South Africa’s future depends on an ‘unholy alliance’ solving its real-world problems before time runs out

From Constantia Nek, a pass across the spine of rugged mountain that runs all the way to the Cape of Good Hope, day trippers are afforded a stunning view across centuries-old vineyards all the way to Cape Town’s city centre.

A quick jaunt down the other side past Michelin-star restaurants and gated housing estates leads to Hout Bay, a thriving fishing port on the city’s Atlantic coast.

There, butted up against architect-designed trophy houses, sits Imizamu Yethu, an 18-hectare “informal settlement” of mostly corrugated iron shacks that is home to almost 35,000 residents.

The contrast couldn’t be more incongruous. But it is a stark illustration of the unachieved ambitions and dashed hopes that accompanied the end of apartheid 30 years ago and stands as a monument to the failure of the African National Congress (ANC) to deliver meaningful change after three decades of uninterrupted rule.

It’s not an isolated case.

Right across the country, townships have sprung up and existing ones have expanded as African workers have flooded into urban and regional centres, graphically hammering home the message that while forced racial segregation may have ended, wealth still is largely delineated along racial lines.

The rich, most of whom are white, live very, very well. The rest struggle to eat regularly.