When there is no political will to tackle existing problems, or when entrenched political patronage, criminal or ideological interests appear to be too formidable, ANC leaders often create new parallel structures or policies to circumvent them. This at best leaves the problems unsolved, and at worst creates a new set of problems.
EFF leader Julius Malema has pledged to continue the fight to have the Reserve Bank nationalised, ostensibly to foster employment. Many ANC leaders, members and supporters also want the nationalisation of the central bank. The irony is that nationalising the Bank will create more unemployment, more poverty and more runaway inflation.
The obvious solution to tackling poverty, unemployment and inflation is for the government to manage the state and economy competently and have pragmatic policies. This means having merit-based appointments and service-delivery contracts in the public service; genuinely tackling corruption; and partnering with non-cadre-connected private companies, civil society and professionals to create employment, reduce poverty and combat high living costs.
However, implementing such obvious policies would meaning firing incompetent and corrupt cadres, cadre companies and poorly performing employees who are members of ANC-affiliated trade unions, and ditching wrong-headed ideological policies for more pragmatic ones. But this would undermine entrenched ideological, patronage and populist interests in the ANC, so there is very little political enthusiasm to do so.
The reasons for the financial and service-delivery failures of South Africa’s municipalities are well known — corruption, cadre incompetence and entrenched political patronage
The renewed calls for a new state bank is another example. South Africa has a number of state "banks" — development finance institutions such as the Land Bank, the Development Bank of Southern Africa and provincial state banks such as Ithala. These mostly underperform, due to entrenched political patronage, criminal or ideological interests and the deployment of incompetent cadres, cadre suppliers and untouchable but undiligent ANC-aligned trade union member employees.
A case in point is the failed Post Bank, which was already a state bank. But entrenched ANC patronage interests, the deployment of incompetent cadres and pandering to trade union interests contributed to crash it. Nonetheless, many ANC leaders would create an entirely new state bank, which no doubt will experience the same problems.
Most of the calls for a state bank are ideological fundamentalism — based on the flawed belief that state banks, because they are owned by the state, can supposedly deliver better services to the poor than private ones. Furthermore, there is a clear lack of political will to get private banks to become responsible corporate citizens that provide catalytic stimuli to the economy, don't fleece the poor and don't enrich themselves.
The government should ensure that private banks don't charge the poor for just having their savings in the bank, don't unconstitutionally sell the homes of home loan-defaulting homeowners, and that they provide funding to long-term assets such as homes, businesses and education rather than mostly for depreciating assets such as cars. Banks should be asked by the government to pass on parts of their profits to stimulate the economy, rather than concentrating on making huge profits in a depressed economy.
A few years ago, President Cyril Ramaphosa promised to build a new “smart” city, ostensibly in Gauteng. Again, this is another instance of lacking the political will to take on the patronage and ideological and corrupt interests at the heart of currently failing cities and municipalities. The reasons for the financial and service-delivery failures of South Africa’s municipalities are well known — corruption, cadre incompetence and entrenched political patronage.
The introduction of National Health Insurance (NHI) is another example of creating a parallel structure because there is a lack of political will to tackle the corruption, cadre incompetence and political patronage that has put public health in the ICU. The easier way out is to create an NHI, which is likely going to transfer the public health sector incompetence, corruption and patronage to the new NHI.
It is important that the government of national unity musters the political will and resolves to cut through entrenched patronage and criminal and ideological interests to tackle deep-seated problems head-on, rather than circumventing these by creating new parallel structures or policies to circumvent them, thus leaving the problems unsolved or creating new sets of problems.
• Gumede is associate professor, School of Governance, University of the Witwatersrand, and author of 'Restless Nation: Making Sense of Troubled Times' (Tafelberg)
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