Adam Habib, a South African academic and long-time public intellectual, has come out with an extraordinary endorsement of Helen Zille, the Democratic Alliance (DA) candidate for mayor of Johannesburg.
Habib is currently the vice-chancellor of the School of Oriental and African Studies in London, having previously held top administrative positions at the University of Johannesburg and the University of the Witwatersrand.
He has generally been seen as being part of the broad South African left and sympathetic to the African National Congress (ANC). He has also in the past dismissed the DA as a credible option to challenge the ANC for governance.
Writing on his X account this week, Habib referred to the decay of Johannesburg and wrote of Zille: “This is why Zille needs to win Johannesburg & decisively! If she does not get an overall majority, the city & SA are doomed. Her victory and the clean up she will subsequently undertake is necessary.”
He went to add: “She is the only candidate in Johannesburg with a proven track record of turning a city around. She won Cape Town from the ANC, which is why I believe she needs to win Johannesburg decisively.”
He said that her candidature had defined the election, leaving her competitors to structure their campaigns around her.
“Everyone else is simply responding to her, which is reflected even in the racist diatribes. My fear is that she will win the largest vote share but fall short of a majority, leading other politicians to gang up against her.”
He dismissed those who rejected her for being white and too old, he said: “This is both pure racism and discriminatory on age grounds. My response; I am proud of an electorate who chooses an elderly white Gogo if she is competent.”
He rejected the view that Zille’s ambiguity on the war in Gaza made her ineligible, pointing out – as Zille herself has – that the election was not about foreign policy, but about local administration and service provision.
Another objection, he wrote, “is the inequality in Cape Town, speaking to both the DA’s and Helen’s record. This is true; black townships are far worse than white suburbs. But comparisons of delivery track records cannot compare Khayelitsha to Camps Bay, but Tembisa to Gugulethu.”
He warned further that a win for any other party was likely to destroy the remaining functional elements of Johannesburg, placing its future in jeopardy.
Turning to his online critics who had attacked him in starkly racial nationalist terms, Habib shot back: “I love these pseudo activists who would rather have state collapse than choose an alternative political leader who could rescue JHB. Such is their commitment to the poor. Mercifully, they represent a dwindling, if loud, political cabal on social media.”
