African citizenry needs to be much more active in shaping the future. What is required is a sound educational system to strengthen social, economic and political institutions.
We are a young nation with half of our population under 35 years of age, many of them uneducated. That we are a country with growth pangs there can be no doubt. On an all too regular basis, we face volatile social situations such as service delivery protests, often by young people. There can also be no doubt that a sound education system is critical if our social, economic and political institutions are to be strengthened.
Education gives us the opportunity to change our own circumstances and teaches us how to change the environment we live in. It stimulates us to have enquiring minds to ensure that we don’t simply take things for granted and provides us with the academic discipline to debate in a creative manner so that we can contribute meaningfully to the common good.
We have high levels of poverty and inequalities that need to be addressed. We are in need of policies and actions that promote economic opportunities for young people, the urban poor and people in rural areas. We have a select few benefiting from tenders, resulting in a need for policies that stimulate the creation of wealth and entrepreneurship so that the largesse from such policies can cascade down to the poor and not just be enjoyed by those who enjoy showing off their new-found personal riches.
South Africa is peculiar on the African continent in that most of its poor sit at home waiting for income grants and other forms of social assistance. In other African countries, the poor are usually engaged in the informal sector, busy finding ways to generate their own livelihood.
I want to emphasise that we need a broad vision for South Africa in Africa, a vision that must be founded on the constitutional democracy we attained in 1994 and for which countless South Africans from all walks of life paid a high price. It was the American Christian intellectual Reinold Niebuhr, who made the powerful point that “man’s capacity for justice makes democracy possible, but man’s inclination to injustice makes democracy necessary”.
These words are germane given the volatile social situations in which South Africa often appears to find itself. This volatility is a threat to our constitutional democracy, based on a Constitution that was hammered out on the anvil of pain and suffering. And what are these threats? They include the threats that come through the rhetoric of many of our leaders, as well as the wanton destruction of our infrastructure through service delivery strikes.
Let me be clear: the voice of protest must never be allowed to die in any democracy, particularly in ours. But what is objectionable is the violence and destruction of property that accompanies many of the protests we are witnessing in South Africa.
Allow me to quote Niebuhr again: “There are historic situations in which refusal to defend the inheritance of a civilisation, however imperfect, against tyranny and aggression may result in consequences even worse than war.” Undoubtedly, sentiments such as these were interwoven in the philosophy of former president Nelson Mandela when he emerged from Robben Island, not as a bitter and angry man, but as a statesman revered the world over for the spirit of reconciliation and harmony he brought.
Why is the spirit of reconciliation and harmony now so difficult to maintain? Why is it that in my travels, most recently in the past few weeks to India, I am confronted with challenging questions about the volatility that surrounds protest in our country?
One answer is perhaps to be found, with some sadness I may say, in the unfortunate fact that, as a nation, we have found it easier to hold on to a heritage of violence than to fully embrace the legacy of reconciliation and harmony. If we continue on this course, our image in the world and in Africa will become ever more tarnished until there is no positivity left to it at all.
One way in which to bring about change is to harness the energy and creativity of the youth for good in shaping the future of our country. We need to nurture our youth, provide the best education that we can and, more importantly, we need good role models so that we can create leaders who are ethical and will lead with integrity. It is ironic that when we look back over the 17 years of our democracy, the high points of common good for the community can almost always be traced back to sporting events.
Last year, of course, when the Fifa World Cup was held here, our country was swept up in a spirit of unity and generosity that was infectious. This year has witnessed a milder form of that infectious spirit with the Springboks leaving for the Rugby World Cup in New Zealand, and Banyana Banyana qualifying for the 2012 Olympics.
When the Bokke won the Rugby World Cup in 1995 and Mandela immortalised his image in the minds of countless people worldwide by wearing the Springbok number six jersey, we saw just what was achievable through sport, a feat repeated when they won the World Cup again in 2007. There is much to make us feel depressed in our land, but if we can show our colours as truly proud South Africans in these circumstances, what is so wrong with us that we can’t do so when we are called to build real nationhood for the common good?
Nation-building that embraces reconciliation and harmony requires more, however, than intermittent celebration of our sporting prowess. Building a spirit of reconciliation and harmony on the one hand and a productive economy on the other — both of which serve the common good — requires that we transcend sport and move our commitment to all realms of society.
True reconciliation will occur only once there is a meaningful redistribution of wealth and economic opportunity that is not confined to the elite but in which the whole nation shares. Dialogue about this must include business and the holders of economic and political power.
What we need is a growing practice of reconciliation and harmony; to desert the streets of protest and build on our Constitution and our heritage; and to expend our energy in optimising the opportunities that South Africa calls us to seize. We need to liberate our mindset and move forward as one, “one nation, one South Africa”.
Archbishop Ndungane founded ÂAfrican Monitor in 2006, a pan-African non-profit organisation that monitors fulfillment of the promises of both aid-giving and aid-receiving countries