New African National Congress president Cyril Ramaphosa is taking steps to bring about a premature end to South African President Jacob Zuma's term in office. Ramaphosa is isolating Zuma and prompting the National Prosecuting Authority to begin investigations relating to state capture in order to pressure the head of state to resign by 8 February. That would allow Ramaphosa to make the State of the Nation address at the reopening of parliament and set a new tone for South Africa.

• In the shortest time, and certainly by the time of the State of the Nation address, Ramaphosa will aim to take over as national president so he can set out his vision for South Africa's economic recovery in order to boost investor confidence and prevent further sovereign rating downgrades after slides to junk status in March and November 2017. This will be the first step to lifting economic growth and ultimately boosting the ruling African National Congress's (ANC) chances of retaining the presidency and a parliamentary majority at next year's general election due in May. Ramaphosa told his audience at the ANC's birthday celebrations in East London on 13 January that he would be prioritising a social pact between government, labour, businesses, and communities to reignite growth and accelerate the process of transformation. Ramaphosa also emphasised the need for the intelligence services, police, and prosecutorial authorities to be strengthened because they had to be "at the forefront of the fight against corruption and state capture". He can only make those necessary personnel changes, including a cabinet stripped of Zuma loyalists, once the president has stepped down.
• Zuma is under no obligation to resign, but he now looks highly unlikely to survive more than a few weeks at most, as his position has been critically weakened since the ANC elective conference, when Ramaphosa won the crucial 18 December 2017 vote over Zuma's preferred candidate, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma. Since then, the Constitutional Court has ordered the National Assembly to put in place a mechanism to impeach Zuma over failure to repay public funds used to upgrade his private home; Zuma was forced to agree on 9 January to a judicial inquiry into state capture; and the National Prosecuting Authority on 15 January began investigations into companies involved in allegedly fraudulent government contracts. Many of these cases centre on entities controlled by the Gupta family, but will also implicate companies of international standing that have done business with them in diverse sectors such as computing, banking, and management consultancy. Businessmen the Guptas have denied the allegations.
• If the president cannot be satisfied over the terms of his departure, then it is likely the ANC's National Executive Council (NEC) will call on Zuma to resign, and may even issue a recall notice. Some guarantees could be offered to Zuma to persuade him to go, but there is a limit to what Ramaphosa can pledge, due to political and legal constraints. Constitutionally, Zuma does not have to obey an NEC recall, and he may believe he could leverage a better deal by threatening to force a no-confidence motion at the National Assembly. The ANC would want to avoid this, as it would allow Zuma to deliver the key annual address and highlight populist policies that Ramaphosa probably would not want to emphasise, and trigger a vote that would highlight for a final time the party's inability to bring Zuma to heel by any other means.

Indicators of changing risk environment

• Confirmation that the NEC will be holding a no-confidence vote on Zuma.
• Open calls from Ramaphosa or senior figures close to him that Zuma should resign.
• Information being leaked on possible conditions that could persuade Zuma to step down.
• Who Ramaphosa decides to appoint as a new state prosecutor, who will rule on whether to reinstate 783 corruption charges against Zuma.
• Further cases being opened by the NPA against companies implicated in state capture allegations.