“In our society, we have learned the hard way through the misogynistic approach of the highly educated academics that acclaimed Apartheid never existed.  It appears that Jonathan Jansen belongs to this ilk. He has insulted the Minister of Basic Education in a manner reminiscent of the utterances made by the Apartheid ideologues of the old order.  How often did we not hear, African people in particular being described as ‘lazy and stupid’  by well educated professors with internationally recognized credentials? This is a description illustrative of ignorance and prejudice.”

It is worth noting here the irony (some might say double-standard). The ANC believes Jansen should apologize for expressing his “misogynistic”, “ignorant” and “prejudiced” view that Motshekga is lazy and incompetent when the ANC did not ask (let alone demand) that Motshekga apologise for her comments that COPE defectors Terror Lekota and Mluleki George are dogs: “Now that the dogs are leaving, there will be peace and we will be stronger. The dogs arrived in the ANC and they have left.” It’s open to debate which kind of name-calling is worse or when exactly personal opinion slides into personal insult.

More importantly, Duarte’s open letter situates Jansen’s “lazy and incompetent” comment in the racist colonial and apartheid discourse of ‘lazy and stupid natives’. This is quite easy, given last year’s infamous exposé of the UFS’s Reitz men’s hostel (which has since been closed), one of many sites in this country where the long history of racist discourse still finds praxis. The association of this discourse with “well educated professors with internationally recognized credentials” also has a ring of truth about it. Duarte presumably has the likes of Charles Templeman Loram in mind, whose book The Education of the South African Native, published in 1917, was based on his doctoral dissertation at Columbia University:

“… many of our criticisms of the Native as lazy, stupid, unteachable are due to the failure to comprehend his outlook on life. We have failed to realize that the Native does not feel the need for such virtues as punctuality, application, and thoroughness, which are essential to success in our European sense of the word” (p.8).

But just because it’s easy, doesn’t mean it’s accurate. There are a few things going on which I think merit closer attention.

Firstly, Duarte strategy to deflect Jansen’s comments on commitment and competence draws attention to a key issue in the national debate about governance: How much of a factor is demonstrated commitment and proven competence in selecting candidates for top government positions? Or to put it another way, to what extent does demonstrated loyalty to the new powers at Luthuli House outweigh ability and competence in making cabinet appointments? This is a key issue that runs through much recent political controversy in the post-Mbeki era, and if widespread anxiety about the possible appointment of Judge Hlophe to the Constitutional Court is to be believed, it appears now to be overflowing into the judiciary too (though it’s worth noting that Hlophe has not done much to earn Zuma’s reward). But Duarte’s deflections draw attention to this issue on her own account, not on Jansen’s, because I don’t think this is Jansen’s primary focus. This brings us to the second issue, which is the depth of the government’s commitment to improving education. This I think is Jansen’s real concern and his record of publications, both academic and in the popular press, bears this out.

But Jansen shoots from the hip and he has previously targeted the ANC; they are afterall the governing party, with all the responsibilities that entails: Take for example his article Vital Questions for Politicians. Noting that, “Nothing dismays me more than politicians promising things when they know they have neither the will nor the capacity to deliver,” he poses his first question:

“What will your party do if an MEC for education in one of the provinces shows blatant disregard for a scheduled meeting of the minister of education to discuss the opening of the school year, and trots off to attend the court proceedings for the president of her political party?”

The MEC who prompted this question was Angie Matshekga who skipped class to be at one of Zuma’s court appearances. (Read the ANC’s mostly-spin reply here)

More shooting from the hip is Jansen’s article “Long leave, comrades, long leave” which consists of a mocking satirical dialogue in “Sadtu’s political education class 101”:

Cde Justice: “Sorry comrades, I don’t understand. Must we not choose the most competent people for the job, those who can deliver on the needs of the poor?”

Lem: “Listen, you fool, political positions are not about competence! How do you think Comrade Manto kept her job and Comrade Angie got hers? You do not have to be competent; in fact, you do not even have to go to the meetings of senior Cabinet ministers in your portfolio. All you need to do is show up at the right funerals and at the right courts and, before you can say deployment, you’re high up on the party list. Competence is a bourgeoisie word, remember. So go out there and wreck some township schools!”

Provocative stuff perhaps, but off the mark? Depends what you’re aiming at …

Jansen has a proven track record in education and his cv is very impressive.  It is also significant that he is black, which makes him the first black rector in the UFS’s 105 year history (hence Duarte doesn’t outright accuse him of racism). Thankfully Jansen doesn’t appear to share Xolela Mangcu’s inclination towards self-promotion, but like most of the ‘public intellectuals’ who fill our newspapers with their insight and opinion, Jansen cannot be faulted for lack of commitment nor indeed for lack of insight. Regrettably, it seems the ANC, as governing party, can, which is exactly what Jansen’s consistent critique has aimed at.

So we should understand Jansen’s frustration with Matshekga’s appointment to head-up the newly created Ministry of Basic Education, a portfolio that will require considerable commitment, hard work, management and leadership to get functioning within the government’s broad policy framework. A M&G report that Matshekga, who is also the ANCWL President, was “unimpressive” as Gauteng MEC for Education is not comforting: “Once a leading education department, Gauteng has slipped and seems unable to contain the growing education crisis, particularly in township schools.”  (Questions have also been raised about Matshekga’s failures to disclose company directorships in compliance with the provincial legislature’s regulations.)

Which raises another of Jansen’s Questions to Politicians:

“Given the acknowledged failure to deliver in the provinces on noble policies at the national level, would you appoint people to critical positions on the basis of their loyalty to the party, or on the basis of their competence?”

To this one the ANC replied: “The ANC believes that appointments should be based on competence and proven ability to execute.”

The reply continues:

“This is why we have paid increased attention to teacher development, the review of district offices and their effectiveness, and evaluation (with deans of education faculties) of initial teacher education in our universities. Further, the ANC has supported plans to upgrade teacher qualifications through the provision of bursaries. The ANC has also agreed to the establishment of a National Evaluation and Education Development Unit to review and audit education provision and quality on a regular basis. Such a unit will also have a remit to focus on skills and competence in schools, districts and provincial departments.” (emphasis mine)

All of which are noble statements of intent and commitments at the national level -which won’t be followed through unless critical positions like national minister are appointed based on competence and proven ability to execute.

Duarte’s reframing of Jansen’s critique as complicit with misogyny and the discourse on ‘lazy and incompetent natives’, by obfuscating the difference between incompetence and racist/sexist prejudice, resituates the critique from a concern with capability and capacity to discrimination. Thus Duarte establishes a false choice, as President Obama would say, between meritocracy and accountability on the one hand, and prejudice and discrimination on the other, as if aspiring to the former means sacrificing our national commitment to combating the latter. Sadly, the ANC perpetuates this false dichotomy as a quick and effective means to neutralize criticism. It does a disservice to itself, our history and our future.

But increasingly this strategy is less persuasive. Partly this is because the critique emanates from black intellectuals and professionals. They are harder to pin as racists than their white counterparts, and thus we increasingly see references to their supposed elitism and distance from the grass roots, which has the knock-on effect of giving currency to poor education and proximity to ‘the masses’, as we have seen with the rise of Julius Malema (recall his triumphalist performance at UCT on the eve of the election). But more importantly, and more sadly, the fallacity is shown up by poor pass rates, deteriorating teacher morale, and school violence, all indicators of incompetence and poor leadership, despite notable policies designed to address these challenges.

