The ANC has lost the trust and confidence of the majority of South Africans. This is evident from the results of the 2024 national general elections. It has since been trying to diagnose the nature of the problems that led to the loss of support.
The party has cited varied reasons, from internal divisions to economic stagnation and international geopolitical events that it says were beyond its control.
I argue that the primary reason for the demise is that the once-mighty liberation movement has become a philosophical zombie.
What is a philosophical zombie?
Unlike the brain-eating Hollywood movie zombies, or the zombies of African mythology that do not have free will, philosophical zombies are physically identical to humans.
A philosophical zombie version of you would look exactly like you, like your identical twin.
There is one crucial difference between philosophical zombies and normal human beings though, and that’s the fact that philosophical zombies lack internal conscious experience.
Philosophical zombies (henceforth just zombies) have no feelings. A zombie’s behaviour is also indistinguishable from that of a normal human being insofar as interacting with the physical world is concerned.
However, the zombie doesn’t actually feel the pain. It lacks the internal subjective experience of pain. Similarly, a zombie might drink coffee but it doesn’t have the internal phenomenal experience of the beautiful aroma of that favourite morning cup of coffee. The zombie does not know “what-it-is-like” to experience the aroma of good coffee.
(The “What-it-is-like-ness” phrase was used by Thomas Nagel in his 1974 paper entitled “What is it like to be a bat”).
Similarly, a zombie wouldn’t know what it is like to be unemployed and poor in South Africa today. Like a true philosophical zombie, the ANC talks about poverty and unemployment but they don’t actually know or feel what they are talking about. The zombie is dead inside. It has no feelings. It has no soul.
During the door-to-door election campaigns in 2024, people complained about Fikile Mbalula going to poor townships driving a R2.5-million Mercedes Benz G-Wagon AMG and wearing an expensive watch and clothes.
Commentators were shocked at the lack of sensitivity demonstrated by such actions. It was pointed out that he seemed not even to be aware of the inappropriateness of his actions.
During the same campaigns, the president, Cyril Ramaphosa, was caught on camera joking and laughing about the fact that raw sewerage runs down the streets in some of the townships that he had visited.
Imagine! The president of the country joking and laughing about such serious and sad issues while claiming to be “deeply concerned” about the plight of the poor – gaslighting people. Similar incidences have happened during the 2025 January 8 statement events.
That’s the ANC of today – an unapologetic heartless philosophical zombie.
The impact of this zombieness is the failure to listen to, and internalise, people’s cries for social and economic justice, and then respond positively to these pleas.
It’s also the inexcusable dereliction of duty, botched projects, corruption and theft of public funds. These things continue to happen because a zombie government does not feel the pain of the downstream repercussions of these actions.
The ANC claims to see the dehumanising poverty of our people but does nothing significant to end it. Its leaders stand on public platforms and profess their commitment to solving this and other related problems, only to find that 30 years later, very little has been done. Again, this lack of response is entirely consistent with a zombie’s behaviour.
It does not actually feel the pain. That’s why the ANC does nothing to correct the social and economic injustices in our country, They do not feel the pain that people feel.
Many people say that Ramaphosa, is the biggest zombie of all. They cite his lack of emotion and appropriate response to people’s cries regarding illegal immigration, foreign-owned spaza shops and the death of black children, unemployment and lack of funding for black businesses, amongst others. I leave it to the reader to decide.
• Mthunzi Luthuli is MD of Luthuli Corporation
