Phala Phala is testing where the needle hovers on SA’s moral compass

In a 2016 Freedom Day article, the Centre for Human Rights at the University of Pretoria asserted that “ it is our informed exercise of the freedoms to speak, question and insist on transparency and accountability that can curb corruption and rein in other executive excesses”.

These words resonate as I assess the renewed ripples of shock about President Cyril Ramaphosa’s Phala Phala scandal. What occurs to me is the question we may not be asking enough, namely, what does this moment require of us as citizens?

Yes, he is at the centre of this controversy, with his sofa stuffed with money many of us could only ever dream of having in our lifetime, but what interests me is our moral take here, and what we should be demanding of the country’s first citizen.

This is a moment when we cannot afford to be shaky warriors, because it raises questions of how committed we are to the rule of law and accountability, and what kind of leadership we deem acceptable.

Do we want to just turn the other way because “at least he’s better than Jacob Zuma and much more palatable than Paul Mashatile”? And if so, at what cost?

Has moral leadership vanished?

Has the age of moral leadership – when leaders fell on their swords for bringing dishonour to their office and their people – vanished from the world and our memory, to the point that we have been dulled into accepting “I have not stolen public money” as sufficient to excuse financial indiscretions that may, in effect, reveal something about one’s character?

When the country voted for Ramaphosa to become President, were we not expecting a leadership that embodied ethics, honesty, integrity and transparency that is above reproach? This is not to say that leaders are infallible because, as Alexander Pope said, “to err is human; to forgive, divine”.

However, if one makes the generous assumption that the President did err in his actions in the Phala Phala matter, why does he not simply say so and ask for the country’s forgiveness?

It is obvious that many South Africans don’t really want Ramaphosa to vacate his office, but we cannot allow that to come at the expense of our conscience, or that it requires us to recant our moral principles and values.

Democratic South Africa’s founding principles are those of human dignity, equality, non-racialism, non-sexism, the rule of law and the supremacy of our Constitution, which requires from a president:

• Faithfulness to the republic;
• Obeying, observing, upholding and maintaining its Constitution and all other laws;
• Promoting all that advances the republic and opposing all that may harm it;
• Discharging their duties with all their strength and talents, to the best of their knowledge and ability, in accordance with the dictates of their conscience;
• Doing justice to all; and
• Devotion to the wellbeing of the republic and all its people.

So, inasmuch as this moment is a test of the President’s moral character, it is also a test of us as a citizenry. The question that remains is whether we have succumbed to the seduction of political expedience at the expense of accountable leadership. DM

This story first appeared in our weekly Daily Maverick 168 newspaper, which is available countrywide for R35.