South Africa's next president : the people's opinion

This data was collected in November of this year in response to the question : ‘At the time of our next general election in 2009, President Thabo Mbeki would have been in office for two terms. In terms of the Constitution we will then have to get an new president. Although we do not elect our president by direct vote and the leader of the strongest party becomes president, who do you think should take over from President Mbeki and become South Africa's next president?'

Markinor's Socio-political trends survey is one of the products of the Pulse of the People series and has been conducted bi-annually since 1990, each time amongst a nationally representative sample of 3500 adult South Africans, as such allowing for comparability across time.

Phumzile Mlambo Ngcuka was the next most frequently mentioned candidate after Zuma (by 8% of South Africans), followed by Tokyo Sexwale and Cyril Ramaphosa (6% respectively), Trevor Manuel (4%) and Helen Zille (3%). 15% of South Africans replied that they did not know who should be the next president of South Africa.

At least a proportion of Zuma's support seems to be based on a belief that he is innocent of the corruption charges relating to the arms deal: one in three South Africans (33%) believe that Jacob Zuma is innocent of any dubious involvement in the arms debacle while a similar proportion (35%) do not believe in his innocence. When examining the group of South Africans who believe Zuma is innocent more closely, clear divisions according to political party support emerge – however these are not necessarily as one would expect: 51% of IFP supporters believe Zuma is innocent, while only 40% of ANC supporters and 8% of DA supporters concur.

As household income increases so does doubt regarding Zuma's innocence.

Furthermore three out of 10 (34%) of South Africans think that the alleged corruption charges against Zuma are an attempt by his political enemies to discredit him. The same proportion (34%) disagree with this statement and believe the corruption charges are based on wrong-doings by Zuma. Again Zuma receives more backing from IFP rather than ANC supporters, 55% of whom believe the corruption charges to be based on attempts to discredit Zuma, as opposed to 40% of ANC and 11% of DA supporters.

Interesting differences in the answers received in response to this statement by the different races was seen with 40% of black South Africans agreeing that the corruption charges are an attempt at discrediting Zuma, compared to 22% of Indians, 12% of Coloureds and 9% of whites.