Don’t underestimate how differently this government sees itself from its predecessor. In a recent meeting with two special ministerial advisers, they kept referring to the ‘old days†or the ‘old governmentâ€. At first I thought they meant apartheid days. But it soon dawned on me that they meant the Thabo Mbeki years.
Even though the same party won the election, it is as if Labour has replaced Tory or Democrat has succeeded Republican; even when the policy is the same, the new administration is at pains to pretend that it is not.
As every day passes, so the Mbeki government appears ever more insidious, as well as rancid. Cosatu’s recent political report to its congress — as compelling an analysis as it is a prolix one — invited the federation’s members to ‘recall that none of us spoke freely on our phones, preferring to dismantle our cell batteries and cards in fear that our conversations were being listened to. If Nelson Mandela’s homes were tapped — what about us ordinary mortals?â€
People who were direct witnesses are now beginning to speak freely about the atmosphere that prevailed — for example, how one former senior law officer would circle around ANC national executive committee meetings greeting party leaders with choice phrases such as: ‘Be careful, we’ve got something new on you.â€
Mamphela Ramphele is absolutely right when she says that it Âhappened ‘on our watchâ€. We have no one to blame but ourselves. Cosatu agrees with her; its political report contains a series of candid mea culpas, as well as a powerful critique of the change in the balance of forces during the Mbeki years.
For the Marxist nostalgic it is a dream read. And not just for the nostalgia; as the report excitedly observes, Marxist analysis is coming back into fashion as a necessary tool for understanding the current state of capitalism, and the origins and implications of the global economic crisis.
There is solid common sense in the document on corruption and the plundering of state resources by opportunist members of the ANC; on the contaminating overlap between business and politics that prospered under Mbeki; and on the culture of accumulation and conspicuous material consumption that undermined the ethics and collegiality of the ANC-led alliance.
The report is up there with the SACP’s ‘comprador†analysis of mid-2005 as a seminal piece of political writing. There is a strong passage dealing with conflicts of interest in government and the instruments for managing and preventing such conflicts that some of us have been going on about for years, but which were routinely flouted by the Mbeki government.
Under Mbeki, Cosatu was pushed to the fringes, but always maintained that it in fact represented the midpoint of the ANC political spectrum. This document restores the equilibrium, backed up by the fact that union leaders now either occupy influential positions in the new dispensation or else are able to exert influence on other critical appointments.
Minister of Economic Development Ebrahim Patel is the jewel in this particular crown, though the report notes with undisguised anxiety the need for Patel to establish both a strong team and a clear rationale and niche in the economic policymaking firmament, lest Trevor Manuel — demonised bitterly in the report — wrests control through what the report calls the ‘political manoeuvre†of his Green Paper on national planning.
Given that it is too soon to assess the Jacob Zuma administration’s impact on policy and on the quality of public service, one measure of the president lies in his appointments. And here, too, one can see both the common sense and the value of collective leadership: the need to ensure that a much wider segment of the ANC-led alliance’s broad political spectrum is represented has entailed benefits.
Zuma’s Cabinet resembles a coalition government of ‘all the talentsâ€, with another couple of dedicated democratic socialists alongside Patel at trade and industry and the treasury, to bring greater intellectual and programmatic cogency to government’s response to the economic crisis. Gill Marcus was a popular appointment to the Reserve Bank, not least because she speaks the same language as the economic policy triumvirate in the Cabinet.
Against this backdrop, Zuma was criticised for making appointments in the security positions only from a narrow ethnic base (his); but, frankly, who can blame him? Given what he went through and the scandalous lack of accountability in the police, parts of the National Prosecuting Authority and the National Intelligence Agency, which of us would not have been inclined to appoint people we trust above all?
The SABC board contains many sound figures; it is a massive improvement on its predecessor. The newly nominated public protector, Thuli Madonsela, is an excellent choice, with an admirable record in human rights and democratic governance. No real surprise, since the chair of the ad hoc parliamentary committee that nominated her, Tshililo Masutha, is himself such a fine person, who had to duck and dive his way through the Mbeki years.
What a pity, though, that the exiting Public Protector Lawrence Mushwana has been ‘rewarded†with one of the vacancies in the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC), which seemed to draw the short straw on the appointments front.
Mushwana’s whitewash on Oilgate was one of the most scandalous things that happened under Mbeki — and probably at his behest — yet it seems that Mushwana’s friendship with the new president has given him a soft landing. And that the superb current SAHRC chief executive, Tseliso Thipanyane, was not nominated is beyond me. Too independent for the taste of Ngoako Ramatlhodi and John Jeffrey, key figures in the justice committee that interviewed the candidates?
So, it’s not all good. And remember: it happened on our watch last time.