Publication: Sunday Independent Issued: Date: 2007-02-04 Reporter: Tony Leon Reporter:

Tips for Thabo: It's Time to Take Up Your Responsibilities, Mr President

 

Publication 

Sunday Independent
Date

2007-02-04

Reporter

 Tony Leon

Web Link

www.sundayindependent.co.za

 

What advice would I give the president while he prepares to deliver his state-of-the-nation address on Friday? In all amicability, I submit a few pointers for the president's speech - some "tips for Thabo".

Overall, my chief note is this: Mr President, you can no longer have it both ways. While the ANC has put "transformation" - an insistence on racial representivity across our society - at the heart of its agenda, it has also sought to focus on economic growth and addressing our skills capacity.

Mbeki must put excellence and capacity over the "transformation at all cost" approach.

Let us look at the country's most insistent crisis - crime.

On the day David Rattray was murdered, Mbeki's handpicked police commissioner, Jackie Selebi, asked parliament: "What's all the fuss about crime?"

The "fuss", in Selebi's wildly inappropriate term, is precisely this: South Africans are living in serious fear of crime and its traumatic repercussions - rightly so.

Selebi takes his cue from the president. On SABC TV a few weeks ago, Mbeki averred: "Nobody can show that the overwhelming majority of South Africans feel that crime is not under control; nobody can because it is not true."

This week, a massive 98 percent of respondents to an e.tv poll voted "yes" to the question: "Is crime out of control in South Africa?"

So, with regard to the devastating spiral of violent crime, my tip for Mbeki is that he frankly admit the urgency of the crisis, using the rhetoric of arms if he wishes - for it is a veritable war on all fronts for ordinary South Africans.

A massive recommitment to improve policing is imperative.

My second tip concerns the economy, where the Mbeki presidency has achieved great strides.

The government concedes a skills flight is costing the country dearly, yet fails to admit its transformation policy has driven qualified South Africans abroad.

Meanwhile, our education system is failing to equip our people to plug the skills gap. Accordingly, my tip is that Mbeki commits to massive and thorough reform of education - including merit as a benchmark in the appointment of teachers.

Regarding the management of the economy, the government intervenes where it should not and stays hands-off where action is needed.

Mining has been subjected to controls that are retarding its growth. The industry's total fixed investment has fallen by nearly half, leading to the loss of 20 000 jobs in the past two years alone. The industry could be investing R5 billion to R10 billion more annually, but under current conditions is unable to do so.

By contrast, the national power grid - without which sustained growth is impossible - has been allowed to run down as the state has neglected its oversight function.

In 1994, the government withdrew Eskom's responsibility for ensuring electricity supply, but failed to facilitate independent power producers. As a result, a dangerous vacuum was created and scant preparation made for the power supply vital for a burgeoning economy.

My tip, then, is that the president serves notice that he intends revisiting state stewardship of the economy, maintaining vital infrastructure while freeing business from the burden of red tape.

My third tip involves corruption - which is costing the country in terms of investment and international reputation.

Mbeki's foot-dragging over the arms deal only redoubles public disquiet. Last month, the Mail & Guardian revealed that the British Serious Fraud Office has discovered that "sweeteners" worth more than R1 billion had been paid to eight different ANC-aligned South Africans connected to the state's arms deal with BAE Systems.

Yet Mbeki asserts that the transaction was "not affected by any corruption…"

The president must still release the Donen Report on local involvement in the oil-for-food scandal, in spite of receiving it more than three months ago and promising action.

In his address, therefore, the president can announce a new, frank and full investigation into the arms deal.

My fourth tip: the president must urgently address the faltering capacity of the state to fulfil its service mandate to the people of South Africa. The public's perception is that delivery is being hampered by a widespread ethos of self-enrichment on the part of many office-bearers.

The ANC's Kgalema Motlanthe told Carol Paton, a writer for the Financial Mail, last month that "[t]his rot is across the board … Almost every project [of government] is conceived because it offers opportunities for certain people to make money".

What are the reasons for this all-pervasive culture? Paton refers to "a vacuum of oversight" - what Allister Sparks calls "a comprehensive failure of leadership in the ANC". The president's failure in practice to act concertedly against offenders has fostered the malaise. My tip for the president is to insist that the state is not a site of enrichment, but the site of delivery for all.

My fifth tip concerns foreign relations, where Mbeki has staked his personal reputation as a continental peace-broker. Yet mixed signals emanate from the government here, too: after a two-year campaign to secure a non-permanent seat on the United Nations security council, we used it to join in vetoing a resolution condemning human rights abuses in Myanmar.

This put us at loggerheads with the international human rights community and sadly continues a pattern whereby we continually aid and abet dictatorial regimes worldwide, provided - or so it appears - they are located in the non-western world. Yet our president is fond of proclaiming his democratic credentials abroad.

These contradictory signals are doing damage to our international reputation. Mbeki therefore needs to set the record straight: human rights, rather than misplaced blind loyalty to the emerging states of the world, tops our agenda. Accordingly, we will speak out on human rights wherever they may occur.

The thread that binds my tips is leadership - or, rather, the lack thereof. It is imperative that the president take charge on crime, corruption, the economy, service delivery and foreign affairs, and act with determination to stop the government's drift and assuage the uncertainty pervading our society.

Moreover, it is time the government committed itself to harnessing our buoyant economy in the interests of growth and enabling access for all. The president should stop worrying about perceptions on crime, corruption or delivery and tackle the reality of fear and concern across the board.

Take charge, Mr President. South Africa is waiting.

• This is an extract from South Africa Today, by Tony Leon, the leader of the Opposition

With acknowledgements to Tony Leon and Sunday Independent.