South Africa’s National Dialogue: Born of Crisis in the Shadow of History

South Africa’s proposed National Dialogue is, at its core, an act of political triage. For the first time since the birth of democracy in 1994, the African National Congress lost its outright parliamentary majority. The result was a precarious Government of  National Unity government that is fraying at the seams of an uneasy coalition bound together less by shared vision than by the arithmetic of survival. The air is thick with a familiar anxiety. The centre may soon no longer hold for the national democratic project that may decay into permanent crisis.

It is in this climate that civic organisations, NGOs, religious bodies, and cultural institutions called for a citizen-led process to build a “common vision” for the next stage of South Africa’s democracy. President Cyril Ramaphosa, under pressure, embraced the idea. The stated ambition was sweeping, an assembly of civil society, business, labour, government, youth, and traditional leaders to confront the great unresolved questions of economic stasis, inequality, racial fracture, the corrosion of public institutions and collapse of municipalities leading to gross public service failure of crucial amenities like water, electricity and road and other public infrastructure. 

For anyone who remembers the early 1990s, the echoes are unmistakable. The Convention for a Democratic South Africa (CODESA) also began as an unwieldy gathering of antagonistic actors, many of whom doubted the sincerity of the process. But CODESA’s strength lay in its painstaking preparation, its thematic working groups, procedural agreements, and hard legal scaffolding. It was not supposed to be a one-off event but a marathon, anchored in binding outcomes. By contrast, today’s National Dialogue risks mistaking the stage for the substance.

The cracks are already visible. Foundations linked to revered liberation figures like Steve Biko, Thabo Mbeki, Desmond Tutu, and those of former apartheid president, F.W. de Klerk, have withdrawn from the Preparatory Task Team. They complain about unrealistic timeline, opaque budgeting, and a drift from citizen leadership toward government orchestration.

I had planned to attend the inaugural National Convention at the UNISA campus in Pretoria, though with the suspicion that it might slide into the fate that befell Kenya’s Bomas constitutional talks of the early 2000s. This ambitious national conversation, officially known as the National Dialogue and Reconciliation Process, degenerated into factional grandstanding. It was ultimately shelved when political elites lost interest. Without an implementation blueprint, measurable financial oversight, and legal accountability, South Africa’s Dialogue would collapse into similar symbolic theatre. In the worst scenario, it could become another patronage channel for politically connected intermediaries, or odious means to adapt corruption into institutional form.

Success for the National Dialogue and its outcomes demands enforceable structure before its first plenary session. Without such safeguards against elite capture, even the most inclusive processes can be derailed. The historical minded would recall the Tunisia’s National Dialogue Quartet (2013-2014), born from political deadlock and the threat of democratic collapse, Tunisia’s Dialogue succeeded by using independent conveners, a focused agenda, and mechanisms to make agreements binding on the state. It transformed crisis into consensus, earning the 2015 Nobel Peace Prize. An effective National Dialogue has to has to have some leverage of independence, focus, and enforceability. This can turn even deep political division into durable reform.

Comparative experience offers both warning and hope. Tunisia’s Quartet shows how independence, structure, and enforcement can transform national stalemate into reform. Kenya’s Bomas process warns how elite sabotage can unravel a process with no binding guarantees. CODESA proves that sustained, methodical dialogue, however unwieldy, can achieve constitutional breakthroughs if the scaffolding is sound.

South Africa’s National Dialogue shows few signs, so far, of building those pillars. It has neither the rigorous preparatory research of the National Development Plan, nor a governance framework independent of executive control. Instead, it appears to be rushing toward a headline event before doing the unglamorous groundwork that would make such an event meaningful.

If the Dialogue is to avoid becoming another expensive and fruitless talk-shop, several changes are non-negotiable:

1. Legitimate citizen-led governance.

The process must be overseen by a broad-based preparatory council or, failing that, placed under the custodianship of the Constitutional Court. Civil society should not merely be consulted; it must co-own the agenda and outcomes.

2. Rigorous diagnostics before dialogue.

As CODESA and the Tunisian Quartet demonstrate, credible national negotiations begin with shared facts. South Africa needs expert, sector-specific analyses on unemployment, land reform, corruption, education, energy, and inequality to frame the debate.

3. Budget transparency and legislative oversight.

The projected cost must be subject to both parliamentary scrutiny and Treasury controls. It cannot just be a discretionary presidential funds with executive fiat.

4. Process, not just event.

CODESA worked because it was a process of local consultations also, sectoral working groups, national sessions, each feeding into binding texts. The Dialogue must likewise unfold in phases, with public reporting and accountability checks at every stage.

5. Anchoring in implementation.

Every resolution must be translated into enforceable commitments, with budgets, timelines, and legal penalties for non-compliance by state institutions. Without this, the Dialogue will be nothing more than collective therapy for the politically bankrupt.

Conclusion

The difference between a historical turning point and a historical footnote often lies in design. South Africa has already seen how unstructured national conversations can collapse under their own rhetoric. Kenya’s Bomas process reminds us how quickly goodwill evaporates when elites lose interest. Tunisia’s Quartet shows how success is possible when independence, structure, and enforcement are built in from the start.

The choice before us is whether this National Dialogue will be an effective scaffold for a new social compact, or merely a scaffold from which hope is publicly hanged. Our people are watching, and getting impatient with every false move our government makes that either leads to more corruption or dismal failure.