It was not like any other for many reasons. When I reached the voting station in Rondebosch East, the contrast from previous elections struck me. There was something banal about the voting station. We walked past chattering cops sipping on their coffee. A dog licked the legs of voters waiting in line (a short line). There was no party memorabilia. No shout of ‘Amandla!’ No local campaigners standing outside the gates, excitedly debating RDP vs. GEAR. Even the ink mark on my thumb was more like a trickle than the impressive, bruise-like patterns on my friends’ nails. My dad exited the voting booth looking relieved. “I nearly voted for CAPE!” he said, “I bet they will get inflated results because people think they are voting COPE!” He may have been right.

It was the first time I have ever voted in a national election. In 1994, I was seven years old and in my first year of school. I remember the teacher asking the class what day it was. A few of us in class excitedly replied that it was the first ever democratic elections. My mom had taken me to a rally a year earlier where Mandela had been speaking. She had hoisted me up over the heads of the singing, dancing crowd to see him. My brother (three at the time) and I had covered our doors and pencil cases with ‘Mandela for President’ stickers. I didn’t fully understand what this first election was about but I understood the excitement. I remember having a sense of being part of a broader movement. I grasped that my parents’ excitement came not only from anticipation of a better era to come, but also from their interactions with other people who shared their hope and engagement in building the country.

In 1999, again there was excitement. At the polling station, my parents greeted old friends, handing out ANC stickers and flyers, wearing political t-shirts. In 2003, as signs of Mbeki’s autocratic leadership style were showing and his AIDS policy was having damaging effects, there was some uncertainty. But not enough to shake my parents’ will to vote ANC.

This election was not like the others. Growing up, I was always so sure that I would have no doubts when I voted, so secure was my faith in the ANC. But here I was, a few days before the election, questioning that certainty. For years, I have been looking forward to the time when I could vote. There was no question of not voting. From a young age, my parents have spoken about the importance of voting in order to have a say in government and the significance of having the opportunity to vote, when so many fought so hard during the struggle against apartheid to win this right.

My parents, who have always voted ANC, and who, together with many others, at home and in exile, sacrificed a great deal during the struggle against apartheid, were questioning seriously for the first time whether to vote ANC or not. One of my parents’ friends burst into tears as she recounted what they had struggled for from within the ANC. Another who had been imprisoned for a long stretch during the struggle responded with words: “I can’t stand COPE. But I want to say ‘up yours’ to the ANC”.

At the threshold of our passage, on the way out the door to leave for the voting station, my parents and I were still discussing voting, still wracked by feelings of disbelief and uncertainty that we had reason not to vote ANC. In the weeks and days leading up to the elections, my friends and I had been agonising over voting. We spent an afternoon before the elections scrutinising parties’ policies. We discussed the gains government had made and dissected why we needed to be critical of government despite these gains. We questioned issues of service delivery. We debated economic policy. We wondered how the rest of the South Africa would vote. We wondered whether government was committed to equity, “to each according to their needs”, and we wondered whether this could ever be achieved. We questioned Jacob Zuma’s statements on various public platforms – for example, about bringing back Christian education or the death penalty, or questioning the rights of gay people – statements which contradicted ANC policy as well as the constitution. Could we dismiss these statements as a political game? Should we take these contradictions seriously? There was no doubt that we wanted the ANC in government. There was no doubt that most of us were ANC supporters, in the broad sense of the term. But was it possible not to vote ANC and to remain an ANC supporter? Was that a betrayal? Many of us left the meeting sure we would vote ANC, or was it Cope, or was it ID, or even AZAPO (there were one or two muted and very embarrassed mutterings about the DA). Many entered the voting booth undecided. Throughout Wednesday morning, I received text messages from people about to vote. “About to go to the booth. Democracy!” wrote one friend. “Here I go. Doesn’t feel good,” wrote another. He too was holding his nose.

Now that the election results are in, I am cautiously optimistic. This means recognising all the merits of our government. But it also means continuing to be critical. We should continue to debate, discuss, agonise, lobby and take action. And we should not do this only every five years. The democracy 1994 brought us can be deeper than that, but only we can make it so.

The idea of the Freedom Charter and the Congress of the People (COP), from which it emanated, had so much potential that it was already seen as of historic importance before either the COP took place or the
Freedom Charter was written.

The South African Indian Congress described the COP as “of historic importance” in a letter to the South African Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR) early in 1954, requesting the institute not to proceed with its proposal to hold a national conference to “analyse the position of the non-European people”, as it might interfere with the ANC resolution on a similar theme taken in December 1953 at its annual
conference in Queenstown.

At that conference, Professor ZK Matthews proposed the idea of a national convention which would be representative of all South Africa’s inhabitants, whose task it would be “to draw up a blueprint for a free
South Africa of the future”.

Perhaps influenced by the decision of the SAIRR to call a convention, he had been mulling over the idea for a few months before the ANC met in December 1953. He had raised the matter at the provincial Annual Conference of the ANC in Cradock in the Cape in August 1953, stating in words that have often
since been cited: “Various groups in the country are, as you know, considering the idea of a national convention I wonder whether the time has not come for the ANC to consider the question of convening a
national convention, a congress of the people, representing all the people of this country, irrespective of race or colour, to draw up a freedom charter for the democratic South Africa of the future.”

This was far more advanced in scope than the convention mooted by the SAIRR, whose proposal did not include anything as inclusive as a congress of the people or as inspirational as the idea of a freedom
charter.

All that the institute had said, up to that point, was that the proposed convention would analyse the position of the non-European peoples and that there might be a preliminary meeting to consider the desirability of an agenda for the proposal. A conference about a conference.

The context for these proposals was the state’s assault on human rights since 1950, which had exacerbated the racial tensions within the country and made the need for an appropriate response urgent.

The summary termination of the Defiance Campaign in 1953 in the wake of the Criminal Laws Amendment Act, and the continued presence on the statute books of the six specific acts against which the Defiance
Campaign was mounted, required, at the very least, an assertion of the demands for equal rights for all South Africans and a new call for the abolition of discriminatory legislation.

Interestingly, in July 1951, about two years before “ZK’s” intervention at Cradock, the Guardian, probably speaking at least for the congress leadership, wrote in an editorial entitled “Votes for All”, that “the
time has come for a South African chartist movement There is nothing illegal or subversive about such a movement.

Its aim is not to destroy parliament but to convert it into a true parliament of the people, not to restrict the vote to one section, but to open it to all.” The notion of a chartist movement, however, was left in abeyance as the chosen course of action was civil disobedience. After the summary ending of that action, an analysis of its strengths and weaknesses prompted the congress leadership to mount a more all-embracing mass action, which would, in its assessment, match the heightened political awareness that the Defiance Campaign had created. It was also important, for the morale of its supporters, that the organisation take action against the regime’s punitive response to political protest.

For all these reasons, the idea of a congress of the people, at which the delegates would adopt a freedom charter which would assert the demand for civil rights for all South Africans, seemed to be the
appropriate next step.

As it happened, it excited the imagination of the masses and soon became a force with which the regime had to contend even more seriously than it had the Defiance Campaign. As the chartist movement took root, the leadership of the national movements added flesh to the original proposal and fine-tuned the
concept of a charter, at the same time clarifying the proposal for a congress of the people.

It would not be “a mere get-together of delegates”, but the broadest representative assembly of direct representatives of ordinary people of all races ever held.

