Political transitions in two major Southern African states at the end of 2017, and how they are handled in 2018 and beyond, will drive the pace of much-needed change on the continent.

However, much will depend on how the former liberation movements come to grips with the very fluid dynamics of the politics of governance amid growing popular expectations.

In Zimbabwe and South Africa, leadership changes at government and ruling party levels have again underlined that, decades after liberation wars were won, the politics of national transition is less about race and more about economics.

Thirty-seven years after Robert Mugabe and the ZANU-PF assumed political power in Zimbabwe, and 23 years after Nelson Mandela and the African National Congress (ANC) did likewise in South Africa, apartheid and white minority rule are a distant memory.

Yet, in both cases, political leaders have awoken to the fact that, unless there is fundamental economic change, the black majority will continue to complain about the slow pace of progress decades after the respective national liberation movements transitioned to state power.

In Zimbabwe, new President Emmerson Mnangagwa has reversed Mugabe's controversial decision to seize white-owned farms and hand them to former freedom fighters, by inviting the former owners to return to many farms. In South Africa, new ANC leader Cyril Ramaphosa, as the likely next president, has promised to give priority to national economic plurality.

In both countries, politicians have learned the hard way that capitalism is not wished away by dreams or with words, and true economic emancipation is a long process.

The black majority in both nations has over time come to accept that whites also have equal rights in the new national dispensation. The focus of blame for sloth in delivery on election promises has therefore been focused more on their leaders, than on the capitalist system that kept most in economic bondage for longer than expected.

Mnangagwa, a former Mugabe deputy president with a strongman reputation, as the new ZANU-PF leader and President of Zimbabwe, is quite aware that his honeymoon period is under intense scrutiny at home and abroad. His people have demonstrated their will to wait, but not forever.

Ramaphosa, the former chief negotiator for the ANC in the transition talks to end apartheid, now a billionaire supported both by trade unions and South Africa's business class, knows quite well that as ruling party leader, he cannot wait until President Zuma eventually departs to give the majority confidence that he can make the decisive difference for which they have long yearned.

And Zimbabwe and South Africa are not the only two Southern African states under scrutiny. Angola, Mozambique and Namibia are also under international watch amid allegations of corruption and nepotism against the former liberation fighters leading the new political process.

All know words must be replaced by deeds that will eventually help the perennial poor.

Rich national mineral resources continue to be dominated in most cases by the same traditional multinational corporations that existed during the liberation struggles, even under new arrangements that have significantly improved and increased the national share of extracted wealth.

Yet, it's how that new wealth is handled that matters most. In cases where it is seen as concentrated in the hands of a new powerful minority, it will only be a matter of time before the deprived majority erupt.

Today's leaders, as former liberation fighters, will have to aim their proverbial guns at  changes in the national economic models, with an emphasis on meeting the economic, social, cultural and other needs of the majority.

Technology and innovation will have to replace traditional norms in planning and new national plans must necessarily extend beyond electoral terms to be effective.

The place and role of youth and the generations born after the victorious liberation struggles must not be overlooked, for their expectations differ widely from that of their parents and grandparents.

Likewise, the role of women is another important factor. Women play essential roles in political mobilization for elections, but, as history has shown in Africa and almost everywhere else, they are hardly ever entrusted with political leadership.

Much will also depend on the ability of the ruling parties in Zimbabwe and South Africa, in particular to resist, reject and overcome encouragement, from within and without, to pursue agendas that will hasten changes simply with impending national presidential elections in mind.

For example, criticism of Mugabe's retirement package and pressure to fast-forward Zuma's departure can result in more divisions at a time when unity is essential to pursue national agendas that will, in each case, finally change lives for the majority, for the better. 

Earl Bousquet is a contributor to china.org.cn, editor-at-large of The Diplomatic Courier and author of an online regional newspaper column entitled Chronicles of a Chronic Caribbean Chronicler.

Opinion articles reflect the views of their authors, not necessarily those of China.org.cn.