Motsepe Will Stage a Political Run, Win, and Secure a South African Recovery

Patrice Motsepe’s resignation as executive chairman of African Rainbow Minerals, the firm he founded, should not be read as a routine corporate succession but rather as a necessary step towards considering a political career.

The Common Sense has previously reported that, according to polling from the Social Research Foundation, conducted at the end of 2025, some 23% of all South Africans chose Motsepe as their preferred next leader of the African National Congress (ANC). He was followed by Fikile Mbalula on 19%, Paul Mashatile on 13%, Kgosientsho Ramokgopa on 9%, and Senzo Mchunu on 4%.

That data was produced before the idea of Motsepe succeeding Ramaphosa had caught on in the public domain to any considerable degree. Should he launch a formal run to succeed Ramaphosa, and put an effective media operation behind that run, Cronje is certain he would vastly exceed the popularity of any other plausible candidate.

Cronje's advice to investors seeking to make sense of Motsepe’s next moves and their implications is to assume, on the balance of probabilities, three things.

The first is that Motsepe will consider a political run for either the leadership of the ANC in 2027, or a related facsimile, if the route to victory is sufficiently clear and the balance of the party unites around him.

Stepping aside from day-to-day executive authority of a major corporation clears the path to consider that run seriously.

The second is that if he runs, he will likely win. The ANC faces declining support and eroded credibility and popular confidence. Internally, it remains split between statist ideologues and patronage-driven factions. A candidate able to signal competence, market credibility, and cross-factional appeal offers the party its only plausible route back to broader stability. Cronje said, “We can already see in the early national data that he could address and begin to resolve much of what threatens the ANC’s future grip on political power in South Africa.”

Third, if he wins, ANC support would lift materially. The outcome then, Cronje says, “could be either a restored ANC majority in 2029 or a durable centrist coalition with a Democratic Alliance (DA) under Geordin Hill-Lewis, both of which are good results under which reform should accelerate markedly”.

Such reforms should be able to lift the fixed investment rate to over 20% of GDP in short order, with the effect of pushing the rate of economic growth closer to 3%.

The Economic Freedom Fighters has significant internal weaknesses and obstacles to its future growth and in 2025 polled at less than half of its peak level. uMkhonto weSizwe is closely tied to the cult of personality around Jacob Zuma, who is ageing, as well as to a loathing of Cyril Ramaphosa. The Common Sense has also reported on risks to the DA in its present leadership race and the potential splitting of its forces. The ANC, or an ANC facsimile under a credible leader, therefore faces a fortuitous set of political circumstances.

Cronje’s assessment is not that a run or recovery is certain. He is quick to stress that if the Motsepe camp sees no clear route to victory, a run may not be attempted at all. Rather, his view is that such a run represents the plausible baseline and may easily translate into a rapid domestic economic recovery.

Cronje notably did not buy into the theory that the CR17 campaign would deliver a marked South African or ANC national recovery. Instead, he warned that that leadership transition would continue the slide in ANC support. This time, he stresses, the circumstances are very different and the potential upsides therefore quite credible.