One of the core functions of a government is to leverage its resources to deliver services to the people. The executive comprises the accounting officers of these functions, accountable for operationalising the government’s plan. In South Africa, that plan comes from the governing party’s manifesto and conference resolutions. The executive and its members should be held to the highest standard of performance.
Failure to achieve results should result in citizens mobilising for political change using democratic means.
State institutions are vital organs of state tasked with providing governance and oversight, maintaining law and order, protecting citizens’ rights, and ensuring the provision of basic services to the population. They are the engines of scaled impact across stakeholders and beneficiaries.
The state is responsible for maintaining institutions of government – and the current condition of all South Africa’s major state institutions is deplorable. They are ghosts of their former selves and are failing to deliver the core objectives of government. Some are in such a state that they can never be revived again.
State-owned enterprises
Ask yourself: Would this performance be tolerated in any other self-respecting organisation that is committed to its shareholders and customers?
Just take a look at the major national state-owned enterprises that are always in need of bailouts and cannot meet their core business obligations.
How is it that Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan (who is so violently allergic to accountability) still has his job, when on every account and measure he has failed at it?
I dare you to name one shining example of his contribution in the Ministry of Public Enterprises.
The Cabinet reshuffle was a scam, a deflection and a distraction.
On a related matter, if you do a random survey during conversations over a braai among family, friends or colleagues (if you’re lucky enough to have work), the likelihood is that feeling safe and being able to provide for one’s family is at the apex of priorities.
At state level, safety is an accelerator of creating an enabling environment for economic prosperity, global connectedness and social stability. Safety creates trust and maintains the collective mental health and happiness levels of a people, allowing them to move and work freely.
And yet, another individual in a high position, the minister of police, has failed to do his job and simply relies on theatrics for social relevance. This has depreciated the quality of living across all sectors of life.
Crime is at an all-time high and getting worse. It is one of the biggest contributors to capital flight (human, financial, intellectual, social), which means the country is poorer for it, on top of a failed domestic economic programme yielding high unemployment, inequality and poverty.
However, Police Minister Bheki Cele remains comfortable in his position.
Missed opportunity
A Cabinet reshuffle offers the President an opportunity to strengthen the executive by bolstering leadership where there are gaps, reprioritising government efforts to areas requiring attention, sending a message to stakeholders and citizens about intentions and expectations, and setting the tone for the future.
Like other professional spaces, performance management is a critical tool to ensure that those tasked with targets and goals are kept honest and held accountable. Using performance management and the mechanism of a Cabinet reshuffle, the President can make significant and visible changes which will bring about confidence and clarity.
Despite the powers vested in his office, and the opportunity a reshuffle provides for wholesale but meaningful change, President Cyril Ramaphosa made only cosmetic changes to his Cabinet this month, failing to rise to the occasion. He has demonstrated absence from his duties. By having a new minister dedicated to planning, monitoring and evaluation, we are made to believe that performance and evaluation is a key pillar to turning things around, driving success and prioritising performance and service delivery.
Read in Daily Maverick: “Here they are — the long-awaited changes to President Ramaphosa’s Cabinet”
However, Ramaphosa keeps Gordhan and Cele in ministerial roles, showing South Africans that he really doesn’t care to account to the people or hold anyone accountable. The non-event of a Cabinet reshuffle was a slap in the face for those who have been affected by failed institutions and have been victims of crime. By failing to rise, Ramaphosa is accountable for violence against his own people.
The Cabinet reshuffle was a scam, a deflection and a distraction.
In 2024, South Africans will go to the polls to vote. The shifting political terrain suggests that next year the people will vote differently, unleashing a change to the political terrain and a possible reconfiguration of government. The minister of electricity, Kgosientsho Ramokgopa, no matter how impressive he is, is not guaranteed his job after 2024, nor can we be convinced that he (and his other colleagues in new portfolios) will have enough time to make an impact.
