Last year's Ipsos poll suggests that the former president's Lazarus moment with the uMkhonto Wesizwe party adds to the African National Congress's woes, but is not the cause of them.

Since former president Jacob Zuma's announcement last October of his involvement in the uMkhonto Wesizwe Party (MK party), there has been a lot of noise about the party's impact on KwaZulu-Natal and national politics.

This seemed to reach fever pitch recently, when a poll was released by the Social Research Foundation (SRF), indicating that the MK party could get as much as 24% in the KZN provincial election on 29 May. According to the same poll, ANC support was down to 25%, with the DA% at 15%, the EFF at 5% and the IFP at 24%

"The ANC's house is on fire; it is finished. They are in shock," one analyst warned. "This indicates a total game change in South African politics," another said, pointing to this poll as proof that the MK party had "halved ANC support in the province in the last four months".

Although there can be little doubt that Zuma's involvement with the MK party will draw a significant number of votes in KZN, some of these predictions and analyses are problematic.

It is important to note that the SRF poll sampled 820 respondents telephonically. In a province with more than 5.7 million voters that is...