I am surprised at the ANC’s apparent naivety, to think that handing over poorly managed government departments to other political organisations, would come with little risk to them.
In the past, the risk of power-sharing coalitions (largely at the local government level) was mitigated by the cookie-jar plundering bed-partners the ANC chose. After the national and provincial elections of 29 May, with little choice but to form a Government of National Unity (GNU) with partners that promote good governance, the ANC finds itself in a relatively unfamiliar and daunting political environment.
Good governance enables politicians to easily discover and address maladministration and corruption. Some will accuse the writer of promoting the efforts of the DA, but that is not the case. The approach of good governance applies equally to new ministers and portfolio committee heads from the IFP, FF+, Rize Mzansi and others. And the environment now affords the ANC with a real opportunity for meaningful rejuvenation.
When government officials view their role through the lens of service delivery for public benefit, good governance and impressive results come easily. This has been a foreign mindset for the majority of ANC leaders for many years. However, when given power, new politicians know exactly where to find and address issues of inefficiency and maladministration because they have been following the stories and listening to civil society.
ANC members who complain of grandstanding do so from a position of victimhood. They chose not to ask who was to blame for the maladministration that was uncovered. Wrong is wrong, and covering up is not an option. The sooner the ANC accepts this, the sooner it can begin its journey of recovery as a political party.
The party has a few commendable people within its ranks. Senzo Mchunu is one such person. He has taken the positive and engaging approach he applied as minister of water and sanitation to the Ministry of Police. Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana is another who has exercised rational thinking, when halting decades of incessant annual fuel-levy hikes over the past three years.
Recent statements of transparency and actions to reduce unnecessary expenditure by new ministers, including the DA’s Dean Macpherson in Public Works and Infrastructure, the DA’s Siviwe Gwarube in Basic Education, the IFP’s Velenkosini Hlabisa in Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, and the FF Plus’s Pieter Groenewald in Correctional Services, have been loudly applauded by society.
Opportunities abound
Corrective action opportunities are abundant and waiting to be seized, following years of maladministration (often deliberate), that opened the doors to waste and corruption. New ministers journeying down the corridors of power would have to be blind to miss the opportunities to save the country billions of rands and expose the perpetrators of wrongdoing.
Low-hanging fruit options include:
- Unnecessary office rentals when government buildings lie empty. It would be remiss of Macpherson not to conduct an audit of empty government-owned buildings that exist close to premises leased by government departments. He will find overpriced rentals from landlords with political connections. Society expects him to resolve the problem of empty government-owned buildings and ensure that government departments move out of private office rentals and back into their buildings.
- A review of the size, composition and remuneration of government entity boards is long overdue. Many have become employment agencies for connected cadres who apply minimal oversight and merely rubber-stamp dubious conduct.
- Excessive government department service fees have been exposed by civil society organisations. Irrational charges and tariff increases have given rise to lucrative profit centre empires that dish out excessive and irrational contracts to the politically connected.
While opportunities for change exist across many departments, there is little hope of the same in the ministries of Mineral and Petroleum Resources (under Gwede Mantashe) and Science, Technology and Innovation (under Blade Nzimande). Sadly, the departments under these ministers will continue to resist administrative efficiency improvements. Some forensic economists concur that replacing the likes of Mantashe and Nzimande with people who focus on service delivery and growth will unlock economic opportunities and job creation in South Africa.
Less dialogue and more action
Dialogue without action is tiresome and meaningless. The public is fed up with talks about talks to develop new ideas and societal compacts. We have enough laws and oversight mechanisms, and an acute understanding of what needs to be tackled. Fixing failed municipalities requires entrenching the formulas applied by the nation’s top-performing municipalities: good governance, merit-based appointments and consequence management. It’s not rocket science.
Very encouraging is the number of requests extended to organised civil society by politicians and MPs who seek their knowledge and ideas of solutions for necessary change. And why would they not, given the ample research and experience garnered on the topics of maladministration, system failure and corruption? Besides, these politicians will merely be doing what President Cyril Ramaphosa has tasked all members of the GNU with: conduct meaningful engagements with civil society and communities to seek input and solutions to the country’s woes.
A most interesting opportunity has been offered to many new ANC ministerial appointees within the GNU. They too can seize the moment for meaningful rejuvenation of their political party. They too can take the bull by the horns and display moral courage to the electorate. Their only challenge is to make one of two choices: Do the right thing (and let the consequential cards fall where they will), or look away and continue to drag the ANC’s support to lower levels in the next elections.
We are in a far better place as a nation than we were six months ago. To the new players within the GNU (including all ANC ministers), we encourage you to go for it, be bold, exercise moral courage, and seize the opportunity. You will be celebrated. To ANC Secretary-General Fikile Mbalula, we say stop fretting. Relax and encourage your members to do what their moral conscience tells them. Society will protect them from the wolves and so should you. DM