From June 11 to July 11 2010, all eyes will be on South Africa: for the first time, the FIFA World Cup is taking place in an African nation. This prestigious event comes at a time when South Africa is facing its most serious crisis since the end of apartheid. With more immediate concerns at stake, authorities are keeping silent but the gravity of the problems will constitute a painful priority as soon as the FIFA World Cup is over.

Alec Russell is unwilling to wait that long. His new book, After Mandela, The Battle for the Soul of South Africa, is an enthralling eye-opener. The author, World News Editor of the Financial Times and formerly its Johannesburg bureau chief, uses a deep knowledge to describe the new battle for the soul and future of South Africa which is currently taking place. If the country’s ruling party the ANC does not reverse its course of action, it might do to South Africa what ZANU-PF, Mugabe’s ruling party, has done to Zimbabwe. After fifteen years in power, the ANC is not only failing to deliver what it promised but it is also plagued by rampant corruption, infighting and misrule.

Alec Russell acknowledges that he, along with other correspondents, were more forgiving of Mandela’s weaknesses because of his mythical status. Mandela completely misjudged the danger of AIDS and the end of his presidency was marred by a high crime rate and a poor economy.

Mbeki resented the way Mandela was adulated and this exasperation showed during the press conference when he succeeded Mandela. Asked how he felt stepping in Mandela’s shoes, he answered with a rare bluntness: “I would never be seen dead in such shoes. You wear such ugly shoes!”

Mbeki conveniently forgot that he himself received preferential treatment during his exile in Britain “because he wore tweed suits, smoked a pipe and quoted classical poets...it blinded people to Mbeki’s faults and the attention encouraged him to think he was a genuine policy intellectual and superior to his political peers and his people.”

Mbeki’s political legacy is one marked by mixed results. His economic reforms, the push for fiscal discipline and the creation of a black middle class achieved positive results; on the other hand, his unflinching support for Mugabe, and his decision to delay the life-saving antiretroviral drugs (ARVs) have been catastrophic. South Africa now has more people living with HIV and AIDS than any other country in the world.

Equally disturbing is the ANC senior officials’ direct involvement in business transactions for their own interests. Members loyal to ANC’s original mission compared the party’s approach to business to “the selling of the party’s soul.” In 2004, people learned that the ANC had set up a front company known as Chancellor House, to which the government gave away stakes in private companies through contracts in order to raise funds for the party.

It soon became apparent that the government’s economic policies were benefiting mainly the rich, which resulted in a growing inequality gap and increased poverty in the country. At the same time, South Africa was going through a serious crime wave which earned it the epithet, “a country at war with itself”.

“One of the most striking physical changes in Johannesburg over the first 14 years of majority rule was the growth of the suburban fortress: The average height of walls rose by several feet; gated suburbs and office parks sprouted on the fringes of the city like medieval walled towns; more and more roads were fenced off with booms and sentries,” writes Alec Russell.

Zuma won the ANC presidency because he promised to help the poor. Furthermore, his style of government is completely different from that of Mbeki.