We evaluate the peformances of South Africa’s ministers over the past year
Keeping score: What the marks mean A –Brilliant. On top of the job, innovative, delivering. Vote yourself a salary increase. B — Very good. Could do better. C — Average. Needs quite a lot of brushing up. D — Mediocre. Not up to scratch. E — Lousy. One last chance or you’re fired. F — Pathetic, a fail. An appointment as ambassador to Vanuarta or Burkina Faso should be announced shortly.
Name: Nelson Mandela
Title: President
Grade: B
Has spent much time this year preparing the country and the world for his successor, Thabo Mbeki. In marked contrast to neighbouring heads of state such as Namibia’s Sam Nujoma and Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe, Mandela shows no determination to hang on to the reins of power, and appears genuinely to relish his impending retirement in the company of Gra=E7a Machel and his grandchildren. He retains an admirable commitment to nation-building, reconciliation and political stability, going out of his way, for instance, to assuage the fears of white farmers. His belief in jaw jaw rather than war war led him to give the finger to the world’s only remaining superpower and visit Libya. His status as a statesman of international repute has been slightly tarnished by his tendency to shoot from the hip. However, his intemperate attacks on the political opposition and the media and undemocratic slightly paranoid utterances, most notably in his five-hour speech to the African National Congress conference, have lowered his overall rating.
Prognosis: A well-earned retirement and not a moment too soon.
Name: Thabo Mbeki
Title: Deputy President
Grade: B
As strategic and canny as he is behind the scenes, Mbeki has not yet emerged as a people’s politician. He remains fairly aloof, surrounded by a close circle of officials, ministers, businessmen and old-time comrades. He gets full marks for his grasp of politics inside the ANC, though the country as a whole would like to get to know him better. He has championed a new brand of Africanism which has won favour with a section of the black intelligentsia. For many whites, his earlier, more cuddly image as a pipe-smoking pragmatist has been replaced by an altogether tougher, slightly scary figure. Chances are that both are caricatures and that the real Thabo Mbeki will start to emerge in the year ahead. As the de facto head of government, Mbeki must bear some of the blame for its failure to deliver transformation on the ground. Through some masterful stage-management, however, he emerged from the ANC conference stronger and with the party united behind him –for now, anyway.
Prognosis: He will need all that unity in the tough year ahead, with an election coming up, the Growth, Employment and Redistribution (Gear) programme still failing to make the grade, impatience for delivery on the ground and some of his least favourite people voted into prominent positions on the ANC’s national executive committee (NEC).
Name: Kader Asmal
Title: Minister of Water Affairs and Forestry
Grade: B
Asmal continues to generate favourable publicity from what has traditionally been regarded as a lowly portfolio. His work in water affairs and conservation has been excellent. He works hard to get water to the rural poor and to preserve indigenous vegetation, and has introduced dramatic new water-saving legislation. In recognition of being one minister who really has delivered, he shot up in the ANC’s popularity stakes and finished second on the NEC list. He would have got an A but for his handling of the committee regulating arms sales, the National Conventional Arms Control Committee, which has not practised the promised transparency and has been tarnished by a number of questionable arms deals.
Prognosis: No one would dispute that he’s worth a new ministry in the new year. Foreign affairs? Justice? Just don’t give him defence.
Name: Sibusiso Bengu
Title: Minister of Education
Grade: F
It was a disastrous year for education, an area desperately in need of vision and urgent rescue. The offer of voluntary severance packages had to be halted when it proved an expensive exercise in shedding some of the best teachers, few of whom opted to relocate. The budgets of tertiary institutions were slashed and Bengu lost to Grove Primary in the Cape High Court over his insistence that schools only take teachers from a central list available for redeployment. The introduction of Curriculum 2005 was hampered by the fact that the provinces don’t have the cash. Meanwhile, many black schools in the townships and rural areas are overcrowded and barely functioning, levels of teacher commitment are at an all-time low and millions of pupils will not even have school textbooks next year.