It would reach out to the masses “whether or not they belonged to the (national) organisations” and unite with them in calling for such an assembly. The movement would enable all lovers of freedom “to go on the attack and sweep the country with a clear and limited call for freedom”.

The leadership believed that this was an objective which ordinary people understood and about which “all levels of the congress membership were passionate”. That this assessment was accurate was to
some extent manifested in the intensity of our activity and the language of the campaign.

This last was essentially the genius of Rusty Bernstein, who as the “movement’s publicist”, reached out to the masses with a quality of prose that matched the expectations of the occasion. Accordingly, the
Freedom Charter would help to “mobilise the people up and down the land and awaken an echo (for freedom) in their hearts”.

When the leaders of the national organisations met in March 1954, they elected a joint planning committee accountable to the National Action Council, an instrument that had already proved itself in developing the
working unity of the congress organisations during the Defiance Campaign.

Collectively, the NAC gave some form to the campaign, which at that point was still a stimulating idea without shape or structure. Its first meeting was held in Stanger, Natal, near the home village of Chief Albert Luthuli, who was restricted to that area. A number of important decisions were taken there that set the course for the COP, ensuring that it would be people-driven, decentralised and start immediately.

Accordingly, the congresses would work to form local people’s convention committees in every village and reserve; they would do the same in the cities and towns and in the rural areas throughout the country.

As their purpose was to mobilise and inspire the people, their first task was to call public meetings to hear what grievances people had and what they thought should form the contents of a freedom charter. The idea was that they should effectively participate in the drafting of such a document, the contents of which “will emerge from countless discussions among the people themselves (and) be in every sense of the word the charter of the ordinary man and woman”.

Interestingly, the form of that assembly and the election of the representatives to it initially assumed the symbolic image of “a parliament of elected delegates of the people” and the act of electing

the delegates, “a general election”. In retrospect, I think it was the novelty of the approach to the
campaign for the COP that appealed to the people’s imagination; its emphasis on hearing people, rather than telling them what was important to them, the spontaneity of its style, its insistence that everything
that touched their lives – whether it was education, employment, shelter or the ordinary freedoms associated with speech, movement, justice or equity – were human rights and proper subjects for a freedom
charter.

The idea of writing all this down and “telling it like it is” was in itself empowering and was at the same time an assertion of our rights, when these were being whittled away with scant regard for the people affected.

The irony of a people feeling its way “towards the inspiring goal of a fully democratic state for all South Africa”, when the country was faced with the stark alternative “of going completely fascist”, did not
escape Walter Sisulu, who was encouraged by the favourable conditions “the work of the liberation movement” had created for the success of the Congress of the People.

The idea of the COP had captured his imagination no less than it had many in the leadership and activists in its ranks, including my own. He was excited by the possibilities it offered and thought the event would
be the most significant in the country’s history, “for there for the first time would meet in a great assembly … the true representatives of the people”.

The elected delegates would come from diverse centres, “carrying with them their resolutions, demands and grievances of all sorts from the people who sent them.” This excitement was captured in “The Call to the Congress of the People”, a passionate document in the format of a leaflet drafted for the working committee by Rusty Bernstein, under the imprint of the National Action Council of the Congress of the People.

He was obviously touched by the emotions that the idea of the COP had aroused. He was not by nature overtly passionate and, but for a gifted facility to turn a phrase to the most compelling advantage, he was
taciturn by temperament and usually set himself at a distance from others.

When he wrote, reason, supported by solid argument, usually prevailed over emotion: “The Call” (the first of the major documents of the campaign) was an exception, an indication of the extent to which he was
personally inspired by the egalitarian idealism of the action.

Its stirring message reached out “to brothers without land and children without schooling”; to the farmers in the reserves; to the miners “in the dark shafts and cold compounds far from our families” and the
farmworkers and workers in the factories: it called on them to speak of long hours, housing and pass laws, of taxes and of cattle-culling and of famine, ending with the repetitive refrain “Let us speak together,
all of us together – African and European, Indian and coloured. Voter and voteless. Privileged and rightless. The happy and the homeless Let us speak of freedom.”

The leaflet closed with an appeal to form committees to campaign for the Congress of the People and to gather in groups to send in their demands for the Freedom Charter.

It is interesting that early understandings of the event were centred on the idea of a charter emerging in situ from the demands and grievances of the thousands of delegates present at the “great assembly”. Sisulu initially expressed this (as already noted) when he said, “there for the first time would meet in a great assembly the true representatives of the people carrying with them their resolutions, demands and grievances of all sorts from the people who sent them”.

The logistical implications of such a process, were it to have happened, would have been unimaginable and, as events turned out, a huge disaster, for the COP in its closing stages was surrounded by the police and the army, even as the charter was being adopted. Fortunately, the organisation of the COP and ideas on the presentation of the Freedom Charter crystallised during the course of the 18-month campaign and in the end a draft document was presented to the “assembled” delegates, largely compiled from the “demands” that had
been submitted to the COP for their adoption.

The remarkable feat achieved (by Bernstein, who drafted the charter on behalf of the National Action Council) was that the document, as presented, had the spontaneity of a people’s charter and the resonance of the diverse demands for rights that were submitted over the many months of the campaign.

It was an age of charters. The localised, grassroots style of the COP campaign was taken up by women: ANC members, church congregants, trade unionists and housewives came in large numbers to a conference in
Johannesburg in April 1954, just as the campaign for the COP was getting under way.

They adopted a charter of women’s rights, resolutions embodying the demands of women “who came forward to tell of their hardships, their dreams and their aspirations”. Significantly, they also passed a resolution for a federation of South African women’s organisations, which gave rise to Fedsaw, the

Federation of South African Women, which subsequently played a legendary role in mobilising women for the struggle. There were two aspects of the conference that I recall quite clearly. The first was the identification of the local struggles of women with the international movement of women for equity at work and at home. The impact of this was to place this ordinary meeting of women from the smaller and larger towns and cities in South Africa on a world stage with women everywhere. This, at least, was the impression I had, listening to the speeches on that occasion. There were 150 women delegates who seemed to come from all over South Africa, representing more than 230 000 women.

Hilda Watts Bernstein spoke of the struggle of women for peace. Fatima Meer addressed the meeting on the terrible disabilities of Indian women in South Africa; Ida Mtwana, fiery and militant as ever, on the struggles of African women as mothers, as wives and workers. Duma Nokwe, the only male on the platform, fresh from a trip abroad, spoke of the emancipation of women in China.

He was dwarfed in height by Ray Alexander, who stood next to him, as she reminded the delegates that they were not alone but joined by working women everywhere in the world.

What I remember most about the event was the new division of labour arising from the inversion of “traditional” tasks, where the women were the delegates who made impressive presentations to the conference, while the men provided the catering and rendered all the services. Paul Joseph captured this in an amusing piece in Fighting Talk, where he wrote: “A visit to the kitchen showed a hub of activity. You would find John Motsabi, banned secretary of the Transvaal ANC, and Youth Leaguer Harrison Motlana slicing ham… Young Faried Adams would be preparing biscuits and munching some at the same time. Leon would be washing lettuce, while Norman would be preparing fruit.”

The conference took up much of my time and energy. I remember making several journeys in my battered car to meet the delegates at the old Johannesburg train station, transporting them to the various houses
where they were to be accommodated and later ferrying them to the Trades Hall where the conference was held. After that, the catering was an easy task.

