Like a castrated bull required to make calves — that’s how Pule Zwane sees the new KwaZulu/Natal Peace
THE KwaZulu/Natal Implementation of Peace Bill, gazetted a few weeks ago, is a bid to resurrect the already-dead — and ineffectual — Peace Committee.
It is not clear who authored the Bill, as the province’s multi-party portfolio committee on safety and security claimed no knowledge of it. However, it was leaked to the public and the press before being officially published and then, with some minor changes, was gazetted on June
The Bill proposes the establishment of a Peace Committee comprising representatives of the multi-party safety and security committee and respresentatives of labour, business, the church, the police, the defence force and other “relevant structures”. The Bill also provides for people who were part of the previous Peace Committee to retain their positions.
This is nothing other than the resurrection of the old committee.
The chairman of the new committee, and its directorate, are to be appointed by the premier, who will also have to supervise, regulate and control their activities, expenditure, code of conduct and operations. This makes this body nothing other than an extension of the provincial leader.
The premier will also be empowered to prescribe penalties of up to six months’ imprisonment for anyone who ignores a summons to appear before the committee. Anyone fomenting violence can be so summoned, and sentenced by the premier to a R2 000 fine or six months imprisonment for not appearing. This usurps the powers of the judiciary and would thus be contrary to the constitution, which does not give provinces the power to deal with judicial matters.
While it is important for mechanisms to be developed to restore peace in our province, it is equally important not to retain expensive machinery like the present Peace Committee. This committeee has failed, since its inception, to restore peace, end no-go areas, bring perpetrators of violence to book or come up with practical mechanisms to curb violence.
Run by senior officials of political parties, its meetings are dominated by political bickering, with the African National Congress blaming the Inkatha Freedom Party for fomenting violence, and vice versa.
The local peace committees, which were formed by the central body, are nothing more than the extension of the dominant political party in that locality. It is well documented that there are many no-go areas in this province, and members of certain political parties are not allowed to settle in those areas. Therefore, if one forms a local peace committee in an IFP-dominated area, it is logical that most of the members of that local peace committee would be members of the IFP — and the same is true in ANC-dominated
What is the role of that local peace committee? Merely to keep peace among IFP members or among ANC members?
In some areas, people are complaining that the people who foment violence in their localities are also seen attending peace committee meetings. This clearly shows the failure of the committees to bring perpetrators of violence — both within and outside of their ranks — to book.
It is interesting to note that senior officials of different political parties in this province support this Bill. They argue that this province would be down the drain if the Peace Committee had not existed. But I would like them to point out any significant achievement of the Peace Committee in this province.
They only point out that the Regional Peace Committee has served as a forum for political parties to debate and settle their differences peacefully. If this is the reason for its existence, then its lifespan has ended. Political parties can now use the provincial legislature or multi-party portfolio committees (after all, executive members of the Peace Committee are also members of the safety and security portfolio committee) for this purpose. That would save them the expensive machinery of the Peace Committee, which costs us more than R10- million a year.
Because of political bickering, the multi-party portfolio committee has failed to develop guidelines on community policing and community policing forums. These are legitimate and low-cost mechanisms for maintaining peace and stability.
Many communities in this province are keen to belong to community forums rather than local peace committees. In fact, some of the latter have been transformed into the former and, young as they are, these forums have made a significant impact in some localities.
Peace committees were the offspring of the now defunct Peace Accord, which was a mechanism to allow political parties to settle their diferences peacefully in the absence of legitimate government structures. But now we have a legitimate government, with several constitutional mechanisms for restoring peace and stability. Our constitution makes provision for community police forums, community development forums, a Human Rights Commission, a Public Protector, legitimate community courts and a Constitutional Court.
These are just some of the legitimate mechanisms which can be used to restore peace and settle conflicts, rather than resurrecting the dead Peace Committee, which would be controlled by the Premier — like a castrated bull being required to make calves.
Zwane is research co-ordinator of the National Association of Democratic Lawyers and provincial co-ordinator of the Community Policing Network
Constitution gets too little press
THE recent 10th birthday celebration of the Mail & Guardian led me to reflect on the contrast in constitutional circumstances between 1985 and now. We are justifiably proud of the progress towards a democratic order; and the role of civil society, including parts of the media, in achieving this ought not to be underestimated. Yet media reaction to certain recent events gives rise to concern that hard-won gains may be slipping away.
No democratic order based on the supremacy of a constitution can thrive without governmental institutions whose task it is to give life to the idealistic promises of basic rights and government through the law. It is obvious that words on paper mean nothing without human action to interpret and enforce them. In South Africa, such institutions are the Constitutional Court, the Public Protector, various commissions, and so on. Critical and independent media ought to be monitoring all such bodies, because, without intelligent coverage of their valuable work, they may not deliver to their full potential. In addition, such scrutiny leads to better-informed public debate, which ultimately strengthens the legitimacy and therefore capacity of the institutions to entrench fundamental rights throughout society.
Herein lies the problem. Take the recent spate of judgments by the Constitutional Court, including its decision that the Bill of Rights outlaws the death penalty. To my knowledge, only one newspaper attempted to summarise the very important process of reasoning used by the 11 judges. The rest of the English-language media in South Africa merely commented editorially and then indulged in reflecting fatuous reactionary sound-bites from an uninformed and fearful “public”.
