Take a short time-out from the Zuptagate
emails, the imminent vote of no confidence in JZ, and other cause célèbre
that are presently occupying our minds, and start thinking about the 2019
National Elections that many believe will deliver the cure for all our ills. The first question I asked myself was - where can
I find really meaningful socio-political engagement in South Africa? The ANC
has lost its way and many of the good things they achieved are forever lost in
the mire of State Capture, but in my opinion the main opposition parties are also
not offering anything that even loosely resembles a meaningful alternative. In general, they appear to be relying upon
votes against the ANC rather than
votes for themselves in their quest
for power.
While not absolving the ANC or
making excuses for the dire straits we find ourselves in, politically it is
much easier in South Africa to be in opposition than in governance. For
example, ConCourt case outcomes aside, for which we can thank Chief Justice
Mogoeng and his team of Justices, the EFF has effectively done nothing but loudly
criticise the governing party while promising impossibilities in their own
manifesto, and simply disappearing from Parliament every time Jacob Zuma showed
up. Their seemingly confused grasp of economics has fathered (or should I say
parented?) a legion of populist rhetoric resulting in what can only be
described as EFFonomics. Their policy call for land expropriation without
compensation for example, which is by far their loudest and most emotive call, is
one that is completely divorced from reality. They shout “Give back the land”
without providing any details of how mortgage bonds will be settled, how
improvements on the land will be compensated, or whether it is all rural, urban
and suburban land that will be expropriated, what criteria will be used for
determining how land will be redistributed, or where the investment will come
from to develop redistributed land if there is no ownership potential etc.
It is more than likely that many
of their most ardent supporters don’t realise that under an EFF government they
will still never get to own any land
- ever. This, along with an
unrealistic recruiting rhetoric of promising free everything to 18-24 year-olds
makes a recipe for an economic disaster that will only serve to push more
people below the poverty line. Their ever-increasing racist rhetoric against
minority White and Indian communities is cowardly. They have no vision for
unifying the country so, like bullies on a school playground they simply resort
to attacking those they think are too small and vulnerable to retaliate.
But then again, when was the last
time any South African politician tried to realistically address our everyday problems?
Julius Malema has confirmed via Twitter that politics is just a
game and he believes he is good at playing this game. But then anyone can
be good at a game if they are spoon-fed information on what their opponents are
up to. There can be no doubt that Malema has a mole, or moles deeply entrenched
within ANC leadership structures feeding him information. So he is not the
great oracle he tries to project, but rather has been gifted the political equivalent
of playing a lottery after the numbers have already been drawn. Add to this his
vitriolic personal attacks on Jacob Zuma, which sound more like the vented
emotions of a jilted lover than a seasoned political leader, and the EFF can be
recognised for what it is - just a populist empty drum intent on making the
most noise. How EFF supporters will react not if, but when Malema goes back to
the ANC, either as a coalition partner, or fully-fledged member, will make an
interesting debate for another day.
On the other side of the same
coin, the main opposition Democratic Alliance has become, to borrow from
Winston Churchill, “a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma”. I am not
sure if they are suffering an identity crisis, or have simply embraced the
double-standards endemic to South African politics. Their reaction to losing a secret ballot vote
in Mogale City was outrageous in the context of the imminent Parliamentary vote
of no confidence in JZ. Witch-hunting of councillors in Mogale through
“voluntary” lie detector tests, while encouraging ANC Parliamentarians to break
ranks from the party line and “vote their conscience” is the DA’s most egregious
application of double standards. Then again, in a recent article on the subject
of State Capture, Mmusi Maimane wrote: “It
is one thing to deploy cadres in politically elected positions. Quite another to deploy them to other
organs of state....” This statement implies
that it is OK to deploy crooks and incompetents to Parliament, Provincial
Government and Local Councils, just don’t let them anywhere near a proper
business!
It is this type of statement that
confirms Mmusi Maimane and the DA are also comfortable with maintaining the
political status quo, where a deployees’ accountability is to the party
(leader) first, and the electorate very distantly second. With the decline of
ANC morality, the DA was in pole position to inherit the mantle of multiracial
unification, but they have so far lacked the vision and tenacity to grasp that
particular nettle. The politically expedient but generally unimaginative compromise
over Helen Zille’s colonial tweet saga is a clear example of how not to handle
perceived racism. The internal politics
of power became more important to the antagonists than the external perception
of racism within their ranks, which served only to damage the DA’s image with
their main target audience. They also seem to lack imagination and a cohesive
vision, not about what the country
needs which is obvious to anyone with ears, eyes and half a brain, but how to satisfy those needs. The limit of
their imagination is to ask the electorate to “lend us your vote, and if you
don’t see a difference after five years then take it elsewhere in the next
election” – no policy substance, just a desperate appeal that stretches
credibility a little too far.
So if the ANC is not an option, we
can now choose between an unimaginative plea, and a long-ago bankrupted dogma. Hardly
inspiring stuff is it? Even less inspiring is the lack of transparency in
political party funding where none of them wants to tell us where their money
comes from. Their solution to achieving more transparency is to increase
public funding to cover the money they can no longer take from dodgy donors
they don’t want to tell us about. This particular “solution”, touted on the
basis that we South Africans must invest more in our democracy, proves that
politicians inhabit a completely different planet than you and I.
We live in the real world of
increasing joblessness and poverty, not in the elite world of SA politicians. Their
world is so far removed from reality that they should be embarrassed by their
ignorance of the plight of our people. Is this the best we can do South Africa -
allowing ourselves to be channelled into believing that our only choice is between
the relative evils of these three lesser candidates, or perhaps a self-serving
combination of any two of them that brings them the power they crave?
We
are being challenged to stand up and be counted in the fight against Zuma and
State Capture but, as vitally important as this is, it is still only the tip of
the South African political iceberg. Until the root cause of the problem, which
lies in the almost limitless power invested in party leaders by the
Proportional Representation closed list electoral system, is removed, the
threat of State Capture will remain an ever present risk no matter who is in
power.
