Politics in 2016? Stand by for another year of trying to send Zuma packing

Local government election campaigns, the fight against corruption and attempts to unseat President Jacob Zuma through legal and parliamentary processes are expected to dominate the political scene in the new year.

In addition, South Africans can expect intensified political battles over economic policy, political accountability in relation to public protector Thuli Madonsela's office and the student fees crisis, which has become a headache for Higher Education Minister Blade Nzimande.

This is according to the top three political parties - the ANC, DA and EFF - as well as the SACP.

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The ANC, preparing for its January 8 statement, which sets the tone for the party's annual political programme, conceded this week that it was facing a "challenging" year, compounded by the student fees crisis and the untransformed economy.

The ANC ended 2015 in crisis mode after President Jacob Zuma's National Treasury bungle - replacing Nhlanhla Nene with David van Rooyen, then four days later replacing him with Pravin Gordhan and moving Van Rooyen to the Department of Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs.

This was after civil society and the markets revolted over Nene's axing, hitting the rand.

ANC spokesman Keith Khoza said the party would work towards fast-tracking service delivery, deepening democracy and transforming the economy.

"We think that the new year is going to be a challenge. We are coming from a year where even students raised their demands, where we now have to intensify implementing the Freedom Charter in all its facets, looking at all its clauses," he said.

DA leader Mmusi Maimane's spokesman, Mabine Seabe, said the official opposition would bring another no-confidence motion against Zuma before his February state of the nation address.

It would lead a "march for change" in Johannesburg on January 27, support the Constitutional Court case aimed at forcing Zuma to implement Madonsela's Nkandla recommendations in full and try to ensure that parliament worked for the people and "does not become an arena for mudslinging".

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Seabe said the DA was consulting its lawyers to check if it was possible to exclude cabinet ministers from the no-confidence debate on the grounds that they "owe their jobs to the president".

EFF spokesman Mbuyiseni Ndlozi, who described 2016 as the "year of the EFF", said his party would prevent Zuma from delivering the state of the nation address because he had sabotaged the economy with his axing of Nene.

The EFF would pursue its economic equality campaign by targeting Absa, which it regards as the heir of the "Broederbond banks", and focus on its Nkandla Constitutional Court case, Ndlozi said.

The EFF wants the court to clarify Madonsela's powers and order Zuma to pay back a portion of the R246-million spent on upgrades at his Nkandla private home.

SACP spokesman Alex Mashilo said the party would push ahead with its financial sector transformation campaign, prepare for its 14th national congress in July 2017, demand the reconfiguration of the tripartite alliance, and intensify its fight against tender corruption.