After President Cyril Ramaphosa announced his multiparty cabinet 100 days ago this week, I asked a friend what he thought about the appointment of Angie Motshekga as defence minister. He burst out laughing. After wiping away the tears and collecting himself, he said that, on hearing the news, he thought someone was pulling his leg.
Given our circumstances, I guess, laughter is our only antidote — our coping mechanism. But it’s no laughing matter. It’s hard to understand why somebody who had for 15 years assiduously taken the education system to the gutters should be chosen for another high-profile position. We will never know. Because we’re not supposed to know. It’s not our remit to be in the loop. Motshekga is certainly not alone. She’s no exception to the norm. She however sticks out like a sore thumb. Even the army generals must still be wondering what their commander-in-chief has against them to saddle them with such an unfortunate appointment. But comrades and competence rarely belong in the same sentence.
Aaron Motsoaledi left home affairs in a shambles. And he’s now been given the joyful task of imposing the cumbersome and ill-thought-out national health insurance — perhaps the most consequential and damaging piece of legislation — on all of us. It is probably in the nature of the least competent that they tend to be the most arrogant. Motsoaledi was asked whether, given other partners’ implacable opposition, the NHI would not destabilise the government of national unity. GNU be damned, he said. The arrogance of unearned power.
Away from the glare of publicity, bad things happen to poor people in state hospitals. They visit these facilities seeking help, but too often end up worse off. Thank your ancestors if you come out of there still in one piece. These places instead have become lucrative hunting grounds for tenderpreuners and other comradely shysters. They may be short of medicine or sheets and blankets, but the comrades are making a killing. Now Ramaphosa has chosen one of his most trusted and incompetent sycophants to spread the agony.
Aaron Motsoaledi left home affairs in a shambles. And he’s now been given the joyful task of imposing the cumbersome and ill-thought-out national health insurance — perhaps the most consequential and damaging piece of legislation — on all of us
Thabo Mbeki was asked, when announcing his first cabinet as president, why he had appointed the men and women that he had. Because they’re all good people, he said curtly. The question was a genuine attempt to understand his thinking, and the skills and strengths the appointees were bringing to their roles. It was an opportunity to take the public into his confidence. But Mbeki was having none of that. It’s none of your business, he was in effect saying. He didn’t have to answer to the public. That sort of reaction is unfortunately a thread running through all levels of government. Incompetence is compounded by arrogance.
Apartheid was so vile, so vicious, that the mere elimination of it is supposed to send us into everlasting joy and jubilation — and therefore forever mask any hardships visited upon us by the new political class. "Eish! Things are so bad, but thank God apartheid is gone." It’s almost as if it’s a gogga that could come back to haunt us if we didn’t behave ourselves. Our preoccupation with the past, while understandable, somehow blinds us to tackling current issues or holding those responsible accountable.
As Jacob Zuma would say, ours is a crazy democracy. Politicians don’t have to account to voters. That is the biggest failing of the system, the source of all the rot. Whether they steal, are incompetent or simply sleeping at the switch, we have no way of recalling or reprimanding them. And whether it’s the gemors in parliament where shameless criminal suspects masquerade as honourable members, the appointment of incompetent people or the debacle in our metros — they all have to do with the system’s lack of accountability.
Our politicians are given huge responsibilities without being tested either through a rigorous election campaign or even a perfunctory interview. US presidents appoint their cabinets but these people are then subjected to intense interrogation and approval by the Senate. British prime ministers select their cabinets from MPs who’ve been elected and therefore are accountable to their own constituencies. Ours simply glide into power without even a cursory hello to the odd voter.
I once asked Ngconde Balfour why ordinary South Africans were not allowed to elect their own public representatives. “No, we can’t do that,” he said. Why not, I asked. “Because if we do that, Tony Leon [then DA leader] will take over,” he blurted. “Our people still need the direction of the movement.” Another minister said that if a constituency-based electoral system was introduced, “our people will kill each other”. It is this sort of patronising nonsense — and arrogance — that has landed us knee-deep in the mud.
If we had a properly functioning democratic system there would have been no need to go to court to stop a charlatan like John Hlophe from having any say in the selection of our esteemed judges. He wouldn’t have been in parliament without being elected. And the insufferable Busisiwe Mkhwebane would not be spewing racist bile from the hallowed precincts of parliament. We certainly wouldn’t be having the mayoral debacle in Pretoria, because the good burghers of Tshwane — and not some cabal sitting behind closed doors — would have decided who they wanted as their first citizen.
This week residents in some parts of Johannesburg — the much-vaunted first-class African city — were waiting patiently in the streets with their plastic containers, hoping a water tanker would come by. They’ve had no say in the selection of the individual visiting this misery upon them, and certainly no way of getting him off their backs. They’re more like hostages. If this is what’s happening to Johannesburg, spare a thought for the townships. Out of sight, out of mind.
We need a total review of the electoral process or we’ll continue to sink even deeper. Incompetent people and the debacle in our metros — they both have to do with the system’s lack of accountability.
Update: A previous version of this story mistakenly stated that Ngconde Balfour had died.
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