South Africa

OP-ED

Beyond Saints and Sinners: Ramaphosa’s South Africa (Part 2)

Beyond Saints and Sinners: Ramaphosa’s South Africa (Part 2)
President Cyril Ramaphosa tours a Nissan factory, 10 April 2019. Photo: Deaan Vivier/Netwerk24/Gallo

Post the elections, Cyril Ramaphosa will have to implement a radical pragmatic strategy that tackles the critical issues of corruption, land redistribution, violence, racism, redress and developing a common social pact with key societal actors to move South Africa forward. But this is only if Ramaphosa is savvy enough to navigate our current serpentine politics without being swallowed by it, as I explore in Part 1 of this series.

See Part 1 of this series here

What then should be the essential elements of Ramaphosa’s programme of action in the days and months after the election? I discern six essential elements of a radical pragmatic strategy. First, Ramaphosa has to be seen to act against corruption. If there is a singular descriptor of the Zuma administration, it has to be State Capture. At the heart of this phenomenon was a pervasive rent-seeking programme that involved a few families and businessmen who used their access to the President, his Ministers and Premiers to enrich themselves at the cost of both the public purse and service delivery to citizens. There has to be accountability for this destruction, if only to ensure that others are dissuaded from repeating this plundering but one has to be pragmatic as to how this is done.

Given the pervasive character of the State Capture programme, there are not many senior politicians from the governing party who evaded being at least partially contaminated by this agenda. As a result, Ramaphosa will have no choice but to act against those who committed the most egregious violations. Ace Magashule, Bathabile Dlamini, Nomvula Mokonyane, Malusi Gigaba, Mosebenzi Zwane will all have to fall on their swords or at least that of Ramaphosa’s. Jacob Zuma will have to go through a legal battle but it is unlikely that he will see the inside of a jail for a very long time given the political costs that this will create and the instability that it will generate. Other politicians who committed relatively minor misdemeanours will probably get off with a slap on the wrist. The one easy win will be to go after the Guptas and the Watsons, a move that will likely unite all South Africans across the ideological and party political divide. It will not only allow South Africa to be able to get back at least some of the country’s money and assets, but the action would send a strong message to actors in the private sector that there will be severe consequences for corrupt behaviour.

Second, Ramaphosa must intervene on the land question in a transparent and decisive manner. There is no question that a more equitable distribution of land is necessary for inclusive economic development, political stability and a sustainable democracy. If Ramaphosa wants to lead on this question, then he needs the confidence to play to his own political narrative and not that of the EFF. There must also be no “smoke and mirrors” and deflections. He must simply determine his own agenda on land and present it in the full glare of the public light. The substance of the intervention has to be directed at implementation. Changing the Constitution will not make land distribution happen. It is having the political will and marshalling state institutions and resources towards this goal that will make the difference.

Three distinct interventions should be undertaken in this regard. First, selected state land should be made available for immediate distribution. This should be managed by a national task team with external experts and a twelve-month deadline to distribute the land and provide skills and support to create thousands of new emerging farmers. Second, a conversation should be opened up with two groups – mine owners and agricultural landowners – to redirect their surplus land for expanding the development of a new generation of farmers. If they refuse to negotiate and be reasonable, then and only then, should land be expropriated without compensation? Finally, an engagement should be undertaken with traditional leaders on the use of land under their control. There is huge abuse of land in some traditional areas and it needs to be heavily regulated within strict parameters that speaks to directly addressing landlessness. One mechanism that could be considered is the provision of time-bound title deeds to inhabitants along the lines used for monarchical land in the United Kingdom. As Ramaphosa well knows, the trick about social transformation is getting multiple stakeholders in society to act in concert as one. State force should only be invoked when necessary and never for emotional satisfaction. Social transformation is not about revenge, rather it is about building a better life for all.

