Nkosazana's ex will certainly be high maintenance

What, I wonder, must Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma make of the new year message from her former husband, Jacob Zuma, to the effect that South Africa "is ready" for a woman president?

Does she appreciate just how patronising and condescending the thing is? Does she care? Or does she think that in a country like ours, where male dominance is all-pervasive, Jacob's message may just be a necessary evil?

I reckon that after 10 years of Jacob Zuma running the country, South Africa is ready for almost anyone else. As for the thing, we've been ready for a woman to be president forever, as long as they were any good. The same applies to men.

Most sane South Africans will see right through this latest edition of the South Africa-is-ready-for-a-woman debate. Zuma wants this particular person, Nkosazana, who just happens to be a woman, to succeed him as president of the ANC this coming December and later as head of state. The gender thing is a blind alley that might fool some people.

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He evidently follows the George W Bush rule of politics: "You can fool all of the people some of the time. And you can fool some of the people all the time - and they're the ones you've got to concentrate on."

The reason he wants her to succeed him is simple. They were once married.

I know this is dangerous territory. There's a clamour in the media to not refer to Nkosazana as "Zuma's ex-wife". But there's a twofold problem with that.

First, it is short and accurate. Anyone writing for print knows how tight they have to be with words. And it'll fit even single-column headlines.

Second, the marriage, long ago ended, remains central to the fact that Nkosazana will be a very powerful candidate for the succession in December. Any divorced parent will know you never quite get rid of your ex and Jacob and Nkosazana had four children together. They are the key to his support for her candidacy for the top political job in the country.

His barely disguised endorsement of her on radio this week, following the ANC Women's League endorsement earlier - which he would have expressly encouraged - has been a long time coming.

From the moment the DA began its court challenge to the National Prosecuting Authority decision in 2009 not to pursue those 750-plus counts of fraud against Zuma, which cleared his path to the presidency, he has had to plan for the moment when he would no longer have enough formal power to stop the charges being reinstated.

The courts have already overturned the NPA's decision. Zuma will be in both the Supreme Court of Appeal and the Constitutional Court this year appealing the reversal. And, boy, it is urgent. By the time he is no longer ANC president (around December 21) but with still 18 months to go as head of state, he will be almost completely powerless. What has to be done has to be done now.

Hence Nkosazana, or, at least, hence Nkosazana in this form (open declarations of competence from the president and the women's league), and now (so early).

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There is nothing subtle about it. Zuma faces prison if those charges are ever reinstated by an NPA director he can't control, and his calculation, whatever Nkosazana's other qualities and experience, is that she will not send the father of her children to jail. It is a visceral response to a clear and present danger.

The danger to Nkosazana, though, is also clear. Zuma will have an uncomfortable year. He will have to make some hard choices. Does he hold on to Pravin Gordhan at the Treasury?

Does he allow the attacks on South Africa's banks (much of them made in his name or that of his close friends, the Gupta family) to continue? The more policy missteps he makes, the weaker he will become and the faster his support for his ex-wife will become a burden to her.

As it is, Nkosazana is not a natural leader. She is a functionary, a taker of instruction, an organiser. She began the turnaround at home affairs. Those are fine qualities, but once she becomes Jacob Zuma's candidate (which she is already) she will also become the candidate of every sleazy rent-seeker that has thus far fed from Zuma's bountiful trough. It is not a nice place to be and I doubt she relishes the prospect. But she can't change it. It is what it is.