If there was anyone who could connect the national and international struggles, it was Moses Kotane. Banned from public speaking and from the ANC, his party outlawed under the Suppression of Communism Act, he was still able to make political interventions through the columns of Advance, the movement’s feisty

newspaper. It was not an open secret that he was the general-secretary of the new

party (or even publicly known that he was a member of the South African Communist Party), but as the former general secretary of the Communist Party of South Africa, his interventions were treated seriously. Kotane placed South Africa in a world context: the present policy in  South Africa had its origins in

colonialism and the Empire; it was rooted in the basic structure of South Africa, based on cheap labour
and the deprivation of democratic rights; it rested on the granting of concessions and monopolies in business, political representation and commercial opportunities as well as skills and professions to the white middle class and the (white) working class in order to buy their support and sustain South Africa’s top-heavy structure.

“Only on such a soil could the vile doctrines of apartheid take root and flourish The choice was between suffering an increasingly brutal dictatorship or emancipating the majority in a multiracial democracy

with equal rights for all.” The liberation movement, a serious opponent of fascism, was the only
major opposition to stand up to the government. The representatives of big business and the mine owners feared democracy more than dictatorship and sought a political compromise with the Nationalists
under the guise of stability; in reality, this was for the protection of their investments.

Warming to the recent campaigns of the movement, Kotane warned that a movement that failed to go forward would go backward. It was the absence of a great central task, common to all democrats, that was a retarding factor during the year between the ending of the Defiance Campaign and the COP. The Congress of the People was just the task to unite the great majority against fascism.

“It would be a great exaggeration to claim that any substantial section of the white population has yet granted the vital truths that the real alternative to a fascist republic is a genuine all-embracing democracy;
that any real struggle against the autocratic Swart-Malan state is in allying with the non-European majority.

It is in the field of race relations that the Nationalists must be met and defeated if any sort of harmonious development is to take place.” He concluded this part of his long statement with the seemingly gentle
warning that those who were against the democratic majority “may preserve their freedom or their unscientific prejudices, but they cannot preserve both”.

Kotane displayed the same level of excitement at the idea of the COP as Sisulu, despite the former’s cautious tendency to stand back and subject the movement’s policies to rigorous scrutiny and analysis. The idea of millions of ordinary men and women electing their representatives to a “real” assembly and discussing “how South Africa should be governed, who should elect the men and women who make the laws, how these should be administered… at meetings great and small throughout South Africa”, fired his political imagination and led him to conclude that the Freedom Charter “could become an historic

document, guiding the way forward to a new and better life”. That is not to say that he did not have his own ideas as to what the charter should say. In his view, it had to do more than express “pious hopes in words that mean all things to all men”. It had at least to claim the four freedoms.

These, however, were not the conventional freedoms of speech, assembly, movement and equality before the law that would normally come to mind.  What Kotane was saying was that unless “the rich farmlands were shared among their rightful owners” and “the mines and monopoly owned industries become the property of the people” and “workers were guaranteed the right to free trade unions and wages were sufficient for
a civilised life (which included the provision of houses schools and hospitals)”, there could be no freedom.

All the topics raised by Kotane were important, but none as pressing as the questions concerning the “who” and the “how” of the COP. The significant “suggestions” regarding the contents of the Freedom Charter
on the subjects of the land, mines, workers’ wages, and social services, including education and health, would be addressed later, when the demands were sorted, catalogued and interpreted.

The tension between the specificity of Kotane’s characterisation of the charter and the need for open-endedness in the “broad church” of the Congress Alliance, would be the burden of Bernstein’s task when drafting the final document.

For the moment, the joint executives of the four organisations and the NAC addressed themselves to matters of process and (for the sake of clarity) rehearsed their original proposals.

The COP would be a mass assembly of delegates elected by people of all races, not only in the cities but also in every village, mine, farm and kraal. As representatives of the people, the delegates would consider
detailed demands “incorporated and embodied in a declaration”.

This was an advance on previous thinking as to how the charter would “emerge”. Local COP committees would be set up on a provincial basis as well as in the towns, factories, suburbs and streets.

As to the questions of who would be elected and how the people would vote for them, the directives were clear: delegates would be elected by direct vote and speak directly at the COP. (The NAC emphasised that the
people had suffered enough from indirect representation in the all-white parliament and were fed-up with the contempt with which the government had treated the natives’ representatives in parliament and
the members of the NRC who were elected (indirectly) through electoral colleges).

This assembly would be a genuine parliament. Anyone, without distinction of colour or sex, over the age of 18, could vote and election day would everywhere be an occasion for great political demonstration and rallies.

IT IS a measure of SA’s isolationist mentality that we are preparing for the most important general election of our democratic era against a backdrop of the worst global economic crisis in nearly 100 years, yet that forbidding factor is hardly featuring in our political debate.

Jacob Zuma, who is presumably going to be our national leader through the lean times that lie ahead, is literally racing around the country at 180km/h in a 33-car cavalcade with blue lights flashing, telling the poor that they are going to get a better deal and big business that they need fear no radical changes, but explaining to neither just how he intends delivering on his populist promises in the midst of a major economic recession.

President Kgalema Motlanthe is just back from a meeting of the G-20 heads of government called to discussed the global crisis, but he has had nothing to tell the nation about it since his return.

Nor have the leaders of the new breakaway party, the Congress of the People (COPE). Its deputy chairman, Mbhazima Shilowa, addressed the Foreign Correspondents’ Association the other day but had nothing to say on the subject that is gripping the attention of the entire world.

Only Trevor Manuel has been vocal on the subject, warning that the global crisis will indeed affect this country, but offering the reassurance that his economic prudence in the past will help cushion us against the worst of the storm.

For the rest, the economic crisis, which dominated the recent US presidential election to an extraordinary degree, is simply a non-subject in our political arena. This is disconcerting, for it gives the impression of a failure to understand what is happening in the rest of the world; a failure even to appreciate that we are part of the world and that what happens out there inevitably affects us.

The failure of leadership was highlighted the other day, when an extraordinary attack on Manuel by key trade union leaders drew no admonition from either Zuma, as president of the ANC, or Motlanthe, as head of the government.

Irvin Jim, the newly elected general secretary of the National Union of Metalworkers (Numsa), castigated Manuel for sticking to the macroeconomic policies he has followed for the past nine years, and told him he should either toe the Zuma camp’s new leftward line or ship out and join COPE.

Jim was supported by Congress of South African Trade Unions general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi. “Economic policies shifted at Polokwane,” Vavi said, “and all loyal members will have to implement those policies, and that includes the finance minister.”

Does Zuma, who keeps telling the business community there will be no radical changes in economic policy, agree with these clear threats to Manuel’s position?

Is he sanguine about the thought of Manuel leaving the ANC and joining the new opposition party?

He shouldn’t be. For Zuma surely hasn’t forgotten how the rand fell 2,5% and the JSE Top 40 index more than 40% in an hour when Manuel briefly resigned his post after former president Thabo Mbeki’s dismissal two months back, and how he had to be lured back in a hurry to stop the rot.

That in itself should have caused Zuma to be concerned that these attacks on his widely respected finance minister might again rattle the markets and cause more foreign investment to fly out of the country. As it is, R52bn has gone this year. But if such worries did occur to Zuma, he showed no sign of it.

Is he too wrapped up in his high-speed election campaigning to give a thought to the dangerous things that some of his people are saying in this volatile economic climate?

In the event it was left to Manuel himself to respond, and he did so in a devastatingly elegant open letter to the upstart Jim. In tones of a professor lecturing first-year students in a course called Globalisation 101, he noted that the members of Jim’s union work in what is perhaps the world’s most globally integrated industry.