Third, a social pact has to be built beyond land and across all sectors of society. Ramaphosa has publicly advocated for such a social compact. Yet two hurdles stand in his way. First, unions have been reluctant to recognise that they have to be more measured in their wage demands if social democracy is to be born. Wage demands across all sectors are way beyond inflation and have in a few instances even threatened the sustainability of enterprises. Unions, and the South African Democratic Teachers’ Union (Sadtu) and the National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union (Nehawu) in particular, have also compromised the delivery of social services like education and healthcare to poor and middle-class communities. Much of this has to do with the breakdown of trust between workers and their enterprises, both private and public. This trust has to be rebuilt across society and has to be politically led by Ramaphosa himself. It also needs to be premised on the belief that workers stand to gain a fair share of the benefits that are likely to accrue. Only then will there be an incentive for workers and unions to consider being part of a shared social project.

Another necessary element enabling this would be if politicians, business leaders and the wealthy are seen to make their own sacrifices in building such a shared social pact. This would necessitate a voluntary or even legislated regulation of executive remuneration and dividend flows. Ramaphosa has been publicly silent on this aspect. It may have to do with a concern on his part that it might provoke a backlash from the corporate sector and facilitate greater policy uncertainty. He has to engage the corporates and make them aware that their own long-term sustainability is dependent on such regulation. Not only would such a measure be of enormous symbolic value and useful in rebuilding trust between constituencies but it is also a necessary element in addressing income inequality, which is fundamental for healing the political and social divides of our society.

Fourth, Ramaphosa must be seen to proactively and decisively lead in advancing and defending non-racialism. He has often spoken of his desire to reignite and consolidate former president Nelson Mandela’s vision of a non-racial and inclusive society. But this vision has come under significant attack in recent years by political parties like the EFF with their militaristic and racially toxic brand of politics. It has also been challenged by some within the post-apartheid generation whose absence of memory of apartheid and experience of the inequality of the post-apartheid era has led them to not only legitimately challenge the failures of the post-apartheid political administrations but also to question the legitimacy of Mandela and the non-racial principles on which the democratic era has been founded.

Ramaphosa has of course already committed himself to a non-racial project but he must be seen to do more on this front. Ramaphosa must be seen to lead the public discourse on the issue, defend Mandela’s legacy, and if necessary publicly challenge the toxic rhetoric of Malema, his political cohorts and even those advancing racialised agendas among the post-apartheid generation. Here is where Ramaphosa has been hitherto absent. When Pravin Gordhan came under racial attack from the EFF, or when the same happened to officials in the national treasury, Ramaphosa was absent in the public discourse. Only much later in the Gordhan incident did he express concern at the racial tenor of attacks. Even then this was done too meekly to constitute a serious challenge to the toxic racialised rhetoric and culture that has come to define our political interactions.

Fifth, if the State Capture hearings have done anything, it is to bring to the fore the need to rethink and revise our redress strategies. Two elements warrant rethinking. The first is cadre deployment. Not only has this detracted from the building of a meritocratic civil service, but it has also conflated party and state and ensured that the ANC branches have become a battleground for tenderpreneurs whose only interest in membership is to use it as a lever to enrich themselves. The net effect has been to compromise service delivery to mainly the poor and the middle classes and to enable the spread of corruption across all levels of government. The second redress element that needs revision is the Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) policies and in particular, it’s explicit link to state procurement. This has not only created an unholy relationship between state officials and aspirant businessmen, but it has also dramatically increased the costs of procurement as more and more middle people have to be compensated. State procurement has also not enabled the emergence of an entrepreneurial class. Too often, the tenderpreneurs are middle persons with no productive capacity in their own right. The net effect is the creation of what (Frantz) Fanon describes as a parasitic bourgeoisie who leech off the state, divert its resources from the poor, demonstrate very little entrepreneurial ability or innovation, and are the architects of the very corruption that needs to be stamped out.

