Hero-worshipping politicians is among reasons for society's crisis of mediocrity. It has dumbed down public discourse. It has made incompetence, corruption and anti-intellectualism acceptable. It has stunted South Africa’s development, innovation and prosperity.
Politicians are treated as celebrities by many black South Africans, including the youth. They are put on pedestals. They are bestowed with enormous social power, whether ideological, political or influential, even if they lack merit, honesty or ideas.
At public events, citizens stand to honour often corrupt and uncaring politicians, sometimes even kneeling before them. Ministers are called “honourable” when there is nothing honourable about them. Politicians should call citizens “honourable” or kneel before them because they pay their inflated salaries, benefits and freebie lifestyles. If this happened, perhaps our leaders would become accountable, deliver the public services they promise and be more honest.
Because politicians are held, by some, in such high regard, the public accepts their being overpaid, driven around, protected at taxpayers’ expense and exempted from load-shedding. Politicians do not use the public transport, schools and hospitals they extol — and incompetently oversee.
Countrywide, streets, buildings and parks are named after them. Universities confer on them misplaced honorary degrees, appointing them as chancellors and heads of their councils. Politicians are regularly asked to deliver memorial lectures, mouthing mostly platitudes or rehashing rhetoric and outdated beliefs, devoid of evidence and facts.
The government regularly elevates them onto honorary lists. Private companies appoint them to boards to safeguard government contracts and licences, and to protect them from reprimands involving consumer exploitation, labour rights violations and environmental obligations.
Sadly, the hero-worshipping of flawed politicians has caused many thinking black people to be accused of being “clever blacks”, a derogatory term used by former president Jacob Zuma for those critical of corruption, victimhood, black and white thinking, thinking in extremes, conspiracies and slavish mass conformism.
Political entrepreneurs who receive government contracts based on connectedness rather than skills, capacity or desire to deliver are hero-worshipped as so-called “businessmen and women”. Genuine entrepreneurs who create businesses that create jobs, thereby reducing poverty and inequality, do not receive the same veneration.
In this country, they set moral, social and political norms, as well as fashion and trends. Many young people copy their bling behaviour - the violent dismissal of evidence and facts, and empty pontification
In China, entrepreneurs are so admired by citizens that the government has clipped the wings of those perceived to be more popular than themselves. In successful East Asian states, entrepreneurs, entrepreneurial civil servants and innovative professionals are put on pedestals.
This is one of the reasons these societies achieved post-World War 2 economic miracles. In the postcolonial period, politician-admiring African countries deindustrialised, became poorer, lost their manufacturing ability, became less skilled and saw their infrastructure regress.
Politicians have made many black South Africans fabulously and instantly rich. Because of this, politics has, for many, become the preferred route to a pay cheque, wealth and power.
In this country, they set moral, social and political norms, as well as fashion and trends. Many young people copy their bling behaviour — the violent dismissal of evidence and facts, and empty pontification.
Because politicians are hero-worshipped, many see politics as the only way to economic freedom. Few see as appealing pursuing careers that demand study, such as engineering, accounting, medicine, science and academia. As politicians are elevated, professions such as these are devalued and artisans, craftspeople and technicians invite disdain.
Unless society stops putting politicians on pedestals and starts treating them like ordinary citizens, holding them accountable, incompetence, corruption and anti-intellectualism will endure and South Africa will continue its downward spiral into a failed state.
• Gumede is associateprofessor, School of Governance, University of the Witwatersrand, and author of 'Restless Nation: Making Sense of Troubled Times'
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