Prognosis: Ambassador to Albania has the right ring. It’s time to start a “Draft Mamphela Ramphele” campaign.
Name: Mangosuthu Buthelezi
Title: Minister of Home Affairs
Grade: C
Gets kudos for his willingness to support innovative policies on immigration and refugees but then leaves these to civil servants, mostly of the old order, to implement. His Green Paper on migration has been stalled by senior civil servants who are reverting to old habits. Things don’t look good: refugees have uncertain status in the country, illegal immigrants are flooding the borders, and Buthelezi does little to counter xenophobia, which is expressed in attacks on street hawkers. He still has too much of a mind on his provincial domain of KwaZulu-Natal and the increasingly fractious Inkatha Freedom Party.
Prognosis: Much of the year will be spent playing footsie-footsie with the ANC over a merger and issuing contradictory statements before he accepts the post of deputy president after the 1999 elections.
Name: Alec Erwin
Title: Minister of Trade and Industry
Grade: B
The biggest criticism levelled at this quiet and industrious former trade unionist is his inability or unwillingness to delegate — his workload is too heavy. Which means we still haven’t sorted out the European Union, or settled on a new competition policy. But as Erwin would say, it’s about quality, not quantity. The Maputo corridor initiative has taken off and the Wild Coast is not far behind. More must be done, however, to encourage foreign investment and the export industry.
Prognosis: An A next year if he gets industrial policy right.
Name: Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi
Title: Minister of Social Welfare
Grade: B
She is good on policy, but slow on delivery. Her big battle during 1997 has been to deliver a new child grant scheme to poor mothers and care givers. She mismanaged the public relations of the scheme and it has been delayed by the resulting political fall-out. Fraser-Moleketi has however repaired rifts with the NGO community, taken time to answer criticism of her department’s work, spearheaded projects to set up centres for juvenile prisoners and done her best to clear out corruption in welfare. One black mark was her clash with her director-general, Leila Patel, which led to Patel resigning under a cloud.
Prognosis: She’s a fast learner who’s headed for bigger things.
Name: Derek Hanekom
Title: Minister of=20Land and Agriculture
Grade: B
Hanekom has had to walk a tightrope between the landless abyss on his left and the volcanic mountain of landed interests on his right. Land reform did, however, begin to take off this year with the restitution of nearly 150 000ha removed under apartheid land laws and the improvement of tenure rights for millions of rural farmworkers. For all that these figures represent a long-awaited dent in the unequal economic relations between rural landowners and landless people, they are just that — a dent.
Prognosis: An A if he can speed up land restitution and continue to balance the interests of the people who fall under this portfolio.
Name: Pallo Jordan
Title: Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism
Grade: B
He shot up in the ratings when he saved the Brento Blue butterfly from extinction, dropped back again when it was revealed that he was allowing the export of baboons and monkeys to a suspect French outfit for scientific experiments, but again redeemed himself with an innovative tourism plan that would save St Lucia once and for all from dune mining. His biggest fault is his too-low profile for a tourism minister, thrown into sharper relief by the obvious enthusiasm that his deputy, Peter Mokaba, shows for the portfolio (and for Jordan’s job). After an apparent walk in the political wilderness, Jordan experienced a comeback towards the end of the year with several key papers for the ANC conference on non-racialism and the economy. His support in the party was illustrated by the fact that he finished third in the NEC elections.
Prognosis: A lot more will be heard of this brilliant if not very PR-conscious minister in the new year. The left needs a theorist of this calibre.
Name: Penuel Maduna
Title: Minister of Minerals and Energy
Grade: F
No significant policy achievements this year. He has made no progress with the deregulation of the fuel industry — his main policy challenge. Instead, he has almost entirely preoccupied himself with a probe into the books of the state’s oil trading company, the Strategic Fuel Fund. He blew up at the auditor general, making wild and unsubstantiated claims. He has shown himself to be impetuous and lacking in judgment — witness his refusal to condemn publicly his one-time associate, Emanuel Shaw II.