“So when consumers in the US stop buying cars,” Manuel explained, “the three car manufacturers in Detroit find themselves in trouble and, as a consequence, your members at plants that manufacture catalytic converters may find themselves on short time too.”

Likewise, if the world demand for steel dropped, Numsa members at steel plants in Pretoria, Vanderbijlpark, Middelburg and Saldanha would be affected.

Moreover, cars manufactured in SA were being driven all over the world, while others manufactured in Mexico and Germany were travelling on roads here. The overall lesson being that there is no way a South African steel industry could survive if its sources of inputs and its markets were confined to one country. So Jim and his fellow workers are dependent on globalisation for their survival.

“I cannot imagine you,” Manuel went on, rubbing in the point, “as the Numsa general secretary, standing before a shop stewards’ council, chanting ‘Phan si nge globalisation’ (down with globalisation) and demanding that shop stewards assist in shutting the plants where they are employed. Nor can I imagine you writing to the large steel producers who operate in SA and asking them to leave the country because your members are tired of all this globalisation stuff.”

Manuel might have gone further and pointed out that if the big three Detroit manufacturers do go under, which may well happen, it will throw some 3-million people out of work in those plants and the service industries that supply them. Three million consumers whose loss of earnings will further shrink overall consumer demand in the US, throwing yet others out of work.

And that as American consumption shrinks in this way China, as America’s biggest supplier of consumer goods, will also undergo an economic downturn and will therefore buy less of our resource materials, so that South Africans will suffer too.

It astounds me that we have politicians aspiring to lead this country who seem oblivious to these self-evident truths, who are still locked into the same old mindset with the same old dogmas and debates of the last century and the one before it, arguing over such abstruse issues as which should come first, the national democratic revolution or the socialist revolution, while their blinkered vision cannot see the obvious in the here and now.

What is obvious is that you cannot create thousands of new jobs with a declining growth rate, and the highly regarded Bureau of Economic Research at Stellenbosch University predicts our growth rate may shrink to a miserable 1,9% next year.

Zuma should slow down his speeding cavalcade, take a deep breath, and start looking reality in the face.

Instead of bamboozling the people with false promises to buy their votes, he should start telling them instead how to prepare for the hard times that lie ahead — and what his government can realistically do to help them.

Some people find it hard to tell truth to power, but sometimes it is harder still for power to tell truth to the people.

(Source: Business Day)

ANC urges public debate on a Roadmap for Education

16 November 2008

Since April 2007, the ANC Health and Education Committee has been involved
in a major policy review of education, implementing the resolutions of the
ANC’s 52nd National Conference, held in December 2007.

The conference declared education and health major priorities for social
transformation for the next five years.

This has been a seven-month dynamic and participatory process led by the
ANC, involving the Alliance and relevant government departments. The process
was further broadened to involve interaction with a range of stakeholders,
including teachers and student organisations, policy analysts, academics,
etc. Various technical teams were established to work on a number of policy
areas.

The Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA) hosted both the education and
health policy review processes, which culminated in the release of draft
reports on roadmaps for education and health.

It is against this background that we publicly release the report on
education for purposes of public discussion and debate. This report only
covers the Ten-Point Plan for the schooling system – from early childhood to
primary and secondary schooling. Further reports on higher education and
skills development will be further communicated to the public once they are
ready. The report on Roadmap for Health is being finalised and it will also
released to the public as soon as its ready.

The full report on Roadmap for Education and a leaflet on the ANC’s ‘Quality
Education for All’ campaign, launched on 15 August 2007, will soon be
available on the ANC’s website: www.anc.org.za.

Review of our schooling system

The ANC government has recorded significant achievements since 1994 in
transforming our schooling system from its apartheid past. Access to our
primary and secondary schooling has reached near universal enrollment, with
the participation of girls the highest in the world. Participation rate for
children aged 4 and 5 (Grade R) in early child development has now reached
70%. The matriculation pass rate has increased from 58% in 1994 to 65% in
2007. Pupil-to-teacher ratios have improved from 43:1 in 1996 to 32:1 in
2006.

Despite these significant achievements, major challenges remain in the
quality of education. This is demonstrated by the fact that more than
5-million of our people cannot read and write and our school system performs
poorly in areas like maths and science. We have not produced enough skills
required for our economy. As a result, skills shortage has become a binding
constraint on employment creation and growth.

This raises serious concerns regarding teaching and learning in our
schooling system, and therefore the need to review the experience we have
accumulated, including the implementation of Outcome Based Education (OBE).
Contrary to press reports, no decision has been taken to scrap OBE. The
review process of the department of education will guide us on its future.

The infrastructure backlog has been highlighted. This requires more
resources and innovative ways to fund education system.

Ten-Point Plan for the schooling system

The report identifies key interventions – the 10-Point Plan – needed to
build on achievements made in the last 15 years, as well as addressing the
challenges going forward. The following constitute the proposed core
elements of interventions:

In-school

1. Teachers to be in-class, on time, teaching. Teachers to also be required
to have and use textbooks in class.

2. Focus efforts on improving the quality of early childhood education and
primary schools, including implementing the Foundations for Learning
Campaign emphasising the promotion of language and numeracy.

3. Conduct external tests for all grade 3 and grade 6 learners every year,
and provide the results to parents.

4. Ensure effective evaluation of all teachers based on the extent to which
learner performances improve, with results influencing occupationally
specific dispensation pay for teachers.

5. Enhance recruitment of quality teachers and strengthen teacher
development

Support to school

6. Strengthen management capacity to ensure working districts and schools.
This entails bringing in management capacity from the private sector, civil
society and elsewhere in the public sector:

• Phase in a process of measurable improvements through targeting efforts at
  selected education districts and dysfunctional schools.
• Use of infrastructure budgets as an incentive for schools that deliver
  improved teaching and learning.

7. Increase the use of ICT in education, including audiovisual teaching
materials in the classroom to supplement teaching and demonstrate quality
teaching to learners and educators.

8. Improve national-provincial alignment and efficiency of education
expenditure, through procuring textbooks nationally and allocating resources
to improve district capacity. In this regard, the use of conditional grants
is an important tool to ensure alignment.

Societal

9. Develop a social compact for quality education. This will include a
National Consultative Forum dedicated to clarifying the “non-negotiables”
and performance targets for key stakeholders, and the monitoring thereof.
Mobilisation of communities at all levels should be encouraged to raise
awareness and participation in education issues. Examples include graduates
assisting their former schools, corporate social investment, party branch
campaigns to clean up schools, and supporting food gardens, and encouraging
young graduates to enter teaching (“Teach SA”).

10. Implement poverty combating measures that improve the environment for
learning and teaching, such as a nutrition programme (cross-cutting
programme with health), basic infrastructure for schools, and social support
for children.

The ANC is upbeat and encouraged by the achievements of the education
roadmap process and wishes to acknowledge the contribution of the
participants. The public is invited to participate in the debate on
education as are structures and that of the alliance have already started .

Issued by
Zweli Mkhize
Chairperson:
Education and Health Committee

African National Congress

Political parties appear to have been caught off-guard; the ANC is no longer so sure about whether it wants early or delayed polls. Smaller parties are hoping for coalitions after the elections, but aren’t targeting specific constituencies. The two major parties, plus the new one, are woefully unprepared for the elections, and are facing a few hurdles as a result. Complacent, the ANC has been resting on its laurels.

