Marion Edmunds
MORE heads than one will roll in the Eastern Cape, according to sources close to President Nelson Mandela. Premier Raymond Mhlaba has already been told that he is to be dismissed and once he steps down his cabinet and his two key civil servants – the director general of the Eastern Cape administration, Dr Thozamile Botha, and cabinet secretary Zam Titus – are also expected to go.
The clean sweep will be in line with recommendations in a top-secret report on the Eastern Cape presented to Mandela and Deputy President Thabo Mbeki last week, in which they were advised that the administrative disaster besetting the province cannot be fixed until the political leadership is overhauled.
While the report does not identify personalities, its meaning is clear and it is ushering in one of the most painful chapters of African National Congress government – for the first time the party blames itself for weak leadership and poor management and is taking action against personalities it holds dear.
Mandela is said to have broken the news to ”Oom Ray” last Friday. The instructions are testing the friendship which dates back to their imprisonment together on Robben Island, particularly given the fact that Mhlaba is reluctant to go and that in his time he contributed enormously to the ANC’s struggle against apartheid. It is said that Mbeki has been influential in his axing.
It is not known if Botha or Titus have been officially informed of their fate. But since the public service director general, Dr Paseko Ncholo, took his crack team to Bisho to examine the problems, as reported by the Mail & Guardian two weeks ago, the writing has been on the walls.
As with Mhlaba, Botha and Titus made critical contributions to the struggle against apartheid and to the first round of constitutional negotiations. Botha led the ANC through local government negotiations and Titus played a key role in the multi- party talks in Kempton Park as a legal drafter and representative of the ANC- supporting Transkei government. The ANC has much to thank them for and will probably find new jobs for them.
Initial transparency about the report has, according to public service sources, been replaced by instructions that it not be given to anybody while the ”Cabinet at central government decides what the hell it can do about the problems in the Eastern Cape”.
Mandela’s representative, Parks Mankahlana, has denied that the Cabinet discussed the Eastern Cape report this week, but senior officials have already confirmed that the ANC’s treasurer general and chief whip, the Reverend Arnold Stofile, will be replacing Mhlaba. It is expected that Stofile will choose a new cabinet early next year.
Mhlaba’s authority is said to have slipped to such an extent that his cabinet ministers do not report back to him. MECs complain that they cannot control public servants, particularly those employed since 1994 as political appointments.
Ncholo’s report also suggests curing problems by restructuring the Eastern Cape administration. It describes new organograms for the premier’s and director general’s offices. Possible changes include the linking of finances to projects, proper budgeting, setting goals for departments and training civil servants to do their jobs.
Head of the University of the Witwatersrand School of Public Administration, Mark Swilling, said that one of the province’s main problems was that ”it is a morass of competing policies and with a totally weak premier”.
Swilling said the pity was that the civil servants from the chief director level down were by far the most capable group of civil servants in the country, but their natural skills were being wasted by poor political management.
However, former ANC MP and Transkei’s last military dictator, Bantu Holomisa, defended Mhlaba this week, saying that it was unfair to turf him out before his five years were up.
ANC MPs in central government fear that the political overhaul in the Eastern Cape will provide rich pickings for the dissident Holomisa.
Holomisa put such fears temporarily to rest this week, saying: ”I’m through with homeland and regional politics.”
He warned, however, that the Eastern Cape would be a ”political nightmare” for the next five to 10 years unless the ANC acted fast.
”The problem is not Mhlaba, but a lack of policy from central government and a lack of advice as to how provinces should operate,” he said.
Sources say that the Eastern Cape Provincial Service Commission appealed for help early last year but was rejected by the National Public Service Commission.
Meanwhile, Ncholo is setting off for a similar inquiry into the Northern Province administration. He refused to discuss the report, saying only: ”The Eastern Cape has opened our eyes …”