This article reminds me about my civic responsibility to be well informed. Without a well informed public discourse we are but poor players that strut and fret our hour upon the stage, and then are heard no more. It becomes a tale told by idiots, full of sound and fury, Signifying NOTHING! (with apologies to the Bard)
Understanding
This Very Strange Society
-
with apologies to Lawrence
Durrell, 1968
29
March 2012
Over
dinner this week an old friend said that he had bought a property in Mauritius.
Why? “Because this place is going to blow up.” This place – South Africa
– is not going to blow up. But I understand where my friends’ attitude
comes from. And if he as a South African is puzzled to the point of being
concerned by the political goings on in our society, I wonder what foreigners
must make of our country – whether seriously involved in a deal or ordinary
folk who are here not to invest but just to enjoy these lovely late Autumn days
looking – in vain I’m afraid – for whales in Hermanus.
Most
people get their information from television or from newspapers, and South Africa, by any comparison, has the best
print media in Africa. It’s Sunday
newspapers – and there are five substantial ones – are probably unique in the
world in the political role which they play. In fact, to keep abreast of
developments during the course of the week, you just have to read the Sunday
newspapers.
Tertius Myburgh, a now deceased but much-loved
and first-rate editor of The Sunday Times, said of his paper – its
unique magic was to bring together sex, scandal, business and politics. The
Sunday Times’ competition in those days was The Sunday Express and The
Sunday Tribune. The Sunday Tribune survives, but added to it
are The Independent on Sunday, City Press, and the Afrikaans
newspaper Rapport, which is co-owned with The City Press by the
giant publishing company Media24. And one can include in this collection
the weekly Mail & Guardian which reaches most readers late on a
Friday or over the weekend. But come Sunday, they all tell their own
story – as they genuinely see it and as their columnists genuinely interpret
it. I add this positive qualification - because the reality is a
confused and conflicting one, and – most of the time – disconcerting to
ordinary South Africans.
For
example, over the weekend of the 11th of March, The Independent published
an article under the heading “Our democracy hangs in the balance”, with a
sub-heading “Our President is betraying his party’s legacy by turning on the
constitution.” The article is written by none other than Dr Mamphela Ramphele, a former Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cape Town and World Bank
executive. In other words, a highly respected person with impeccable
credentials to comment on the South African situation. Among other things
she wrote “The past few weeks have witnessed an arising crescendo of rhetoric
that places our failures as a nation to transform the socio-economic inequities
of our society on the doorstep of our national constitution” She goes on
to warn “The principle of the rule of law is a critical building block in the
pursuit of the concept of constitutionalism, and a more sinister driver behind
the betrayal of the spiritual values of our constitutional democracy is to
shift the blame for poor performance.” She warns South Africans “We must
be very afraid as citizens when scapegoats are used to mask government
failures. We need not look far for examples of the tragic results of such
scapegoating.”
This
is potent stuff coming from a highly reputable person. Yet on the same
Sunday (11 March) but in a different newspaper, Cyril Ramaphosa, an independent
businessman but probably one of the most respected and influential members of
the ANC outside of the cabinet, and commanding as much respect as Ramphele,
contributed an article in City Press under the heading: “Alarmist
headlines bode ill for logical and rational debate.” Ramaphosa was
critical of an article City Press had carried in an earlier edition
under the heading “ANC wants a new constitution.” Ramaphosa described
this “as the latest instalment of this fear-inspiring approach” He went on to
say that “the use of fear and ignorance as political weapons is not new to South Africa.
It is part of a concerted effort to suspend reason and evoke fear. It is
part of a narrative that suggests that the ANC would like nothing better to
reverse the country’s democratic gains, erode constitutional freedoms and
undermine the independence of the judiciary. Not only are these
assertions untrue, they also diminish the opportunity for rational discussion
about the challenges facing our country.”
Here
are two points of view, both well-articulated and published in good faith, but
conveying very different messages. It is clear which of the two views has
influenced my good friend with the property in Mauritius.
This
is just one example. Another is an interview, which ANC Treasurer-General
Mathews Phosa gave to The Sunday Times last weekend (25 March). It
was on the front-page, and therefore prominent, and under the headline: “Phosa
warns of Arab Spring in South
Africa”. The report goes on to say:
“Phosa warned of a North-African style Arab Spring if the government does not
affectively tackle rising unemployment among the youth. “What happened in
North Africa was that there were too many
unemployed young people. If we don’t draw lessons from there, we are
making a big mistake.”
Admittedly,
Phosa’s interview was given against the background of on-going service delivery
protests in many parts of the country. But the point is, here is a person
of substantial influence within the ANC, one of its top leaders, in effect
expressing a lack of confidence in his organisation, which effectively is the
government of South Africa.
How utterly confusing to ordinary South Africans!.
Yet
another example is Zwelinzima
Vavi, head of the powerful Congress
of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), a partner in the South African
government alliance, quoted under the headline “Vavi says ANC risks being
overthrown.” His message: “Unless the government does better, it will be
overthrown.”
No
doubt there are people who will welcome the expression of such sentiments
because they believe the government is failing. But the element of
confusion and discord is distinctly worrying to many people and certainly to
foreign investors. We’ve seen this in relation to the mining
industry. Is there an answer?
It
may be the wrong time to raise this question because we are also into an
election year. And it is a rather unique election – because while until
now the ANC has avoided direct competition, this time it seems there will be a
real fight to see who will be the ANC candidate. So it may be the wrong
time to talk about serious answers to our situation.
Insight has at
different times referred to the argument over the role of the judiciary and the
concept of separation of powers and the government’s challenge to the right of
information and the right of expression, and the deeply worrying debate over
the role of the judiciary relative to the other branches of government.
These issues raise two points.
Firstly,
while as a country we have adopted the constitutional model most prominently
represented among democracies by the US,
we don’t have America’s
philosophical underpinnings – the Federalist papers, the writings of Madison, Hamilton and Jay – that rich Enlightenment philosophical
base. We need to think about this. And while foundations –
particularly the German foundations like the Adenauer and the Hanns Seidel
foundations, etc. – are playing an important role in South Africa in
strengthening our civic sense, American foundations should be promoting that
philosophical underpinning which is absent in this country but so necessary to
the functioning and survival of our constitution. Secondly, while we have
adopted the supremacy of the constitution, with its particular implications for
the legislature, our constitutional thinking has been determined down the years
by England,
in which parliament is sovereign. And while it is therefore not
surprising that ANC spokespersons will quite regularly refer to parliament as
the voice of the people to the relegation of the role of the judiciary in our
polity, this is wrong and potentially distructive of democracy.
But
these are things that in calmer times one needs to debate and promote because
right now in an election year our political discourse is going to get tougher,
more robust, and more confusing to ordinary South Africans, if not impossible
for foreigners to understand.
Dr Denis Worrall
Chairman,
Omega Investment Research
Cape Town, South Africa
www.omegainvest.co.za
Omega Investment Research
Cape Town, South Africa
www.omegainvest.co.za
Email: staceyf@omegainvest.co.za for all enquiries.
Copyright 2008. Omega Investment Research. All Rights Reserved www.omegainvest.co.za
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