Monare critiques each party’s campaign strategy and although his comments are broad and occasionally vague, he does make some very significant points:

Zuma’s election campaign messages do not quite give a sense of political direction, despite his claim that the response from the rallies demonstrates support. The party is on the defensive. Meanwhile, the breakaway Congress of the People (COPE) is banking on discontent, which is unsustainable. The party is ill-prepared and disorganised, and subtle personality clashes are already emerging. Its representatives’ bashing of Zuma-Malema comments is a short-term strategy that could collapse as soon as these two are out of the picture. The strategic reliance on multimedia communication appears sexy and cool for young, first time-voters.

She might be lucky in that voters – especially young people and those belonging to the black middle class, who don’t necessarily vote with their hearts – want something more than Zuma.

The article is definitely worth a read, Monare makes the point that no one is really addressing the massive challenges that ANY party of government will necessarily inherit next year. These challenges are state-bound, but also significantly they are global. Provincial governments (especially with regards to lack of service delivery) will be the biggest headache to next year’s government. Hopefully, COPE and its potential coalition partners will shake up the ANC’s legacy of cronyism – the poor have suffered too long and it’s devastatingly undemocratic and embarassing to say the least.

One thing is certain, the people will speak next year, what remains uncertain is whether realistic, workable policies will be on the table in time.

The ANC and all informed opinion makers are looking carefully at the split in the ANC and how this will effect the economy of the country which, like the rest of the globe, is facing an economic downturn and severe crisis. The ANC, it seems, is unable to manage the hemorrhaging of a sizeable number of its members to the Shikota group (COPE).

The credibility of the President of the ANC – his desperate turn to mindless popularism and his relationship to the Youth League – is not winning him or the ANC friends. In fact Zuma’s and the Youth League’s leaders use of intemperate language, that has verged on hate speech, has raised the spectre of violence marring the election campaign. It also raises the question of why is it that the ANC cannot reign in Julius Malema and his Youth League? Is it that he is a battering ram for Zuma or is it that the ANC is so divided and weak that it is beholden to the Youth league. If the ANC was strong then it would be able to deal with the Malemas in its ranks and not rely on the Youth league to drive its election campaign. It is no coincidence that the former youth league president and also a dangerous demagogue is heading its election campaign. 

The ANC has sunk to such a low level that the Malemas could, from a public forum, denigrate the premier of the Northern Cape by calling her dishonest and asking her to leave the movement. The behaviour is reminiscent of the public show trials conducted by Stalin and Mao. One wonders if these thugs would use the same language in KwaZulu-Natal against a ANC leader who moves out and joins Buthulezi’s IFP?

The charge that the ANC has now been taken over by a clique who will use violence and other undemocratic tactics to oust people so that they can get control over the leavers of power was clearly evident in the Northern Cape.  

It is clear that other than the likes of (Pallo) Jordon and (Zola) Skweyiya and a few others, the rest of the ANC leadership are silent or powerless and do not have the courage to stand up to this behaviour and win back the ANC.

Durban Exhibition Centre, 30 October 2008

The family and friends of Comrade Billy Nair,
The President of the Republic, Comrade Kgalema Motlanthe
Premier of KwaZulu-Natal, Province, Sbu Ndebele,
Members of the ANC National Executive Committee,
Chairperson of the ANC in the Province of KwaZulu-Natal, Cde Zweli Mkhize,
Cosatu President Cosatu, Cde Sdumo Dlamini,
SACP Secretary General, Cde Blade Nzimande,
SANCO Deputy President, Cde Ruth Bhengu
Leadership of the ANC Women’s and Youth Leagues,
Leadership of the Cosatu and SACP,
Comrades and friends,

There comes a time in the life of every revolutionary, when the sun
must set. And when it does, the remaining fellow soldiers should not be
at a loss for words to describe the life and times of the fallen
soldier.

That is the case with Comrade Billy Nair. We are gathered to
celebrate the life of a stalwart and hero of our struggle. We do not
have to mumble, as his life was straightforward, dedicated to the
service of his people, and of this country.

Comrade Billy Nair was, indeed, everything for our struggle.

He was, in general, an embodiment of all the facets of our
struggle, and in particular the embodiment of the Congress Alliance. He
is one of a few Comrades who was a member of all the Congress Alliance
organisations. He was a member of the Natal Indian Congress, SACTU,
South African Communist Party, the African National Congress, uMkhonto
weSizwe and later part of the collective leadership of the United
Democratic Front.

We are proud of this leader and cadre of our movement. We are
not hesitant to speak out about his life, which was dedicated to the
service of this nation and its people in a most outstanding manner.

Comrades this is a sad week as the ANC is also mourning the
loss of Mama Vuyiswa Nokwe, who is also an ANC stalwart and life
partner of former ANC Secretary General, Comrade Duma Nokwe. We also
pay tribute to her for her dedication in our struggle as a cadre of our
movement. She remained committed to the ANC until her time of death. We
send condolences to her family, friends and relatives. She will be
buried this coming weekend.

The ANC is fortunate to have cadres and members who dedicate
their lives to the movement until they catch their last breath, working
to create a better life for all.

Comrade Billy Nair dedicated 58 years of his life to the
African National Congress and the struggle for the liberation of this
country and its people. What more dedication could we ever want from a
man who put the freedom of his people above everything else in his
life?

Comrade Nair loved this country and its people, and would never
rest until all South Africans could live in freedom and equality as
proclaimed in the Freedom Charter.

He worked at Clover Dairies, and was fired after six months for
leading a workers’ strike. He joined the Dairy Workers’ Union as a
full-time organizer and secretary. This was the beginning of a long
involvement in the trade union movement culminating in his influence in
the launch of COSATU in 1985.

We emphasise that we are today celebrating 58 years of fighting
for freedom and justice. Comrade Nair joined the Natal Indian Youth
Congress and became its secretary in 1950. In 1952 he took part in the
defiance campaign and served a prison term.

He was also Organising Secretary for 17 trade unions. In the
1950s he played a key role in the formation of the SA Congress of Trade
Unions. Throughout the 50s he played an active role in all the
campaigns and was a prominent leader of the Natal Indian Congress.

In 1960 when the ANC was banned, he went underground and mobilised people from the underground while on the run from the police.

In 1961, he joined uMkhonto Wesizwe and became a member of the
Natal Command of MK together with Comrades Ebrahim Ebrahim, Curnick
Ndlovu, Ronnie Kasrils and others.

He was arrested in 1963 and was charged with sabotage in the
well-known Natal sabotage trial in 1964 and was sentenced to 20 years
of imprisonment, which he served on Robben Island, with our icons
Nelson Mandela, Ahmed Kathrada, Govan Mbeki, Walter Sisulu and others.

On his release in 1984, he became an active leader in the
United Democratic Front. He will always be remembered for his
integrity, honesty and straight-talk. He was a mentor, leader, and a
role model to many generations of activists.

In remembering our stalwart, we have to reflect on the culture
and traditions of our movement. Comrade Nair was schooled in the
culture of sacrifice, dedication and commitment, a culture of putting
the ANC and what it stands for above personal interests and ambitions.

The ANC has a history, a present and a future. Its history
guides us and ensures that we do not go astray. Part of our history and
tradition is the non-racial character of the ANC.

It is the patriotism and dedication of Comrade Nair and others
who made us see beyond race, and to view oppression and racism as a
system that we had to destroy at all costs, without destroying the
people who practised or benefited from it.