Look to the future
To call a spade a spade: this ANC-led administration is a sham and an epic failure. For decades it has been unable to unshackle itself from practices that have weakened its ability to govern and damaged our prospects as a burgeoning and thriving African country. We have lost so many years of potential and possibility. Our so-called leaders continue to prioritise ANC factional “unity” above South Africa’s collective prosperity. We don’t get those years back.
We must look to the future.
Fellow South African, I ask you: What will it take for you to see that this ANC-led government lacks the leadership, imagination, moral authority and energy to shift us into the future?
What will it take to show you that a Pentium 2 cannot deliver you into a world of robotics, artificial intelligence and machine learning?
Read in Daily Maverick: “We are a nation that has surrendered itself to be led by fools – we need courageous and visionary leadership”
What will it take to show you that the toxic political relationships of the governing party prioritise the ANC before the interests of the people? Even if they cared, this crop of leaders just doesn’t have what it takes to make South Africa a great country to live, work and play in.
Time has run out.
The next 30 years of South Africa’s path must be defined by a new collective of leaders. They are among us. We eat, dance, cry, work and pray with them. They are not superheroes who wear capes and drive around surrounded by blue lights. You find them in the spaces where we work, and their contribution is significant.
They are capable, passionate, intelligent, beautiful and compassionate.
They deliver.
They are US. Given a chance to make a difference to people’s lives through the state, they would do it. But they haven’t, because the culture and structure of politics is violent and vulgar.
The citizens will awaken
The tide is now turning. The great awakening to citizen power is happening. And frankly, we’ve had enough and waited too long. The cost of doing nothing is too high. And so now we must act, we must now RISE.
The only way to hold a failing Cyril Ramaphosa, Bheki Cele, Pravin Gordhan and ANC to account is with the vote. They cannot hold themselves accountable, so the voters must do the work.
The year 2024 is our 1994 and we are most certainly the ones we’ve been waiting for. Matla le lerato (strength and love). DM/MC
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This kind of article seems to be flavour of the month at the moment. The criticism of the ANC, while welcome, is then typically followed by vague exhortations for ‘the people’ to rise up…. and do what exactly? Is Rise Mzansi campaigning for our vote? If so, are they a registered political party? What is their record of service delivery? What do they stand for? These are the considerations that need to be made with the 2024 election looming.
Thanks for this inspiring message. I hope and wish that there will be enough like=minded collaborators to make this a reality.
While there are some fine words here, there is a distinct lack of a policy / strategy / vision to bring about a change. As seems clear from the polls and surveys, the ANC is justifiably unpopular and clearly Ramaphosa has no idea how to bring about a change or has the authority to carry it out even if he had one. It is, however, a travesty that the opposition parties are so fragmented and currently look set to bring back a re-elected ANC by default. The opposition needs to wake up to the realities now and come together on a platform that gives voters a real chance to bring about a change. South Africans need a vision not a government that seems hell bent on recreating Mugabe’s Zimbabwe south of the Limpopo!
Congratulations Tebogo on a brave and inspiring commentary. It is good to know that there are young, committed South Africans willing to “call a spade a spade” as you say, and activate for a brighter future shorn of the useless, corrupt ANC politicians that have held us hostage for so many wasted years.
Right behind you brother!
Sometimes all that is required for change is passion. I sincerely hope, Tebogo, that you and those like you are prepared to now vote ABANC – “Anyone But African National Congress”. The rest of us have been doing it for 29 years now, but to little effect.
Brilliant, inspiring article 👏. How can we help?
Remember all, the ANC has not even begun to implement the vote rigging strategies of many other African nations. So be very careful about the lull of a false sense of security that they will not have a majority come the 2024 elections.
I see only a restatement of the problems that anybody who lives in SA and is half awake will be more than aware of. “RISE” is hardly a manifesto.
Emerson said: “What you do speaks so loudly, I cannot hear what you say”. We’ve had words, words, words from the ANC, as though they would – by some magic – turn into actions. They haven’t. They won’t. But … just perhaps, just perhaps … Ah! it would be nice to be wrong.