Daily Maverick
Dailymaverick logo

Opinionistas

This is an opinion piece. The views expressed are not that of Daily Maverick.....

Sona yet sofa — the urgent need for visionary leadership post Ramaphosa

Ismail Lagardien
By Ismail Lagardien
11 Feb 2025
Facebook
0
After Cyril Ramaphosa, the ANC will find it difficult to avoid resembling an early 21st century Bacchanalia. My experience is that beyond people like Ronald Lamola or Enoch Godongwana, the field is empty.

Cyril Ramaphosa seems to have finally delivered the State of the Nation Address (Sona) he always wanted to deliver. It will probably be Ramaphosa’s last Sona, but South Africa is Never-Say-Never-Land so there are no certainties. Who could have imagined, 30 years ago, that the white minority would be back in the executive after three decades?

The Sona has been delivered, there is no need to go over it all again, here. My colleague Rebecca Davis wrote what was probably the definitive piece of analysis.

The shamans have banged their vellums for those who have been dancing on South Africa’s grave for years, and those who have been gloating gleefully at everything that has gone wrong in the country in bestial schadenfreude (for the latest of venomed melodies, see the catastrophe in the DRC and read the glee).

Things have gone wrong, horribly so, to be sure. But if you have been using the same frame of analysis for four decades, you become rather predictable and stale…

Anyway, we know that about 10% of the population would have had something disparaging to say the moment Ramaphosa inhaled before uttering his first words. It’s safe to say that they, and a drizzle of people who get their kicks from a sac near the genitals of a Siberian musk deer, would lose their rag over Ramaphosa’s audacious response to Donald Trump’s finger-wagging. How dare he question the leader of the white world?

They will probably invite Lawrence Summers, Stanley Fischer or who knows, Alan Greenspan to keep the natives in line under the guise of “development enterprise”.

It does not help that Ramaphosa installed Dani Rodrik as one of his economic advisers; if the president were really serious, he would have included Branko Milanovic, arguably the world’s best economist working on global inequality. I guess holding a Ford Foundation chair never does any harm. It is at least consistent with the money the foundation spreads around the country. Or, as they say in the greatest country the Lord gave the world: if you pay them, you play them.

Legacy 


What then of Ramaphosa? Well, there are mumblings which suggest that Ramaphosa will be gone before you can say “back of the sofa” (I hope I’m wrong). I don’t think he would be too disappointed. I truly believe he has done as much as he possibly could.

His appointments have by and large disappointed, though not for want of trying. Anyone who has ever spent any time in and among rank and file public servants should have a sense of the cultural incompetence, and the tall poppy syndrome (you ostracise, or criticise people who stand out as exceptionally competent and professional).

Worst still, (in my experience) you’re told: “You’re making everyone look bad.” My guess is that Ramaphosa is either waiting to exhale (to get out of office), or he believes that he has a legacy to leave. As for the latter, he has, already.

South Africa’s charges against Israel at the International Criminal Court place Ramaphosa head and shoulders above his predecessor, which does not say much.

Nelson Mandela represented a great moral authority in the world (only Tony Leon would disagree, as his speechwriter told me in 1997). Under Thabo Mbeki, Trevor Manuel led South Africa to the country’s greatest post-apartheid achievement, membership of the G20. The less said about Jacob Zuma the better.

Anyway, two things stand out from Ramaphosa’s presidency. First, rubbing against the grain of orthodoxy (“the realism”) that shapes thinkers from the jacarandas of Parktown to the slopes around Table Mountain, the challenge shows that states can be moral in international relations.

Second, his leadership of the G20 this year is an opportunity for the Global South to assert itself more forcefully in international affairs. The South is a long way from becoming rule-makers (after being rule-takers for centuries). Anyway, see this report for further context.

The Economist, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal (and our 10 percenters represented by the Centre for Development Enterprise, and US embassy stenographers, among others) may not agree, but Christopher Vandome of Chatham House makes a point worth noting: “Under the banner of solidarity, equality and sustainability, Pretoria’s priorities include driving greater equity in global governance and giving more prominence to Africa’s development agenda.  

“The event will be the culmination of a series of G20 summits hosted by Ibsa nations – India, Brazil, South Africa. All three democracies have positioned their G20 presidencies as champions of the Global South and of reforming international governance to be more inclusive,” Vandome explained. He is correct. (Disclosure. I have been observing movements and discussions between Western Asia and Southeast Asia for the past several weeks, and in the coming weeks I will be visiting Bandung in Indonesia for a visit to the site where the Non-Aligned Movement was established in 1961.)

There are strong arguments to be made that the Non-Aligned Movement, which led to the G77, did not turn out to be much in terms of the South becoming rule-makers (much of it has to do with external pressure and interference in the region; notably US complicity in Indonesian genocide), but its core principles remain intact.

For what it’s worth, the US also sank all efforts of the Non-Aligned Movement to make an impact on global affairs, but the group played important roles in the decolonisation movements of the 1960s. Until a decade ago, anyone who was an enemy of the US was described as despotic (to be clear — North Korea definitely is not the most democratic country), and a member of the Non-Aligned Movement. Ask Mark Fischer of the New York Times.

Three of the Non-Aligned Movement principles are foundational for the creation of the fledgling Hague Group, which includes the governments of Belize, Plurinational State of Bolivia, Republic of Colombia, Republic of Cuba, Republic of Honduras, Malaysia, Republic of Namibia, Republic of Senegal and Republic of South Africa.

The three principles of the non-aligned states are:

  • Settlement of all international disputes by peaceful means, such as negotiation, conciliation, arbitration or judicial settlement, as well as other peaceful means of the parties’ own choice, in conformity with the Charter of the United Nations.

  • Promotion of mutual interests and cooperation.

  • Respect for justice and international obligations.


Mission improbable


His legacy apart, beyond Ramaphosa the ANC will find it difficult to avoid resembling an early 21st century Bacchanalia. My experience is that beyond people like Ronald Lamola or Enoch Godongwana, the field is empty. Backbenchers in their corpulent fullness have done nothing for their constituencies, and cannot wait to shimmy over to uMkhonto Wesizwe or what’s left of the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF).

Yet the senior politicians are less of a problem than the legions of public servants who get by with doing as little as possible every day. Seriously now, does anyone really expect the president to go, personally, to the office of each of the estimated 1.2 million people in the public service? No.

He can send a message down the line that people need to jack up their work ethic. But when every conversation starts with “haai comrade…” and tall poppies are hacked down, there’s very little you can do other than rely on the emulative effect.

I’m afraid the examples higher up the hierarchy aren’t very inspiring.

What is needed, quite urgently, is a group of good people — not necessarily associated with any political party — to come together and work hard and with focus and vision on what type of country successive future generations deserve. Think of former politicians, public servants who left the service, academics and thinkers who are committed to making the country a better place for future generations. It can work.

Compromises may have to be made; independent and no-strings-attached funding may be exceedingly difficult to come by. But the right people, and the right vision (trustworthy and visionary people) can make it happen.

It really is time to look beyond Cyril Ramaphosa. His scorecard makes for dire reading. He surrounded himself, at the start, with professional people whom he believed he could trust and rely on… Well, things don’t always work out the way you plan. DM



Categories:

Tags: