Warwick Bruce Chapman

Note: A shortened version of this letter was printed in the Daily News of 22 February, 2011.

Mr Meth, in Daily News 17 February, says that the DA is hypocritcal for “blacklisting” Anna Majavu. Anna Majuva was removed from a mailing list providing DA press releases. She still has access to them via the website and could ask any of her colleagues for them if she needed. This is not blacklisting, it is the DA excercising its own freedom of choice. The DA is is under no obligation to send press releases to journalists which it believes have an anti-DA agenda.

Ms Majavu is still able to attend DA press conferences and report on DA statements. Considering these facts, I wonder how Ms Majavu’s freedoms, the freedom of speech or the freedom of the press been affected in anyway by the DA’s choice not to email her press statements?

Mr Meth would do well to look at the analysis by the ANC-run national Department of Co-operative Governance, and he will see that DA-run municipalities score the highest figures for the provision of basic services and the overall quality of life. I can assure you that even “brilliant public relations workers” would be not be able to convince an ANC-run national department to release reports which make the DA look good.

Core to the principles of the DA is real accountability, not the ANC-style accountability which involves talking about and consulting around corruption and mismanagement and doing nothing to hold those responsible to account. The unqualified audits of the Western Cape Provincial Government for the first time since 1994 and those of all DA-run municipalities are the proof of the application of these principles to the DA itself.

Lastly, as defined in the DA Regulations for the Nomination of Candidates, the definition of “fitness for purpose” explicitly addresses the euro-centric concern expressed by Mr Meth. “fitness for purpose” is described as “the sum total of attributes and competences of a candidate that are most likely to achieve key objectives of the Party, including attracting votes, providing competent activism, contributing expertise and experience, adding to diversity and building the Party’s brand.”

As our democracy matures, we need a small revolution of our own, a revolution in voter thinking about choice. Before we see the real balance our democracy needs, we must see a rapid swing away from racial voting and toward issue voting. The dominant issue in South Africa is delivery; the delivery of jobs and the delivery of services most crucially.

Many South Africans, across the spectrum have not yet experienced a government which is truly good to all. The NP government of white privilege and the ANC government of cadre privilege will be remembered for serving only some South Africans.

The Apartheid government made itself infamous for harnessing the wealth and human resources of a country to enrich a racial minority, and the new government was always going to have a mammoth task transforming it into a government which delivers for all.

But in too many respects, the ANC Government isn’t doing much better than its predecessor. Non-whites in general, and blacks in particular, continue to live in poor conditions, with little real prospect of material improvement. Cadres of the ANC meanwhile have jobs and contracts which they aren’t doing well enough to ensure the required service delivery and economic growth required.

What we saw in Egypt over the past weeks was not a people’s struggle for better delivery, but instead for the fundamental bedrock we already take for granted here in South Africa: a democratic system of government. The Egyptians want to be able to choose one party over another, one public representative over another. They want real choice.

Technically, we have real choice in South Africa but only to the extent that everyone in the country has the theoretical freedom to vote as they so choose. I believe that there are two practical limitations to that choice: intimidation and lack of experience.

First, threats that pensions and grants will be cancelled if beneficiaries do not vote ANC are widespread and well-known. This claim is repeatedly rubbished by the ANC as being unfounded and unproven and yet political activists come across it election after election and on an increasingly regular basis.

Second, the structural inertia among South Africans communities means that few South Africans get to experience the level of service delivered by a party other than the ANC. By this I mean that the lack of economic resources to travel or live in another part of the country means that a great many South Africans have no frame of reference when considering their choices beyond beyond the ANC they know.

I am regularly contacted by friends who have been to Cape Town or another DA-run municipality for the first time. Quite often they say something like, “Now I understand what you guys are on about”, because for the first time they have actually experienced the quality of government delivered by a government focused on delivery.

The miracle of our South African democracy came with a ryder, which like a nasty spell, keeps our democracy from realising its full potential. The race-obsessed mindset which most South Africans have regardless of their desires one way or another is the barrier to the informed choices we need South Africans to make.

The democratic system has become so popular, despite its inherent inefficiency, because it is the only system which manages to put real power in the hands of the people governed by the system. Democracy, however, does not functional very well when one party dominates with an overwhelming majority. This scenario allows that party to abuse its popular position without the real fear of enough voters turning against it in favour of another. One party or one party-dominant democratic systems the world over, with few exceptions, bear testament to the abuses which take place when the voter is dis-empowered.

In the wake of the Egyptian revolution, we are reading of Zimbabweans in South Africa being told to go back to Zimbabwe and stage a revolution of their own. Why such a revolution is not likely to happen, given the proximity of the army to Mugabe is clear, but the topicality of the subject reminds us of the widespread unhappiness with the number of Zimbabweans living in South Africa.

And yet the policies which drove the collapse of the Zimbabwean economy and the flight Southward of millions of its people are too often cited by individuals within the ANC as examples of how South Africa could be doing things. Nationalisation is forever being placed on the agenda, the land problem is regularly directed toward the Zimbabwean solution and the question of foreign ownership remains a concern. These are the grand populist policies, efficacy cast aside, that dominate the politics of out-of-balance democracies such as ours.

I want to see the control of South Africa’s democracy where it needs to be, in the hands of voters who genuinely believe that they have the power. Voters need to believe that their vote can bring the change they want to see in their government, and that is only possible through stiff political competition.

In his letter, “South Africa needs the IFP’s experience and integrity” (The Mercury, 27 January), Prince Mangosuthu Buthelezi made a rather quizzical statement when he suggested that “there is no party which can play the role we do”.

In the eThekwini Council, the IFP sit to our left, and we are forever bamboozled by their voting patterns on council issues. In the nearly two years I have sat on council, I have no idea what informs their positions or what role the IFP plays in eThekwini let alone in KwaZulu-Natal.

The reality is that the IFP is a party which had a role to play in the bad old days when it represented the interests of the oppressed majority in the KwaZulu homeland, of which the Prince was Chief Minister. Since 1994, however, the relevance of that role in the new South Africa has been questioned by voters, resulting in the IFP consistently losing support in the last 4 general elections, from a high of over 2 million votes in 1994 to just over 8 hundred thousand in 2009.

Then IFP MP, Gavin Woods, said in 2004 that the IFP “has no discernible vision, mission or philosophical base, no clear national ambitions or direction, no articulated ideological basis and offers little in the way of current, vibrant original and relevant policies” and importantly, that the party “must treat Buthelezi as the leader of a political party and not the political party itself.”

I believe that Magwaza-Msibi and her followers wanted to modernise and transform the party beyond the restrictive context of being led by Prince Mangosuthu Buthelezi and representing the interests of Zulus. The Prince, a former member of the ANC Youth League, founded the IFP in 1975 and has led the Party for the last 36 years – too long by any international guideline on business or political leadership.

The total decline of the IFP is inevitable and the ANC, DA and NFP will fight overs its remaining voters in the coming local government elections and will cleanup in the 2014 general election. That leaves just one race-based one-man party left in KZN. History will show that parties like these survived too long and in the end ultimately only served to the benefit of their leader-for-life.

Our placard protest at Old Main and Stapleton today in support of media freedom was a most interesting experience. A small group of about 15 of us donned our DA-kit and held our placards to the passing traffic. The response was most unexpected with about 2/3 of vehicle passing us giving us the unequivocal hoot of support!

I’m certain an ANC big wig drove past as well because the index finger he showed us was most certainly the opposite of support. I wonder if it was quite necessary to display the same finger to Cllrs Jean Lindsay and Gill Noyce – but perhaps that’s me just being a little traditional.

Cllr Noma Phungula and two activists from Mpumalanga township she brought along got a fair bit of hecking and sprinking of “we are disappointed in you” from passing motorists. Those giving them stick pretty consistently looked like what one might call a BEE fatcat (or that’s how Noma put it at least!).

If anything the support for protest was a great indication that the issue of the Information Bill and the Media Tribunal is one that surpasses race. Secondarily, it would appear that ANC loyalists are a little prickly on this issue, resorting to the middle finger in response and tackling our activists for selling out (the ANC’s politics of race alive and well!).

ANC supporters often plead with me that South Africa has come along way since 1994 under the ANC and we should recognise their contribution instead of focusing on the problems. One even reminded me that the ANC could’ve murdered us all if they wanted and suggested we should be thankful for that.

As a true liberal, I should laugh at such a comment, but in Africa, considering the post-colonial track record, I most certainly do appreciate the ANC for having taking reconciliation seriously.

However, as to recognising the contribution of the ANC since 1994, I struggle a little more. South Africa should have progressed further and improved the lives of more people than it has in the last 16 years.

The state of education in particular, is a travesty. Education is such a crucial issue to the empowerment of the poor and one which many young ANC members died fighting for. One cannot fathom why the ANC didn’t handle it in the world class manner it did Finance and SARS.

The poor management of the Department Health means facilities and human resources cannot cope with the burden of healthcare and, again, it is the poor ANC voter who suffers the most.

Then there’s service delivery, crime, land reform, agriculture, water and a hundred other areas which government is responsible for which have been poorly managed and are now not serving the country the way they should be.

The ANC was a most noble and historic organisation but its legacy as a liberator and moral compass of the world is being quickly replaced by that of just another a corrupt, inefficient and power abusing governing party.