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For much of the past decade, the conventional wisdom in South African politics was that Cyril Ramaphosa was the greatest electoral asset of the African National Congress (ANC). The party might be unpopular, its ministers incompetent, and its record in government increasingly difficult to defend, but Ramaphosa enjoyed a personal standing that extended beyond the ANC’s traditional support base. Removing him, it was assumed, would only accelerate the party’s electoral decline.

New polling from the Social Research Foundation (SRF), conducted in conjunction with The Common Sense, raises an important question about whether that assumption remains valid.

Asked whether South Africa would be better or worse off if Ramaphosa left office, 46% of voters expected the country to improve, against 26% who expected it to deteriorate. A further 23% believed his departure would make no difference. In other words, the share of voters expecting an improvement is almost twice as large as the share fearing a deterioration.

See all that on the chart below.

The findings are striking because they suggest that the political protection Ramaphosa once provided the ANC may have weakened considerably. For years, the party could rely on the president’s personal appeal to soften public dissatisfaction with its record in government. Voters who had lost confidence in the ANC might nevertheless have retained some confidence in Ramaphosa. That distinction was important to the party’s electoral fortunes.

But the latest findings raise the possibility that the relationship has begun to reverse. Rather than protecting the ANC from public dissatisfaction, Ramaphosa may increasingly have become associated with the very failures from which his personal popularity once insulated the party.

There is an important distinction within the polling. ANC voters are more likely to expect the country to deteriorate following Ramaphosa’s departure. That suggests he retains a degree of personal loyalty among the party’s existing supporters, even as the broader electorate has become considerably less convinced of his value to the country.

For the ANC, that presents a difficult political calculation. The voters most attached to Ramaphosa are those already supporting the party. But winning back voters who have abandoned it, or attracting those who have never supported it, requires reaching beyond that existing base. If much of the wider electorate believes the country would be better off without Ramaphosa, his continued leadership may be less useful to that task than it once was.

It is therefore possible that Ramaphosa’s departure could create an opportunity for the ANC to lift its vote share. A change in leadership might allow the party to distance itself from some of the disappointments of his presidency and present itself to the electorate as an organisation capable of renewal. The argument that the ANC cannot afford to lose Ramaphosa because he is its principal electoral asset is considerably harder to sustain in the face of these findings.

That conclusion must nevertheless be treated with care. The survey measures voters’ expectations about the country’s prospects following Ramaphosa’s departure, not their intentions to vote for the ANC. A voter who believes South Africa would improve without him might remain entirely opposed to the ANC, regardless of who succeeds him. Equally, a change in leadership would not automatically resolve the governance failures that have damaged the party’s standing.

But the political significance of the findings remains considerable. Almost half the electorate believes the country would be better off without the sitting president, while barely a quarter fears that his departure would make matters worse.