Over the past few weeks I’ve found myself feeling some sympathy for Danisa Baloyi, the self-styled godmother of black economic empowerment.

Not that she needs any sympathy. She’s a big girl and can take care of herself.

And I’m sure she wouldn’t appreciate sympathy from a news man. In her eyes, we are the hyenas who mauled her and fed on her carcass. So she would probably tell me to go jump into Bruma Lake if she heard I was about to shed a tear for her.

Not that she deserves sympathy from anyone. As the cliché goes, she made the bed that she is lying in.

Baloyi was a high-flying individual. In the world of black economic empowerment she was a tower. Not only was she out there cutting deals and building business, she was also involved in the intellectual side of economic transformation. She sat on commissions that formulated strategies and direction for BEE; she lent advice to new entrants to the business arena on how to survive in the corporate world and sustain enterprises; and she was involved in outreach initiatives beyond her immediate ambit.

She was a well-rounded South African, with business nous, intellectual savvy, lots of energy and a strong sense of citizenship.

No wonder then that blue chips and top corporates beat a path to her door asking her to sit on their boards.

As fate would have it, among those who beat a path to her door were Fidentia’s now notorious corner-cutters. They embraced her and gave her a fat monthly cheque for sitting on their board.

While she sat on that board, massive looting was taking place right under her nose. The corner-cutters were treating investors’ money like a personal buffet.

A large chunk of those investors were pensioners, widows and orphans; and the poor beneficiaries of the Living Hands Trust, a charity of which Baloyi herself was a trustee.

Like other Fidentia board members, Baloyi either looked the other way or willingly slept through this looting frenzy. If she looked the other way or slept through it, she was still alert enough to borrow R8-million from Fidentia ­ a dodgy transaction whichever way one looks at it.

Then it all fell apart and she now finds herself imprisoned in her lovely garden, contemplating her future.

Having initially been booted off the board of Absa ­an embarrassment she could have saved herself by voluntarily stepping down­ she has now had to step down from every other board she sat on.

And she is still arrogantly protesting her innocence and steadfastly refusing to acknowledge that she did wrong.

At some point she even went as far as telling the Sunday Times that she is one of the few law-abiding citizens left in this country.

Her prize quote, however, was one she gave to Moneyweb before being forced off her pedestal : “My position is that only guilty people resign. If I had been found guilty of anything, I think I would have easily resigned. In fact, in typical Danisa spirit, I would have called a press conference and said, ‘I made a mistake, I did this thing wrong, and I’m asking you guys to forgive me.’”

Now, in her quest to clear her name, she has acquired the services of spindoctor Dominic Ntsele, the patron saint of shady causes. She joins the likes of model citizens Brett Kebble and Schabir Shaik as a beneficiary of Ntsele’s media-dribbling expertise.

So why do I find myself feeling sorry for someone who is so determined to rubbish her own name?

Because it is not so much about feeling sorry for her as an individual as about feeling sorry for what she represents.  

Baloyi, in the eyes of many out there, represented the good that this country is about. And with her fall comes that question one hears far too often these days: “Who is there left to trust in this country?”

We are losing good people to greed.

Baloyi is not a corrupt individual. She is just a victim of what President Thabo Mbeki last year referred to as the “get rich, get rich, get rich” mantra.

“It is perfectly obvious that many in our society, having absorbed the value system of the capitalist market, have come to the conclusion that, for them, success and fulfilment means personal enrichment at all costs and the most theatrical and striking public display of that wealth,” Mbeki said in the annual Nelson Mandela Lecture.

The godmother of BEE fell into that trap. In her quest for business success she didn’t so much step onto the dark side as bite off more than she could chew.

She is by no means an isolated case. Across our society many other good people are doing exactly the same thing as we increasingly blur the line between right and wrong.

Elected representatives are getting involved in business, clearly in violation of the ethos that those who enter public service are supposed to espouse. Public servants ignore conflict-of-interest directives and sign deals every other day.

The ruling party abuses its control of the levers of state and ensures that friendly businessmen get contracts in parastatals, government departments and municipalities. Businessmen substitute hard work with palm-greasing.

The twin philosophies are: if it is not criminally prohibited then it cannot be wrong and if I do not get caught then why should I not do it.

And slowly, wrong becomes okay.

With acknowledgement to Mondli Makhanya and Sunday Times.