The outcome of the woefully inadequate media treatment of this decision is typified by a letter to a newspaper bemoaning the fact that, after three months of hearing evidence and argument, the Constitutional Court took one minute 45 seconds to give judgment!
A second area related to constitutional implementation in which media coverage has been appalling is the process of appointing the Public Protector and the members of the Human Rights Commission (HRC). These bodies have pivotal roles in the investigation and eradication of bureaucratic unfairness and corruption and the abuse of human rights, and are in many ways more important than the Constitutional Court in realising basic rights for all. Yet I would guess that 99 percent of newspaper- reading South Africans have never heard about the appointment of their members or their responsibilities. Media attention might have shortened the inexcusable delay in the process. The original Constitution provided that appointments to both bodies had to be made within 60 days of the first sitting of the Senate, subsequently amended to “as soon as possible”. In the event, the HRC was appointed after 11 months, and the Public Protector only last week.
Media attention might also have prevented the situation where each party represented in Parliament seems to have had the “right” to appoint one of its supporters to the HRC, despite little apparent knowledge of, or commitment to, the cause of human rights. Even now, media attention could force some transparency on why the HRC, whose 11 members were approved by Parliament at least three months ago, has not yet started operations. Must we believe rumours of squabbles about salaries and conditions of service? Selby Baqwa received some attention after his appointment as Public Protector, but who were the candidates short-listed for that office and how was each qualified to be the watchdog of the public service? How long must we wait for the establishment of the Commission on Gender Equality?
The cause of human rights protection demands better journalism in South Africa. The media need to take the Constitution seriously. — Hugh Corder, Professor of Public Law, University of Cape Town
Mofokeng’s plan is not gerrymandering
MARK SWILLING’S article (M&G June 30 to July 6) seeks to undermine Gauteng MEC for local government and housing Dan Mofokeng’s four Metropolitan Sub Structure (MSS) boundaries for the Greater Johannesburg Metropolitan Area on the basis of serious distortions of the truth.
Swilling claims that the current seven MSS boundaries were the result of four years of negotiations at the Metropolitan Chamber. This misrepresentation conceals the fact that there was no agreement on MSS boundaries through negotiation, but that the current boundaries are the result of arbitration. The provincial demarcation board acknowledges that “the award is considered to be seriously flawed”. It not only grants residents of the central business district (CBD) MSS indirect representation, but it is also considered to be contrary to the Local Government Transition Act (LGTA). It would, in the view of the demarcation board, perpetuate an undemocratic interim period of local
The demarcation board’s four-substructure model, almost identical to Mofokeng’s proposal, allows more efficient administration, better financial redistribution, consolidation of local authority assets, improved enfranchisement of CBD residents and ethnic integration. Its only disadvantage lies in the perception, in some quarters, that it will cause capital flight from the CBD through linking it to the undeveloped south.
Swilling claims that smaller MSSs will allow for greater grassroots participation in local government. This function can be far more effectively addressed through community development forums and local development forums, at the level of neighbourhoods or wards, where consultation with communities can be embedded in local government structures.
Local government administrations, on the other hand, have to do with efficient, effective service delivery. Here a balance has to be struck between economies of scale for delivery and efficient bureaucratic structures. In addition, in the current period, redeployment of assets and administrative capacity has to be undertaken across the metro to redress current imbalances. Here the four-MSS model is far more rational and workable than the seven-MSS one.
Swilling fails to acknowledge that agreement has been reached on the distribution of all powers and functions between TMC and MSSs except for town planning functions, the co- ordination of which is legislated to remain at a TMC level in terms of the LGTA.
It must be noted that “the leaders of the rent boycotts of the 1980s, who now hold the reins of power in local government”, quoted in Swilling’s article, have given their full support to the four- MSS model. This is not because they support “political gerrymandering”, but because they see it as most able to fulfill the goals of an integrated urban economy, efficient administrative structures, financial integration and redistribution of resources. — Lindsay Bremner, Executive Committee Member, Greater Johannesburg Transitional Metropolitan
* MARK Swilling is right when he says that strong MSSs are not compatible with a strong redistributive TMC. But he is wrong when he says that the seven-MSS model provided a framework for a strong metropolitan government. The seven-MSSs do not have “relatively minor powers” as he purports; they are pretty powerful. The only thing restraining the exercise of these powers is that they are initially held by the TMC.
Ultimately, the TMC will be left only with the minimum list of powers and functions prescribed by Schedule 2 of the Local Government Transitional Act of 1994.
There is no problem with the drawing down of powers, the problem is that these powers go with resources. And this takes us to the question of the tax base. There is no metropolitan tax base; what we have are pockets of MSS-based tax bases.
Why do we need four MSSs? There are four centres of administration and service delivery in Greater Johannesburg: old Johannesburg, Sandton, Randburg and Roodepoort. The MSSs need to be structured so they can benefit from existing capacities. The capacity does not exist in places such as Soweto and Alex. We can either use what is already here, or we can start from scratch. For the latter, Johannesburg does not have money.
One way of achieving a unified tax-base within the context of the four-MSS model, is the separation of domestic from non-domestic rates and taxes, with the domestic accruing to the MSSs and the non-domestic going to the TMC. In this way, everyone has a stake in the Metropolitan Council. — Sibusiso Buthelezi, ANC Negotiator and Member of the TMC