On Tuesday, the 270 elected councillors of the City of Johannesburg are scheduled to meet again to elect the city's fourth mayor in the 18 months since the November 2021 municipal elections.
In these times of silly coalition politics and opportunistic horse trading, it is easy to become cynical about these events. But who leads the city of gold, South Africa's economic heartland is not inconsequential.
It is crucially important for the future of South Africa that Johannesburg survives. As the city faces a potentially crippling water crisis and infrastructure collapse, the electorate should keep a close eye on Tuesday's proceedings for clues as to how political parties will act as coalition partners.
A working, efficient and non-corrupt metropolitan municipality is a prerequisite for Johannesburg to be restored to a functioning, attractive setting for people to live and trade-in.
This is a trial run of what could transpire at a provincial and national level after next year's watershed general elections.
I would argue that the ANC and the DA have the most to lose during Tuesday's proceedings (or whenever a new mayor is elected, in case of another postponement).
According to reports, the ANC caucus is split in its support for another minnow party mayor to replace Al Jama-ah's Thapelo Amad, the train crash candidate gifted to the city by Panyaza Lesufi and Gayton McKenzie for less than four months.
Lesufi, Gauteng leader of the ANC, and McKenzie, leader of the Patriotic Alliance, flanked Amad like proud parents after his election in January when the ANC-led coalition finally managed to unseat the DA's Mpho Phalatse.
A major turning point was the decision by the EFF to formally endorse the ANC in Gauteng's municipalities with an essential condition: that an ANC candidate is not the mayor. The ANC capitulated, handing Johannesburg, Ekurhuleni and Mogale City to mayors from Al Jama-ah, the AIC and ATM, respectively.
But after the spectacular collapse of the short-lived Amad era, the ANC's regional leadership is seemingly split between continuing to dance to the EFF's tune or installing its own mayor in Dada Morero, the regional ANC leader and former city mayor.
Morero is highly experienced, and it would make the most sense for the ANC to convince its coalition partners to back him in the interest of stability and fixing Johannesburg. But some in the ANC want to continue pleasing the EFF by electing another mayor from a minnow party.
Al Jama-ah's Kabelo Gwamanda and Cope's Colleen Makhubele have been mentioned. Gwamanda is even more of a political non-entity than Amad. Makhubele was instrumental in breaking up Phalatse's DA-led alliance when she jumped ship to the ANC's side in exchange for the speaker position.
Makhubele is doing as she pleases since Cope is effectively non-functioning, although it is officially still part of the multiparty opposition coalition.
The remaining opposition coalition, minus the DA, will propose ActionSA's Funzi Ngobeni as mayor. The DA has said it would put forward Phalatse's name again.
This has caused (another) significant fallout between the second and third-largest parties in the metro, who simply seem unable to agree on a strategy to unseat the ANC.
ActionSA and its supporters, like the ACDP and the IFP, have pleaded with the DA to accept the PA back into the coalition's fold. Mathematically, the ANC and EFF can't rule Joburg without the PA's support.
I understand DA leader John Steenhuisen recently met with McKenzie to try to come to an agreement that would have seen the DA-led coalition take back the city, but in a letter to its former coalition partners, Steenhuisen said the DA would not work with the PA if it did not sever ties with the ANC nationally in all municipalities where they cooperate.
This irked ActionSA and its partners who urged the DA to rethink its position to keep Johannesburg out of the ANC and the EFF's hands. This is a tough predicament for Steenhuisen; a few weeks ago, after being re-elected as DA leader, he told the country that the ANC working with the EFF was a "doomsday" scenario.
On this basis, he urged other opposition parties to join the DA's so-called moonshot pact. But the DA has just walked away when presented with an opportunity to unseat the ANC and EFF in Johannesburg.
Must one now assume that the PA is also part of the DA's "doomsday" no-no list? If so, the DA's list of no-go zones is becoming awfully long for a party with grand ambitions.
Assuming the ANC-led camp agrees on a candidate, what will the DA do when it comes to voting? If there are more than two candidates on the ballot, there is a system of elimination until two candidates are left.
Assuming the ANC candidate, ActionSA's Ngobeni and the DA's Phalatse are on the ballot, it is technically possible for Phalatse to be eliminated in the first round if ActionSA could convince almost all the smaller parties to vote for Ngobeni. This would leave the DA in a predicament: to vote for an ANC-backed or ActionSA mayor.
But the same is true for Herman Mashaba's green army: if Phalatse gets more votes than Ngobeni in round one, would they and their smaller partners allow the ANC candidate to succeed instead? Would they vote against Phalatse, who did an okay job as mayor according to all accounts?
Get out the popcorn.
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