Is it possible for a honeymoon to end before the wedding vows have been exchanged? Even as the ANC continues to suffer high-profile defections, the Shikota Movement and its Congress of the People (Cope appears to be the new acronym) is rumored to be beset by divisions.
Even if we grant the possibility that many of these rumors are disinformation that the ANC is planting to sow seeds of doubt a month before Cope's formal launch, it stands to reason that the new party will have some growing pains. After all, the party exists mostly because of what it is not and has not yet established what it is. Which is to say that right now the logic driving the Shikota Movement is that it is not the ANC. But the breakdown of the ANC was as much the result of various personality conflicts and contested loyalties as a break over either policy or ideology.
