They are called the “born-free” South Africans – too young to remember apartheid and with no instinctive loyalty to the African National Congress. And they could deliver a stinging rebuke to the party that led the liberation struggle, if this generation votes at all in elections on 29 May.
Three decades on from the birth of democracy in the country, the ANC could see its vote share fall below 50% for the first time.
In a country that became mired in corruption under the former president Jacob Zuma, inequality has soared and a run of two months without power cuts by the state energy firm Eskom is cause for celebration.
Now a new generation of politicians, many rising from social movements, are trying to reinvigorate the ANC. Youngest of all is Fasiha Hassan, who came to prominence as a leader of #FeesMustFall, a wave of student protests over tuition costs that swept through universities in 2015.
At 30, Hassan is the same age as democratic South Africa and in a hurry to see a transfer of power from the old guard. In 2019, the law graduate became the youngest member of the provincial legislature for Gauteng, the region around Johannesburg; now she is 65th on the ANC’s list of 200 candidates for the parliamentary elections. Young people, she says, are central to the “renewal project” of the ANC.
“We need an intergenerational mix, that expertise; but there’s no new energy or ideas to fix the country’s problems. You need a cohort of young people who are well educated, willing to roll up their sleeves and say, ‘Right, what do we do for the next 10 years?’” In a recent election video, she talks of “cleaning up the ANC” and insists: “We need a seat at the decision-making table.”
Wearing a keffiyeh draped around her shoulders, she issues a bold ultimatum: “Unlock the door or we kick it down.”
Hassan is equally impatient about the obstacles to more equal representation in South African politics. “There is a different set of rules for women and queer politicians,” she says. “A sense of ownership of young women who are public figures – that gives you very little room for mistakes. But there’s also a very large opinion on matters outside of public office: what you wear, where you go, who you’re with, who you’re not with.”
She gets criticism from “very conservative” elements in her own Asian Muslim community. “People who don’t believe a young Muslim woman should be as bold and loud. Even before I took public office, there was a lot of support but also a backlash, ‘Look at these Muslim girls, how they dress, look at them protesting.’ But we remind them that we have every right, even in Islam, to exist in this space and be leaders.”
At a recent symposium at the University of London, she spoke ruefully about older female colleagues putting her down and criticising her clothing, or being taken for a secretary or “plus-one” when travelling with male politicians – and of evading a stalker. Equality of pay and opportunity is crucial, Hassan says, but she acknowledges that gender-based violence is so pervasive in South Africa that improving safety is more important. “I’m afraid to go to my car late at night, but I have a car. It’s a huge privilege.”
To combat South Africa’s high levels of domestic violence, she has taken up innovative ideas such as empowering social workers and community activists to record statements in rape cases so survivors do not have to go immediately to the police, with all the trauma that entails, and suggests separate courts for sexual violence.
“One of the consequences of apartheid and hundreds of years of colonialism has been a very violent society. We haven’t healed,” she says. “We need a sort of Truth and Reconciliation Commission in our own communities dealing with gender violence.”
Hassan is hopeful that this election can lead to some of these ideas being taken up. “There’s a hunger in South Africa for new leadership, within the ANC and outside. They must evolve,” she says. “Evolve or die.” There is a sense of a baton being passed: “Our parents, our grandparents, fought and achieved political freedom,” she says. “But we’ve not reached a point of economic freedom. We view that as our generational mission.”
The sense of an age gap within the party also comes out in her dissenting attitude to the ANC’s old allies in Zimbabwe (“I’m not very liked by the Zanu-PF comrades there”) and Russia (“There can be no justification for invading another sovereign territory … international law is fundamental”). But she is quick to stress South Africa’s non-aligned position: “We can no longer support a unipolar world … Brics [an alliance of developing nations] can help create a world that’s more equal in terms of power dynamics; it gives us more leverage on the world stage.”
Hassan is not too young to remember more optimistic times, citing the former president Thabo Mbeki’s I am an African speech in 1996. “I remember being in primary school and feeling a deep sense of ‘we’ve a good future ahead of us,’” she says. “There was hope.” But if Mbeki turned out to be a deeply flawed leader, forced out of office by his party and tainted by his conspiratorial view of HIV/Aids, she feels his successor, Zuma, reached new lows.
“We saw the economy stagnate, but worse, we started to see the state being hollowed out,” Hassan says, referring to findings of “state capture” under Zuma. Allegations of systemic corruption keep coming. “I don’t think the party is irredeemable,” she says. “I wouldn’t stand for public office if I believed that.” But she accepts it is “an uphill battle” to fight corruption. “It’s not just the ANC – it’s all political parties. There’s a group of people who think politics is a way to make money.” It is about fixing the party, she says, “but ultimately fixing the state”.
A 2022 World Bank report said South Africa was the world’s most unequal country, with the gap between rich and poor widening since apartheid. Though Hassan insists there has been “objective progress”, International Monetary Fund data shows huge disparities in wealth – the richest 20% take 68% of income – and between regions (Gauteng has twice the income per capita of the rural province Eastern Cape, for example), growth stagnating for a decade, and youth unemployment of more than 50%.
But Hassan believes most South Africans have not given up on the ANC. “Even though people are very angry, rightfully so, the more time you spend with them, the more they’re like, ‘This is what we need – young people like yourself who are talking openly about the issues.’”
Hassan points proudly to her record in promoting economic development, in particular helping push through legislation to support new enterprises in townships, something she wants to see replicated nationally, and in supporting marginalised communities: “In Gauteng, the premier’s office now has an LGBTQIA+ desk, or ‘queer desk’, whose job is to create more opportunities but also advocacy work.”
In a country where the term “corrective rape” of lesbians was coined, there were “murmurs” at this, she admits, but says the ANC’s attitude was: “You must trust us on this because South Africa belongs to all.”
