KWAXIMBA, South Africa: In a village nestled in the mountains of South Africa’s hotly-contested Kwazulu-Natal province, former President Jacob Zuma’s new party has campaigned relentlessly to win voters away from his old one, the ruling ANC.
On Monday, rival tents pitched by the two parties outside a local school serving as a polling station blasted party songs welcoming early voters they hoped to sway.
Most South Africans will vote on Wednesday but some, including the elderly and the infirm, were allowed to cast their ballots on Monday in what is expected to be the tightest election in decades.
The emergence of Zuma’s uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK), has increased tension in Kwazulu-Natal, a key election battleground already infamous for political violence.
KwaXimba, a rural area dotted by thatched “rondavel” huts outside the eastern city of Durban, has been ruled by the African National Congress (ANC) since the dawn of democracy in 1994.
But many here revere Zuma, an ethnic Zulu, who was born in the province.
“We’ve needed change for a long time in our lives,” said Thokozani Mthembu, the MK’s local coordinator in KwaXimba.
Some opinion polls suggest that MK could win the most votes in Kwazulu-Natal. This would almost certainly condemn the ANC to its worst electoral result in three decades.
It could lose its parliamentary majority for the first time and be forced to form a coalition government.
Voting proceeded smoothly in KwaXimba during the day, but in a tense atmosphere.
Mthembu claims that after Zuma, 82, held a rally with hundreds of supporters in KwaXimba in January, the party received threats of violence from ANC supporters. Some voters were also wrongly told that the MK would take away social grants and free housing, he said.
The ANC denies all wrongdoing.
“From the day we started our campaign, we’ve had one goal, which is to win the election without threatening other parties,” Sihle Gwala, a local ANC leader, told AFP.
Earlier this month, police warned against “spreading statements that have a potential of inciting violence or create a state of panic in the communities” after a voice note circulated claiming that 11 people were killed in a politically-related shooting.
Many in KwaXimba have turned to the MK, lamenting continuous water and electricity shortages, which some blame on the ANC’s poor management.
Down the road from the school, chickens clucked in 66-year-old Nicolas Ndlovu’s yard, as he walked outside, waiting for election officials to reach his home and allow him to cast his early ballot.
Having fought for the ANC during the anti-apartheid struggle and supported the party all his life, he said he now hoped to see it end up in opposition, so that “maybe they can work harder and earn the power back.”
His village’s streets, where cows roam under the sun, are plastered by campaign posters of the rival parties.
ANC volunteer Jabulile Nduna said the rift between Zuma and her party has caused divisions within her own family.
“I sat (down) my siblings and told them, ‘at the end of the day we have one mother and one father’... whether the MK wins or the ANC wins, we have to remain a family,” said the 43-year-old mother of three, as she walked on a gravel road near a voting station.
During a campaign visit to KwaXimba last month, President Cyril Ramaphosa warned voters about new parties trying to “nibble the edges” of ANC support, saying they would fail to win power.
But some like Nkazimula Makhanya are not heeding the call.
At 26 he has no job and few prospects of getting one, with youth unemployment at 45 percent.
“The old man, as old as he is, he still values our input, and he still allows us to be winners,” he said, referring to Zuma.
Zuma’s party guns for ANC stronghold in South Africa vote
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Zuma’s party guns for ANC stronghold in South Africa vote
- The emergence of uMkhonto we Sizwe, has increased tension in Kwazulu-Natal, a key election battleground already infamous for political violence
Ukraine marks four years since Russian invasion
- Tuesday’s anniversary is expected to see the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, and the president of the European Council, Antonio Costa, in Kyiv to mark the occasion
KYIV, Ukraine: Ukraine was on Tuesday marking the fourth anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion, with a show of solidarity from its staunchest allies and no immediate end in sight to Europe’s bloodiest conflict since World War II.
Tens of thousands of lives have been lost since the Kremlin ordered troops into Ukraine on February 24, 2022, confident of a quick victory but not expecting the fierce resistance that followed.
The worldwide fallout of the war has been immense, with many European countries increasing their own defense spending in anticipation of a possible confrontation of their own with Russia.
But diplomatic talks between the two sides, relaunched last year by the United States, have so far failed to halt the fighting, which has devastated Ukraine and left it facing the mammoth task — and bill — of reconstruction.
Tuesday’s anniversary is expected to see the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, and the president of the European Council, Antonio Costa, in Kyiv to mark the occasion.
Both said they would take part in a “commemoration ceremony” and visit the site of a Ukrainian energy facility damaged by Russian strikes before attending a meeting with President Volodymyr Zelensky.
They are also due to take part in a videoconference meeting with Kyiv’s allies — the so-called “Coalition of the Willing” which includes Britain, France and Germany.
- Impasse -
Russia, which currently occupies nearly 20 percent of Ukrainian territory, bombs civilian areas and infrastructure on a daily basis.
The Russian bombardment has sparked the worst energy crisis since the start of the invasion, during a bitter winter.
Kyiv’s Western allies have slapped heavy sanctions on Moscow, forcing it to redirect its key oil exports toward new markets, particularly in Asia.
Despite heavy losses, Russian troops have in recent months advanced slowly on the frontline, particularly in the eastern Donbas region, which has been the epicenter of the bloody fighting and which Moscow wants to annex.
US-brokered talks are ongoing, with Zelensky unwavering in his demands for security guarantees from Washington before any talk of “compromise,” including on territory, with Russia.
Russia, though, has rejected Ukrainian proposals for the deployment of European troops in Ukraine after any ceasefire deal.
President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly warned that he will pursue his objectives by force if diplomacy fails.
- Reconstruction -
The grinding four-year war has devastated Ukraine, which even before the fighting was one of the poorest countries in Europe.
According to a joint World Bank, European Union and United Nations report with Kyiv, published on Monday, the cost of post-war reconstruction is estimated at around $558 billion over the next decade.
Russia justified sending troops into Ukraine to prevent Ukraine’s ambition to join NATO, arguing that Kyiv’s membership of the transatlantic alliance would threaten its own security.
On Monday, during a medal ceremony to mark “Defenders of the Fatherland Day,” Putin insisted that his soldiers were defending Russia’s “borders” in Ukraine, to ensure “strategic parity” between powers and fight for the country’s “future.”
Ukraine, a former Soviet republic, for its part considers the war to be a resurgence of Russian imperialism aimed at subjugating the Ukrainian people.
In an interview with the BBC broadcast on Sunday, Zelensky said he believed Putin had “already started” World War III.
“Russia wants to impose on the world a different way of life and change the lives people have chosen for themselves,” he told the British public broadcaster.
