Nelson Mandela's party is slowly crumbling in South Africa — and that's a good thing

The titanic reputation of Nelson Mandela has not been all great for South Africa.

Let me explain. South Africa has many very serious problems, from unemployment that is chronically over 20 percent, to endemic corruption, to a recent spate of political assassinations. Probably the biggest obstacle to tackling those problems is a lack of political competition. Mandela's party, the African National Congress, was rightly credited with ending apartheid (though it was not only them), inspiring deep loyalty among South Africa's black citizens — some 80 percent of the population.

Easy, guaranteed success was extremely bad for the ANC, which descended into grubby patronage politics, corruption, and grotesque incompetence at a dizzying rate. But carrying the aura of Mandela, the ANC still managed to win every election before this year with over 60 percent of the vote.

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However, there are signs this situation is turning around. In elections last week, the ANC received its worst result since the beginning of South African democracy, polling only 54 percent. Chances are good that soon — possibly in the next general election in 2019 — the party will fall below the majority mark, ushering in a new era of genuine competition and a more healthy democracy.

The ANC's main rivals, the Democratic Alliance and the recently founded Economic Freedom Fighters, gained ground overall, polling 27 percent and 8 percent, respectively. But in important cities, the ANC's decline was far more steep. It lost the majority-black city of Nelson Mandela Bay to a DA campaign led by a white mayoral candidate, Athol Trollip (who gave a delightful victory speech in English and Xhosa). Given that this is the home of many of the anti-apartheid struggle's leaders, and is well outside the traditional DA base in Western Cape, it's a humiliating defeat for the ANC.

But more meaningful were the results in Pretoria and Johannesburg, respectively the political capital and largest city. The race in both places was so close that results were not declared until 4 days after the actual election — but the DA took Pretoria and came within a few percentage points in Johannesburg.

The Pretoria-Johannesburg area is the beating heart of South African business and industry, and ANC governance there has been poor. Loyal ANC voters there have turned away from the party, disgusted by corruption and incompetence. The party may hang on to its rural patronage networks for some time, but if it can't contest the major urban centers, its days as the political hegemon are numbered.

Quality democratic institutions take a long time to build and are difficult to maintain. At their best, they have ideologically distinct, non-corrupt parties that give voters a real choice of different policies. (One should note that American democracy is not even close to global best practices.) Different elections can thus give different factions a chance at working out their policies, and thus lead to slow but steady improvement as the citizenry develops a sense of what works best.

But this takes time to develop. South Africa is at an early stage, where voting is more about patronage and ethnic loyalty. But if the DA and other parties manage to garner broad support in the black population, then the process of developing coherent ideology and policy will begin.

Make no mistake, this is a dangerous time for South Africa. When a longtime dominant party in a still-new democracy starts to lose its grip on power is often when party leaders begin considering extralegal methods — election fraud, suppression of opposition parties, or an outright coup d'etat — of hanging onto it. South Africa has no shortage of violent political history, and this election campaign saw several ANC candidates assassinated.

But these election results had to happen at some point. And for his other flaws, Mandela did firmly anchor South Africa's constitutional system as president. Now that he has died, his memory serves as George Washington did for the early United States — a universally esteemed secular saint and father of the nation. It's unlikely that the ANC would disgrace his legacy by resorting to outright fraud to cling to power. With a bit of luck, true electoral competition will be coming soon to Mzansi.