None of this must be interpreted to mean that redress must not be undertaken. The historically grounded racial disparities of our society make this a necessity, but the redress strategies have to be rethought in significant ways. For instance, cadre deployment must be restricted to only political appointments. The civil service in its entirety has to be freed of this scourge. Similarly, state procurement can be used as a lever to address historical disparities, but must be limited only to those enterprises that have productive capacities in their own right and whose price differentials are within acceptable bands. In addition, no civil servants or an immediate member of their family, including spouse or child, should be allowed any form of state tender within specific geographic or sectoral boundaries. All of this must be coupled with a rigorous monitoring mechanism and a prosecution service that acts quickly and decisively against all those who violate these rules. Finally, preferential financing for BEE transactions should only be allowed once. The principle of ‘once empowered, always empowered’ should prevail in the sense that subsequent business transactions by the individual should follow the normal channels undertaken by all entrepreneurs. These revisions would then enable redress to be undertaken to address historical disadvantage without compromising state efficiency. In a sense, it would allow for broad-based empowerment and not individual enrichment.

Finally, Ramaphosa has to develop a comprehensive programme to address violence across all aspects of society. It is worth noting that the fundamental element of any social contract between citizens and the state is the right to security. It is this right to security that the state guarantees which provides the incentive for citizens to cede authority to and respect the decisions of the state. But this guarantee of security is violated daily in South Africa not only by citizens being subjected to crime, but also as a result of the political violence that is unleashed by multiple political and social groups. The violence has truly become pervasive. It is evident in multiple community struggles and union strikes, and is now increasingly openly committed by parties like the EFF who trash stores, threaten individual citizens and institutions, and even commit individual acts of violence. This state of affairs cannot be allowed to continue. It not only threatens investment and growth but also compromises the addressing of inequality and poverty and the realisation of economic and social inclusion.

What should be done in this regard? There can be no doubt that violence can only be sustainably addressed if its structural cause – economic inequality – is itself tackled. This must be a programme to which Ramaphosa commits, but this does not mean that his state must be paralysed until this is achieved. On the contrary, the addressing of inequality will itself be compromised if individual acts of violence are allowed to proliferate. Structural violence cannot in any way justify individual acts of violence against citizens. Those who commit such acts must be held accountable. They must be arrested, prosecuted, and if found guilty, imprisoned. As in the case of corruption, violence can only truly be curtailed when individuals recognise that there are consequences for such actions, and that they will individually be held accountable if they commit such acts. All of this requires an efficient and capable police service, one that not only has the technical skills required but also acts within the confines permitted by the Constitution. This is perhaps where Ramaphosa’s first intervention should be; to enhance the investigative, public order policing, and defensive management capacities of the SAPS so that it can play its constitutionally mandated role in this democracy.

Is Cyril Ramaphosa likely to undertake these elements of a radical pragmatic strategy? At one level he has already publicly committed to much of it. But the challenge is whether he will be given the political space to undertake this programme of action given his slender majority in the ANC, and the political forces arraigned against him in the political system. It is of course also dependent on whether South Africans will give him this opportunity by choosing him as their President after 8 May. They would, of course, have to see beyond the prism of “saints and sinners” when choosing their President. Ramaphosa is no saint. He has been Zuma’s deputy for the last five years, and has been a part of the ANC’s hierarchy even before the dawn of our democracy. He has made many mistakes, both prior to inheriting the presidency, and some since. But he is also South Africa’s best bet to build a more inclusive society that we can all cherish. This is not only because he is a part of the ANC hierarchy, or is desirous of the non-racial vision pioneered by Mandela, but also because he has the political guile required to navigate the current serpentine politics of South Africa. As a result, like Lula from Brazil, he may just be able to advance a radical pragmatic agenda that not only gets us out of our economic growth trap, but also simultaneously addresses inequality, and thereby political polarisation, in our society.

If Ramaphosa were to succeed in this regard, not only would he make a significant contribution to South Africa’s development and political stability, but he could also serve as a progressive beacon across the globe in a very difficult historical moment. It is worth noting that the world is currently in a difficult space with the rise of proto-fascist political forces, some of whom have also come to state power in both the developed and developing world. The world is as a result of crying for progressive political leadership, one that could be emulated to stem the tide of global fascism. If this were to come to fruition, and Ramaphosa were to play this role, then not only would he emulate his mentor – Nelson Mandela – by rising to the South African Presidency, but he would also do so by transcending national power and becoming a global statesman. DM

Adam Habib is a Professor of Political Sciences, the Vice-Chancellor and Principal of the University of Witwatersrand and the author of Rebels & Rage.

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