A councilor who dies suddenly, a king in search of legitimacy poisoned, or perhaps not, enemy brothers who dispute the fate of a country: quarrels with Shakespearean accents divide the Zulu monarchy in South Africa. Theoretically confined to customary prerogatives, it is, with its 11 million subjects – nearly a fifth of the South African population – the most influential of the seven crowns recognized by the government. As general elections are scheduled for April 2024, the theatrical dissensions of the royal house take a political turn.
Act I. Saturday, July 1, the indestructible Prime Minister of the Zulu nation, Prince Mangosuthu Buthelezi, number two of the kingdom appointed for life almost seventy years ago because of his lineage, publishes an alarming press release. He said he learned “with great concern” of the hospitalization of King Misuzulu Zulu after the death of one of his advisers, suspected of being linked to poisoning. “When Her Majesty began to feel unwell, she suspected that she too might have been poisoned,” the prime minister said, adding that the king “is fine.”
Act II. The next day, the royal house, through the voice of its spokesperson, disavows the venerable Mangosuthu Buthelezi, 94 years old. Certainly, a king’s adviser is dead. But the monarch, who is “in perfect health”, simply took advantage of a “courtesy visit” to the kingdom of Eswatini (landlocked in the territory of South Africa and governed by an absolute monarch) to carry out a battery of examinations “in order to deal with any untimely eventuality, given the reports of the sudden death of [his adviser]”.
The press release could have ended there and the story with it. But, in an incendiary second part, the spokesman for the royal household, Prince Africa Zulu, denounces an “orchestrated attempt” to spread “defamatory and baseless information about the health of Her Majesty”. “It seems the intention is to create the perception that His Majesty the King is ill and unfit,” the spokesperson charged, aiming without naming Prime Minister Buthelezi.
crown jewel
For several months now, the royal house has been buzzing with tension between the new 48-year-old monarch and his influential prime minister. However, it is thanks to the latter that King Misuzulu was able to sit on a throne disputed by part of the royal family after the death of his father, Goodwill Zwelithini, who died of Covid-19 in 2021. The first woman of the The late king and two of his daughters contested his will in court while another of his sons declared himself the legitimate heir to the crown.
At the heart of the dissension between King Misuzulu and his prime minister is the management of the crown jewel, the Ingonyama Trust: nearly three million hectares of land on which the monarch collects rents and exploitation rights. The two men would be at loggerheads after the king’s decision to dismiss the man who had chaired the board of directors of this structure for more than twenty years.
“People who are close to the king today are after the minerals in the lands of the Ingonyama Trust,” said Professor Musa Xulu, an expert on the Zulu monarchy. But the divisions took on political overtones after the war of communiqués between the traditional prime minister and the royal household.
An “agent” of the ANC
In an interview with the News24 media, the mayor of Zululand district, one of the municipalities of the province of Kwazulu-Natal, the homeland of the Zulus, set fire to the powder by accusing the spokesman of the royal house of being an “agent” of the African National Congress (ANC), the ruling party in South Africa since the end of apartheid. According to Thulasizwe Buthelezi, the king’s spokesman would seek to “discredit” the customary prime minister ahead of the 2024 general election.
Because Prime Minister Buthelezi is not only a traditional dignitary. He is also the founder of the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP), the ANC’s rival in Kwazulu-Natal province. In the years preceding the election to the presidency of Nelson Mandela, the champion of the ANC, in 1994, clashes between supporters of the two parties left thousands dead. The rivals became allies after the advent of democracy, before the IFP was permanently supplanted by the electoral successes of the ANC.
But, nearly three decades after the end of apartheid, the situation has changed. Weighed down by years of catastrophic management and corruption scandals that have left public services dormant, Nelson Mandela’s party is shaken. In the 2021 municipal elections, the ANC failed to garner a majority of votes nationwide, for the first time since it came to power. In the province of Kwazulu-Natal, the IFP has largely benefited from the fall of its rival at the polls.
Although the formation has its strongholds, it is more than a regional force. “Of all the political parties, the one that threatens the ANC the most at the moment is the IFP,” said political analyst Wayne Sussman, who recalls that Kwazulu-Natal is the second largest pool of voters in the country. However, in this context of political rivalry, the influence of the king of the Zulu in this largely rural region, where traditions have an important weight, is not negligible.
“As in all families”
“The problem is that everyone wants to be seen as the one who controls the royal house in order to win the hearts of the Zulu voters”, summarizes Musa Xulu, who underlines the “weakness” of the new king. Reacting to the Zululand mayor’s accusations, a regional ANC official pointed out that the party, far from surfing on divisions, had tried hard not to comment on the dispute, despite requests from the media.
The formation, which fears losing its absolute majority in Parliament in 2024, has however tried to benefit from the quarrel by asking one of its members to mediate between the monarch and his prime minister. At this stage, analyst Wayne Sussman believes that the IFP is the party that has the most to lose in these dissensions: “If one of its members is perceived as divisive, there is a risk for [the training], as many Zulu voters are attached to the idea of ??monarchy. »
Prime Minister Buthelezi seems to have understood this. “There is certainly no growing rift between me and Her Majesty,” he said in a statement where he only acknowledges “disagreements on some issues”, “as in all families”. Before taking the opportunity to tackle the initiative of the ANC by publicly launching the following question: “Why should a political party seek to arbitrate a quarrel that does not exist, when the royal family can resolve its affairs internal? Not without specifying: “If such cases arise.” »
