DA and the ailing Congress of the People.

Just like the ANC, the DA - whose leader, Helen Zille, is a close friend of Ramphele - says it is not worried.

COPE, on the other hand, appears to be feeling vulnerable, with its leaders sounding too eager to join forces with Ramphele.

Their anxiety is understandable seeing that the party has generally disappointed the million voters who backed it in 2009.

My take is that, depending on the strength of the structures Ramphele will build across the country over the next 14 months, her party would win over voters from both the ANC and the opposition parties.

If her focus, as it is likely to be, is on young voters - many of whom are unemployed and would be voting for the first or second time - Agang stands a great chance of emerging as the third-biggest political party in the country come the next elections.

This constituency's loyalty to the ANC is pretty low; its members did not live through the liberation struggle phase, and their dissatisfaction with the current state of economic affairs is quite high.

Such a combination of factors can only work in favour of a newcomer such as Ramphele and her Agang party.