Our non-racial character stems from the fact that we are an
organisation that is deeply rooted in human rights, humanity and
ubuntu. Whether one lives in Chatsworth or KwaMashu, our diversity
defines our character and unifies us in a most unique way.

In 1923 the ANC became the first political organization on the
continent to adopt a Bill of Rights. In 1943, the ANC adopted the
African claims, a bill of rights which asserted the right of African
people to self-determination and human rights.

This Bill of Rights laid the basis of future development of the
human rights perspectives and liberation struggle in the coming
decades.

It created the condition for broadening the base of the
liberation movement with the signing of a co-operation pact in 1947
between the ANC and the South African Indian Congress known as the
Xuma-Dadoo-Naicker Pact which eventually led to the formation of the
Congress Alliance in the early 1950′s.

The principle of humanity and the non-racial character of the
ANC informed the formation of the Congress Alliance that translated to
the adoption of the Freedom Charter at the Congress of the People – at
Kliptown in 1955. This was the first such fully representative
gathering in the history of South Africa.

We, therefore, became the first National liberation movement to
develop a home-grown human rights culture ahead of the international
community. The United Nations, formed in 1946 only adopted the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948.

The same year, 1948, the Nationalist Party came to power on the
platform of Apartheid Colonialism and began to discuss a host of
discriminatory laws. The delegates that met at Kliptown responded with
the claim that “South Africa belongs to all who live in it, black and
white, and that no government can justly claim authority unless it is
based on the will of the people”.

Having proclaimed that South Africa belongs to all who live in
it, the Charter declared that all national groups shall have equal
rights, that all people shall have the equal right to use their own
languages, and to develop their own folk culture and customs.

The Charter proclaims that all national groups shall be
protected by law against insults to their race and national pride, and
that the preaching and practice of national, race or colour
discrimination and contempt shall be a punishable crime.

The Freedom Charter became the cornerstone that guided the
policy and practices, the strategy and tactics of the ANC for over
forty years after its adoption and still forms the core guiding
principles of the ANC.

In 1954 the Federation of South African Women, a body in which
the ANC Women’s League played a leading role in its formation, adopted
the Women’s Charter. This Charter became a guiding principle of women’s
emancipation in our country and firmly established the foundation of a
non- sexist society in our country, a principle we will defend at all
times.

The ANC and the Mass Democratic Movement have always defended
non-racialism. In the mid 1980s, when the ANC and the Mass Democratic
Movement made the country ungovernable, the Apartheid regime proposed
group and human rights as the basis of a negotiated settlement. They
sought to use group rights to disguise their Bantustan policy. This was
fiercely rejected.

In 1987 the ANC issued a statement on negotiations, which
rejected the concept of group rights. This statement was followed by
the constitutional guidelines for a Democratic South Africa in 1988 and
the Harare Declaration which laid the foundation for a negotiated
settlement.

As we lay this revolutionary to rest, we re-affirm that South
Africa belongs to all who live in it, black and white. We underline our
acknowledgement and appreciation of the contribution of this
outstanding cadre who sacrificed the good life so that ours could be a
better country.

We also reaffirm that we will never stray from the culture and
traditions of our movement. We confirm that we will continue to draw
inspiration from the lessons gained from the lives of Comrade Billy
Nair and all our heroes, Comrades Walter Sisulu, Govan Mbeki, Oliver
Tambo, Beyers Naude, Braam Fischer, Chris Hani, Dorothy Nyembe,
Florence Mophosho and many others.

In memory of this hero of our struggle, we urge all ANC members
to remain steadfast in the principles and traditions of the movement.

They must not be swayed into negative action by the anger
arising out of the new phenomenon of ANC members who are calling a
so-called convention to discuss the formation of a new political party.

We wish the adventurists luck, and are pleased that many are
coming out and are resigning from the ANC. We expect the convention to
unmask many others who will hopefully also leave us in peace without
any further delay.

The ANC lives, it leads, it is strong, and it will lead this
country for decades to come, depending on the will of the people as
expressed in the Freedom Charter.

We remain unfazed by the occurrences of the past few weeks. The
ANC is not for the faint-hearted. If it were, it would not have leaders
of the calibre of Comrade Billy Nair or Comrade Nelson Mandela.

We are continuing with our programme of building and
strengthening our structures. We will continue with the programme of
organisational renewal and to heal the ANC.

We are determined to build a caring ANC, and will listen and
address the grievances of all members who wish to engage the movement
constructively.

Comrades and friends, as a cadre of our movement, a leader, a
Member of Parliament and in all capacities, Comrade Nair never turned
his back on this movement and on the people of our country. We salute
him for his dedication, commitment and loyalty, which should serve as a
lesson to all. He has taught us that ANC membership is for life,
otherwise, why would anyone join the ANC if they will run at the first
sight of difficulty?

We salute Mrs Nair and the entire family who went through a lot
of hardship due to the choices Comrade Nair made to dedicate his life
to the struggle.

We respect you all for your patriotism and selflessness and will never forget your contribution to his life and to the struggle.

May you find solace in the knowledge that Comrade Nair will
always be our treasure and hero, inspiring us as well as generations to
come, never to steer away from the traditions of the Congress movement,
and from working to build a better, non-racial, non-sexist and
democratic South Africa.

On behalf of the African National Congress we wish to convey
our heart-felt condolences to the Nair family, relatives and friends.
In Billy Nair, you have lost an important member of the family. To the
broader family of the ANC and the Congress Alliance, we have also lost
one of our most distinguished leaders. We feel the pain of loss
together with you.

To you Comrade Billy, on behalf of all of us, I would like to
say: You played your role in the struggle to liberate our country and
our people. You participated in every level and form of our struggle.
You were a fighter for freedom and human rights. You were a fighter for
the rights and better conditions for the workers through your
participation in the trade Union Movement. You were a fighter for the
total emancipation of humanity as a Communist. And you were also a
fighter for our freedom as a member and a cadre of uMkhonto weSizwe.

To all these organisations, you helped to shape strategies and
tactics, and brought ideological clarity and deepened commitment and
dedication. You, indeed, led cadres and volunteers to action. You
always led from the front and by example. For all of this, we salute
you Comrade Billy Nair and we say you have run your race. You
accomplished the task of liberating our people.

We will pick up your spear as we surge forward in the current
struggle to better the lives of our people. As we bid you farewell, we
all say to you, rest in peace.

Amandla!

Issued by:
African National Congress

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The now-popular idea of a developmental state represents an emerging consensus that
we need an active state with the capacity to intervene in the economy to
coordinate and drive transformation. Implicit in this consensus is that
strategic state-owned enterprises are important.

Also implicit is that public servants, such as teachers, healthcare workers,
policemen and women are (or should be) a valued part of any developmental
effort.

If the state is to play an active developmental role, it needs to be able to
plan over the medium and longer term, to coordinate its own efforts while
mobilising the widest range of national energies, and it needs to be able to
monitor and evaluate what it is doing. Reviewing our own state reality, it is
clear that we have a long way to go.

The ANC national executive set up a task group to develop proposals around planning
and coordination. Proposals, which remain works in progress, were presented,
amended and broadly endorsed last weekend at the alliance economic summit.

In the first place the task group’s report focused on the need for an
institutional centre for government-wide economic planning. Modern societies
face complex challenges that cannot be dealt with in an ad-hoc manner.
Operating in a global environment with uncertainty and turbulence, a strategic
vision is required if we are to stay on track. Especially in a society such as
our own, facing obdurate and systemic challenges, transformation is likely to
take time and we need to remain mobilised and focused as a society on our big
challenges — job creation and sustainable livelihoods, education and healthcare,
community safety and rural transformation.

