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many senior ANC figures with presidential ambitions now see the Youth League as important foot soldiers in their proxy presidential battles and generously fund its leaders in order to woo them. Malema himself, a wily operator, appears to play candidates off according to who can offer the most generous financial terms or can best advance his political career. He clearly sees himself as a contender for the ANC presidency in the future and this fact now influences all his decisions. And in the eyes of many ANC members, Zuma crowned him as a future president of the ANC when he announced last year that Malema was ‘presidential’ material. This undoubtedly raised Malema’s stock in the ANC.

      But Malema’s power also lies elsewhere. Traditionally, the ANC Youth League has always been given the latitude to be contrary and Malema’s power lies in the fact that the controversial views he expresses are at least partially resonant with significant numbers of black South Africans. If he calls for nationalisation, the truth is that there is widespread anger that redistribution to the poor has not worked. Of course, the answer is not traditional nationalisation, but finding ways to make existing government departments and state-owned enterprises work more efficiently – by reducing cronyism, doing away with jobs for pals and encouraging business to be more proactive in terms of job creation and skills transfer. However, this does not mean that Malema’s views do not resonate with many people.

      The youth of South Africa are significant in electoral terms. Statistics tell us that they are likely to be unemployed; poor and without hope; resentful of both the white establishment and the new black elite. The ANC leadership has problems reaching out to them, but Malema has managed to become their spokesperson – they can identify with him because he is like them (he is the embodiment of black marginalised youth: poor education, no job except for working for the ANC). But more than this, he is an inspiration – he has moved from rural poverty to a life of fine clothes, fast cars and expensive whiskies.

      Beeld, 28 June 2010

      Putting the people’s needs over the leaders’ wants

      Given the extreme poverty of the majority of ordinary South Africans, it is an affront that political leaders elected after promising to change the lives of the poor live in extraordinary opulence on public money.

      The majority of South Africans are living without jobs, houses and food. They have given the ANC a mandate to lift them out of this grinding poverty as quickly as possible. Given this situation, our leaders must start to live modestly. Some political activists, during the past election, were driving Hummers while campaigning in squatter camps, urging poverty-stricken people who do not know where their next meal will come from to vote for them. This really is an insult to the majority of South Africans who struggle to make ends meet in these tough economic times.

      Elected leaders are living the high life on taxpayers’ money, and in their bubble of luxury they are forgetting about the poor. Jacob Zuma must change the culture of opulence so pervasive in government. For starters, Zuma must ban extravagant ‘blue-light’ convoys, where one minister is transported in a large convoy of cars driving at breakneck speed, pushing other ordinary motorists and pedestrians off the road.

      The crowd of security guards that surround ministers must be cut down to one per minister. It is a disgrace that they are surrounded by so many bodyguards, while an ordinary citizen in Soweto must face the brunt of daily crime, without bodyguards or responsive police, without the money to buy expensive private security.

      Better still, leaders must start to use public transport. Ken Livingstone, the former mayor of London in the United Kingdom, took the bus and the train to work and meetings every day. This also made him more accessible to ordinary citizens who could vent their anger at lack of delivery at him in person.

      If local politicians take minibus taxis, trains and buses every day, they will experience first-hand the daily dance of death that ordinary citizens experience using public transport.

      Leaders must also drive more humble cars. Imagine President Zuma decreeing that all ANC-elected public officials should drive less expensive official cars, say cars costing under R200 000. Leaders must also live modestly.

      Elected leaders must live in the constituency areas which they represent. This means that if they represent Soweto, they must live there. This will also ensure that they are reminded daily of the hardships and poverty of ordinary South Africans. This will also make them immediately accessible to the ordinary citizens they claim to represent.

      Elected public officials must behave with more humility. President Zuma must issue an instruction that ministers should no longer be addressed as ‘Your Excellency’ or ‘The Honourable’; instead the president should instruct all his ministers to address ordinary citizens in this way. This should help install a culture of elected officials who are there to serve citizens. Ministers must stand in queues in shops like ordinary citizens – there should be no jumping of queues because the person is a minister or a ‘VIP’.

      Secondly, all VIP areas at public events that are funded by taxpayers must be banned. Leaders must mingle with ordinary people. Furthermore, extravagant parties for publicly elected officials that are funded by taxpayers should be banned. So too must the huge banquets available at meetings of government officials. This will save taxpayers huge amounts of money which can then be redirected to poverty-alleviation projects.

      Excessive bonuses in the public sector should be curtailed. In many state-owned companies executives give themselves performance bonuses when they have managed failing and loss-making institutions. This must stop.

      President Zuma has a golden opportunity to bring accountability to South Africa’s political system. Elected leaders who do not deliver must be fired, especially if they are close allies and friends of the president. Under Mbeki, the most incompetent deployees were never fired if they were slavishly loyal to the president. Zuma’s proposal to open a direct line to him, where ordinary citizens can complain about poor service delivery, corruption and indifference, is a good idea, but what matters is whether action will be taken against callous government officials following complaints by ordinary citizens.

      Sowetan, 16 July 2009

      Has the ANC become a tenderpreneur?

      What is happening to South Africa’s ANC and its leadership? There can be no doubt that if the ruling party is a shareholder in a private company that tenders for state contracts this represents a clear conflict of interest.

      The ANC has a financial arm, Chancellor House, which owns a 25% stake in Hitachi Power Africa. Hitachi has been awarded a contract by Eskom, the electricity utility, to supply and install boilers for power stations. The ANC’s stake in the deal through Chancellor House was estimated in 2008 to be R5,8 billion. For the sake of transparency, accountability and clean governance there has to be a firewall between the ruling political party and its leaders, on the one hand, and state and private companies, on the other. It is hardly unlikely that when a company that is partially owned by the ANC is bidding for a government or parastatal tender, such a company will not be awarded the contract.

      Soon after the ANC’s national conference in December 2007, the then newly minted party treasurer Mathews Phosa promised, as part of a post-Polokwane spring-cleaning, to disinvest the party’s shares in Hitachi. This has not happened. The ANC must do so, and it must close down Chancellor House.

      Good ruling parties govern in the broadest public interest. Private companies have a narrow motive – that of expressly securing a profit for their shareholders. They rarely work for the benefit of the public interest. It would be a shame if the ANC leadership governs in a way that maximises its profits in its investments, rather than maximising the prosperity of the whole of SA Inc.

      If the party is a major shareholder in Hitachi, how can one be certain that the ANC leadership applied their minds objectively in the proposed 35% tariff hike proposed by Eskom? The tariff increase is likely to hit the struggling economy, families and businesses at the worst possible moment. Ultimately, ordinary black South Africans – the ANC’s bedrock constituency – are going to suffer the most.

      To get our economy back on an even keel demands tough choices, difficult trade-offs and decisions. Some of these will no doubt be very painful. Knowing such decisions

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