cc Amid fears that Polokwane and the split in the ANC, and the uncertainty that these have generated, will unravel South Africa’s national potential for a rosier future, Adam Habib writes that ‘Economic development, service delivery, and poverty alleviation are dependent on a legitimated and capacitated state’. As the country’s national elections approach, Habib cautions that behaviour that ‘undermines the legitimacy and capacity of state institutions will compromise the new political elite’s own long-term goals’. Exploring the reasons behind former ANC leader Thabo Mbeki’s loss of support and what a Zuma presidency might mean for South Africa, Habib argues that the ‘substantive uncertainty’ introduced into South African politics by COSATU (Congress of South African Trade Unions) and the SACP’s (South African Communist Party) mobilisation against Mbeki has opened up political space and created debate on a range of policy issues, that would otherwise not have taken place. But for this ‘substantive uncertainty’ to be sustainable, it must be institutionalised within the political system as a whole.