Planning by the state has, of course, been one of those things scoffed at by
the international neo-liberal onslaught in the past decades (unless it happened
to be strategic planning by the Pentagon). You can’t second guess the markets;
“leave it to them”, has been the mantra. But, as the eminently
liberal economist James K Galbraith argues in his recent book, The Predator
State, “the great fallacy of the market myth lies simply in the
belief, for which no foundation in economics exists, that markets can think
ahead. A country that does not have a public planning system simply turns that
function over to a network of private enterprise — domestic or foreign –
which then becomes the true seat of economic power.”

The alliance summit broadly endorsed the proposal for setting up a high-powered
planning commission in the presidency. It would need to develop medium and
longer-term strategic planning. It would need to ask challenging, cross-cutting
questions that often drop between the cracks. How will peak oil impact on South Africa?
Will we run out of water? It will need to assist Cabinet to assess
mega-projects strategically. Do we need aluminium smelters? We are not good at
posing, let alone beginning to answer, questions such as these.

But it is one thing to have high-level planning and risk evaluation capacity.
It is another thing to actually implement plans or take effective practical
measures to mitigate problems. It was for this reason that the Alliance Summit
looked at the institutional configuration of our national executive. We have a
relatively large Cabinet — 30 ministers running 37 departments. It is a
structure that has been inherited relatively unchanged from the past. To
overcome the dangers of dissipating coordination in a Cabinet of this size, a
Cabinet cluster system was introduced a few years back. By all accounts the
clusters have not functioned effectively. There is no hierarchy of ministers
within clusters. As a result, cluster plans tend to consist merely in the
agglomeration of separate-line department plans. There have also been problems
of deadlock, in which ministers disagree and there is no strategic override.

Additionally, there are 21 deputy ministers. In many cases (but not all) deputy
ministers are appointed because some departments cover an extremely wide and
demanding field. But the function and powers of deputy ministers are often
unclear. Some deputy ministers are involved in high-level functions (such as
trade negotiations at the World Trade Organisation) but have no original
powers. The relationship between a deputy minister and a departmental director
general is often fraught with difficulty. Does the director general have one,
two, or, in some cases, three political principals?

Then there are
questions of the configuration of national departments. Should a key strategic
challenge, such as energy, for instance, be housed within a single minerals and
energy department (with the additional danger that our energy policies will be
dominated, as they have been historically, by mining interests)? Why have we
grouped environmental affairs with tourism? Is it because addressing the
challenge of climate change is largely for the benefit of tourists? Other
departments appear to cover wide areas, perhaps too large for a single ministry
(trade and industry, for instance).

As we ask ourselves these questions, we are well aware that we find ourselves
in a transitional moment. This gives us the opportunity to ask questions about
departmental configurations without bumping too much into the problems of
incumbency. But the alliance summit agreed that, although we must be prepared
to act decisively, we also need to ensure reconfiguration does not end up
preoccupying us for the next five years to the detriment of actual
implementation.

This is the context within which we have dusted off a proposal that appears to
have first been mooted (rather quietly) in the policy unit of the presidency a
few years back — namely a two-tier national executive structure. Such an
arrangement is to be found in a wide array of countries, including the United Kingdom, India
and China.
In the case of the UK
there is a relatively small Cabinet with a prime minister and senior Cabinet
ministers (Cabinet secretaries, as they are called), and then there are
ordinary ministers (who are not in Cabinet) with their own departments, budgets
and bureaucracies. In other dispensations the senior structure is often called
a “council of state”.

In the alliance summit we have agreed to look seriously at proposing such a
two-tier arrangement for South
Africa. We could have a senior executive
structure, a council of state or, perhaps, we might call it a Cabinet working committee.
It would consist of the president, deputy-president, senior ministers
responsible for convening strategic clusters (for example, governance, economic
development, infrastructure, human development, social development and the
criminal justice system), as well as a few other senior ministers — finance,
international affairs and defence. These, I stress, are proposals for further
debate and refinement. To ensure that we are not creating more layers of
bureaucracy, the senior ministers coordinating a strategic cluster would have
line departments in their own right. One imagines, for instance, that the
minister of education might convene the human development cluster.

Below the Cabinet working committee would be, in terms of our Constitution, a
Cabinet consisting of all ministers. This Cabinet would possibly be somewhat
larger than it is now if we split up some of the rather too extensive current
departments. In terms of meeting schedules, we could shift the broader Cabinet
back into a once-monthly meeting, with the Cabinet working committee meeting
fortnightly and clusters every other fortnight.

There is a strong sense across government that, perhaps by default as a result
of the present lack of strategic coherence, treasury has become a tail that
wags the dog. As one senior political administrator put it to me, where there
is a lack of effective developmental coordination in any government, treasury
becomes the default position. Our developmental state certainly requires a
strong, disciplined and technically competent treasury, and we require
financial management and macro-economic discipline. But financial management is
not the same thing as strategic developmental planning. Treasury (working
closely with Cabinet) needs to set the macro envelope, but budgetary
allocations should be determined by strategic priorities. Where a major
priority has a weak departmental business plan or there is poor capacity, it
should not be the job of a treasury official to simply reject it or slice it
down, but rather to help, collectively, develop an adequate business plan to
ensure the realisation of the strategic priority.

To help achieve this, we envisage a much stronger role for the senior Cabinet
working committee in the budget process. To round the circle, we envisage that
the planning commission should act as a high-powered secretariat to this
Cabinet working committee.

Of course, reconfiguring the national executive and establishing a high-level
planning capacity in the state does not guarantee anything. Weak leadership or
poor policies can undermine matters. But, as Galbraith puts it pithily, to walk
away from this challenge and to rely on the markets is “to disenfranchise
the future”.

Jeremy Cronin is an ANC national executive committee member, MP and SACP deputy
general secretary

]]> http://historymatters.co.za/the-future-of-the-state/feed/ 0 http://historymatters.co.za/angie-chief-recruiter-for-lekota/ http://historymatters.co.za/angie-chief-recruiter-for-lekota/#comments Sun, 26 Oct 2008 19:46:16 +0000 http://historymatters.feedmymedia.com/2008/10/26/angie-chief-recruiter-for-lekota/ Angie Motshekga  the head of the womens league in her interview in the Sunday Times underlines the point that many have been making that some members of the ANC leadership are if not intellectual bankrupt but their views on the role of opposition parties in a democracy could be mistaken for that of a rantings of a fascists under the Franco regime.

to a question poised by Chris Barron “Doesn’t democracy need a strong opposition to hold government to account? she had this to say ” No, your constituents should be able to hold you to account. From what I’ve seen in the past 15years, the opposition spends its time looking for faults, criticising and blocking the ruling party. I don’t think it is in the interests of the ruling party to be unable to implement programmes because it fears that the opposition is going to block them. We don’t need a weak ruling party with the current situation in South Africa”.

Now if Lekota needed some one to be their organise in chief than then they don’t need to go further then aunty Angie. Zuma and Co wants us the believe that the likes of Angie would be open to reach out to ANC members who have grievances.

While we are on the question of the womens League, you will struggle to find any reference to the fact that this week one of our greatest women stalwart and the force behind the womens league Ma Sisulu turned 90. Shame on you Angie. Shame on you Womens League.