You may be surprised to hear that we heaved a sigh of relief that President Jacob Zuma was not toppled by a motion of no confidence conducted in secret. We would have been more comfortable had an open motion of no confidence in his ruinous leadership succeeded.
The opposition and public opinion fête ANC MPs who purportedly voted for the motion of no confidence. But ANC MPs who openly supported the opposition motion are few and far between. The rest did so under cover of darkness.
Why should they be celebrated? Are they so lily-livered that they can only voice their opposition to Zuma in secret?
Rumour even has it that some in the DA and EFF were asked to abstain or vote against their own motion. This is unverified and improbable, but not impossible given that keeping the unpopular Zuma while escalating ANC instability serves opposition interests.Such unprovable and undeniable rumours, unfortunately, are what the misuse of secret ballots promote - cynicism stalked by a climate of fear and suspicion.
The secret ballot exacerbated an already toxic political climate. In this mess, citizens got neither accountability nor transparency.
Furthermore, a view exists that Speaker Baleka Mbete opted for a secret ballot to avoid being dragged back to court.
The prevailing political culture of violent intimidation has been offered as a rational reason for the secret ballot, while Mbete argued specifically for its situational and particular application, rather than its precedent-setting nature.
These justifications for a secret ballot are glib. There are sounder reasons for Mbete to have retained an open ballot, because openness would have better served accountability.
The South African political context is characterised by persistent intimidation, fear, violence and vote-buying. Consequently, any controversial future debates are likely to evoke the same strained emotions and threats.
The DA's latest motion to dissolve parliament requires the support of a majority of National Assembly members. Strategically, the DA is relying on the sympathies of the ANC members who supported its motion of no confidence.
Clearly the DA's strategy, like that of the EFF, is to capitalise on ANC factionalism and keep it in perpetual crisis - maybe at the cost of social stability.Should this vote be conducted in secret too? And what of debates on abortion, capital punishment, expropriation and gay rights - all of which well-organised constituencies could use to intimidate for their cause?
In South Africa, ever the theatre of the absurd, opposition parties claim to provide cover through a secret ballot for the good guys - claiming to promote accountable, democratic government by, ironically, undermining its principal features.
Why should ANC members remain in a party if they believe that it no longer adequately represents their political values?
Although the opposition lost Tuesday's motion, through the secret ballot it still accrued some short-term gain. Zuma remains large and in charge, but the ANC's back is against the wall. An additional layer of crisis and antagonism, seeking out "traitors" and exacting revenge, is now present in the ANC's fabric.
Short-term partisan interests - of the DA, EFF and a portion of the ANC - have been disingenuously served.
A consequence is that cynicism and suspicion now animate the polity and herald a clash between two forms of impulsive populism - the emboldened Zuma ANC and the EFF.
Between them stands the purportedly procedure-driven DA, which has earned the suspicion of its recent allies.
As the opposition jockeys for position, the ANC has a brief opportunity to set aside its discourse of retribution against supposed turncoats, and remove Zuma internally. Alternatively, the ANC can split and go its separate ways, given that policy, political and ideological schisms have reached an almost unbridgeable chasm.
The ANC can take small consolation, however, that an unintentional consequence of the secret vote is that there is robust contestation inside the ANC. In the opposition, internal dissenting voices are subjected to lie-detector tests, or expelled.Speculative numbers about the no-confidence maintain that about 35 ANC dissidents were willing to break ranks.
All the while, the institutional political culture within the DA and EFF is calcifying. The EFF is notorious for expulsions and the DA constitution states that violating party instructions on how to vote would attract sanction.
Within the ANC, a dynamic of genuine political contest and independence of mind is germinating, acting as a brake on its outmoded brand of "democratic centralism".
A wise(r) ANC would celebrate rather than vilify this development.
• Fakir is director of programmes at the Auwal Socio-Economic Research Institute. Sarakinsky is academic director at the School of Governance, University of the Witwatersrand..