Is Life and Times of Micheal K a political novel?

Most of J.M. Coetzee's novel Life and Times of Michael K (1983) is written in close 3rd person, a detailed account of K's life in Cape Town, a city torn by some kind of war, with shortages of all staples and w/ the constant movement of troops and surveillance by authorities, and their journey about 250 miles inland - a hazardous trip that leads to his mother's death, K's illness and capture in a labor camp, and his eventual try for freedom, living off the land and surviving on roots and melon seeds until his arrest my military authorities who believe that he is providing shelter and supplies to a band of insurgents or rebels. Many writers might have tried to narrate this story in 1st person, but I think close-3rd is the right choice, as K does not have the perspective or the analytic ability to make a credible narrator - in fact, part of his personality and character is that he is unable to put his life into narrative form, when questioned (and threatened) by authorities. The 2nd part of the novel - about 30 pp or so, compared w/ about 150 in part 1, is from the POV of a physician in the prison camp where K is being held; the physician wisely understand that K does not have the capacity to help or ally w/ any gang of rebels or insurgents, and gets the authorities to go (relatively) easy on K. In part 3, even shorter, K escapes and heads back to Cape Town, and gets taken in by what seems to be some type of street gang, who more or less watch out for him, as the narrative ends. Oddly, the war is never explained or discussed, and there is literally no reference to racial tensions; I guess it's an open question as to the race of the main characters, although I sense that most or all are white until the gang that befriends K in part 3, who may be clack of "coloured," as they were known in SA. So it's a weirdly apolitical novel in a sense, oblivious of the social forces shaping Africa at the time of its composition - yet in another sense, topicality aside, it's a highly political novel, that feels true today, telling a story of exile and wandering and despair that's taking place in many countries today;  compared w/ the many dystopian novels that involve post-apocalyptic journeys through wastelands - e..g., The Road - Coetzee's is much more political, not about a journey after a disaster but about ordinary, troubled people seeking refuge, solace, even survival in a time of uncertainty and upheaval, again, like many places today and in other times, even Biblical: it may not be explicitly of its time, but it's of our time and universal.