Power Struggle: Jacob Zuma's Double-Edged Spear Thwarts Floyd Shivambu's Ambition

Zamikhaya Maseti

The firing of Floyd Shivambu yesterday did not come as a surprise. In truth, Floyd penned his political obituary the day he walked into the MK Party and emerged as its General Secretary. That was not a promotion, it was a political coffin lined with velvet. But the real reckoning is still coming. The VBS scandal, so long buried under layers of delay, distraction, and legal gymnastics, will soon come to trial. 

And when it does, Jacob Zuma will do what he always does, drop the dead weight before it begins to stink. He will ask Floyd to step aside in the interest of the MK Party. That will be the final burial. Hamba Kahle Mkhonto, not with a song, but with a court docket.

Floyd Shivambu’s political execution was triggered by his clandestine trip to Malawi to attend a church service led by none other than Shepherd Bushiri a fugitive preacher facing serious allegations of rape, sexual exploitation, and financial fraud. That was too far even for Zuma’s elastic ethics.

Floyd Shivambu, the self-proclaimed Marxist sitting cross-legged in the sanctuary of a Pentecostal profiteer, clapping hands for a man accused of sodomising and brutalising young girls. This is not merely a lapse in judgment, it is a moral implosion.

Those who read and understand the Marxist-Leninist Theory, not just name-drop, know that religion is not just “the opium of the people.” It is the ideological glue of the very Bourgeois order Marxism exists to oppose. You cannot be a revolutionary on Monday and a prophet’s disciple on Sunday. You cannot shout “radical economic transformation” at Parliament and whisper “Amen” at the altar of a millionaire scammer who preaches submission to the Capital, patriarchy, and magical thinking.

Floyd failed the revolutionary morality test. His trip to Bushiri’s church was not a mere detour. It was a confession, silent but deafening, that he had no centre. This is where Jacob Zuma, for all his faults, showed leadership and political decisiveness. Love him or hate him, and most people fall somewhere in between, he has demonstrated that, despite his numerous challenges and well-documented shortcomings, in the MK Party, his political outfit, he will not tolerate ideological bankruptcy or political dishonesty.

By firing Floyd Shivambu, Zuma did what many South Africans expected the moment Shivambu returned from that ill-advised pilgrimage to Bushiri’s church. It was not just poor judgment; it was a violation of public morality. And Zuma, sensing the national mood, played his move with chilling precision.

One must admit, that Zuma is, without a doubt, a political chess master. He understands the terrain. He studies the map. He waits. And then he strikes.

He did not flinch at the first sound of public outrage. He did not rush to satisfy the noise of social media or the murmurs of political insiders. No. Zuma sat still. He waited for the moment when he, not the nation, was ready. Then he acted. And when he did, the message was clear: in the Kingdom of Nkandla, there is only one strategist, only one tactician, and only one general. 

He understands the art of war, and more importantly, the art of timing. Shivambu may have embarrassed the MK Party publicly, but Zuma buried him strategically. 

There is, however, a serious downside to Zuma’s political strategy; he is wielding a double-edged spear. Yes, he is decisive. Yes, he reads the battlefield well. But the very authoritarianism that gives Zuma the upper hand in the short term may well lead to the MK Party’s long-term implosion. 

Undoubtedly, many within the MK Party are now unsettled. Their futures hang in limbo. The spectre of arbitrary dismissal haunts even the loyalists. No one is safe not from embarrassment, not from demotion, not from the sudden twist of a knife dressed as a song.

This is not leadership by consensus. It is Stalinism dressed in camouflage.

And Stalinism, as history has shown us, always leads to demoralisation, disillusionment, and eventually, decay.

The full swing of musical chairs, where today's hero is tomorrow’s exile, will only erode talent and collapse morale. Let’s not forget these are men and women with families, responsibilities, and dreams. The stress of living under constant political threat, especially in this suffocating economic climate, will eventually take its toll on them, individually and collectively.

This tired line that “political deployment is not employment” is outdated, exhausting, and frankly, dishonest. It fails to acknowledge that politicians are human beings too, with aspirations, commitments, and material needs. To pretend otherwise is to invite hypocrisy. Political deployment is labour, and those deployed are not pawns; they are professionals, cadres, and citizens. They deserve respect, not permanent precarity.

It may appear, for now, that members of the MK Party are content with these purges. That they clap as Comrades are fired. But don’t be fooled. That is fear, not approval. That is survivalism, not loyalty.

Zuma’s Stalinist approach is unsustainable and will inevitably face a serious internal ideological offensive, as there are tried and tested Communists within the MK Party. If they surrender their ideological discipline just to stay in Zuma’s good graces, then they are betraying more than themselves. They are betraying the memory of the Communist International. They are betraying a generation. And if that is the path the MK Party takes, then history will not be kind.

As I conclude, it is imperative to surface what might well be the most consequential development regarding the MK Party: it now finds itself, by sheer electoral outcome and political reconfiguration, as the Official Opposition Party. 

This status is not merely symbolic; it carries with it a constitutional weight and a historic responsibility. With the Democratic Alliance (DA) having opted to join the Government of National Unity (GNU), the DA has effectively vacated the oppositional bench it once occupied with forceful intensity. The MK Party, however, has not yet settled into this new role. It is not combative, nor intellectually coherent, in the manner the DA once was in opposition. 

The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), with all their contradictions, are currently outpacing the MK Party in opposition performance.

Instead of consolidating its newfound status, the MK Party appears consumed by internal purges and demotions, actions that will, in the long term, paralyse its institutional coherence and public credibility. 

Surely, this is not what the MK Party voters cast their ballots for. They did not vote for bloodletting and factional vendettas; they voted for a party that promised them something bigger, something better. 

A life beyond the margins. A reversal of abandonment. These internal spasms, unless arrested, will erode the party’s capacity to execute its most important mandate: to hold the executive accountable, to represent the excluded, and to articulate a compelling alternative.

The MK Party must focus urgently and with clarity on becoming a disciplined and effective Official Opposition. Anything less would be a betrayal of its historical moment. What is undoubtedly clear for now is that: Kubi Phaya! 

* Zamikhaya Maseti is a Political Economy Analyst with a Magister Philosophiae (M. PHIL) in South African Politics and Political Economy from the University of Port Elizabeth (UPE), now known as the Nelson Mandela University (NMU).

** The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of IOL, Independent Media or The African.