Prognosis: Ambassadorship to Monrovia would be appropriate.
Name: Mac Maharaj
Title: Minister of Transport
Grade: A
Maharaj presides over what is arguably the most efficient government department in the country, which is headed up by the exceedingly competent Ketso Gordhan. Maharaj has tackled all his pressing poliicy challenges with vigour and imagination. One of his most notable achievements has been the Maputo Corridor development project, which was his and Gordhan’s brainchild. One of his only setbacks has been his attempt to revamp the third party state accident insurance system which brought him into conflict with the legal profession. He has apparently succeeded in bringing down levels of violence in the taxi industry. But he has had less success in bringing down road deaths, though he has put the issue on the government’s agenda.
Prognosis: As one of the most successful ministers, he needs to be given one of the really tough portfolios to handle — Housing, Safety and Security or Education.
Name: Trevor Manuel
Title: Minister of Finance
Grade: A
The best-laid plans of finance ministers often come to nought and this year has been no exception. Gear — the government’s growth, employment and redistribution programme — is in serious danger of unravelling: growth, employment and Budget deficit targets are unlikely to be met this year or next. But it’s not his fault — finance ministers have no control over the vagaries of the world’s financial markets or the weather. On the plus side, he did well in gaining mastery over a difficult portfolio and establishing personal credibility. His first Budget was well received, as were the first, tentative steps towards full relaxation of exchange controls. His department has been innovative, moving rapidly towards long-term budget planning. And he has learnt to be diplomatic: no more faux pas along the lines of calling the markets “amorphous” — which is one thing they have proven themselves not to be in 1997. Indeed, South Africa survived the fall-out fairly unscathed. The investment community believes Manuel is on the right track.
Prognosis: He’s going to be pressed to the limit, with markets in turmoil, the economy failing to grow to expectations, el Ni=F1o, and pressing demands to meet socio-economic needs.
Name: Tito Mboweni
Title: Minister of Labour
Grade: B
He scores well for productivity, but his overall performance has been mixed. He rushed through the Basic Conditions of Employment Bill without agreement from the social partners — and then announced that sufficient consensus had been reached. And while the legislation is indeed progressive, it will not contribute to job creation. He has managed to please nobody fully; indeed, the social partnership has been severely compromised. The Nedlac process is still on track, despite fierce criticism from his department.
Prognosis: Jobs will be on Mboweni’s mind — first, the jobs summit, and then a new job for him, in the private sector, which would be a loss to government.
Name: Joe Modise
Title: Minister of Defence
Grade: D
A very nice guy who doesn’t like to work too hard. He headed up a defence review, through which a leaner, meaner South African National Defence Force is being designed. Yet, because of massive budget cuts, very little could be implemented. Instead, the air force has had to stop flying, the army to cease training and soldiers waiting to be demobilised and reintegrated into =0Bsociety do nothing but wait. He tends to defend arms industry interests aggressively but even in this field his efforts have borne little fruit. While South African small arms, which hardly boost the national coffers, keep finding their way to the slaughterhouses of Africa, the much-vaunted R7-billion deal with Saudi Arabia remains little more than a desert mirage. He was outshone by his deputy, Ronnie Kasrils, who has taken on the workload of a minister with enthusiasm and without the status.
Prognosis: Give Kasrils the job.
Name: Valli Moosa
Title: Minister of Constitutional Development and Provincial Affairs
Grade: B
Would score an A for accessibility, coolth, spotless suits and the most neatly brushed hair in the Cabinet. As the Cabinet swot, he has beavered away at the unsexy task of restructuring local government, has placated traditional leaders anxious to have their concerns listened to, and has developed the mechanics of the relationship between the national and provincial governments. The ANC leadership was almost faced with a rebellion over a border dispute in Bushbuckridge but Moosa guided the situation out of harm’s way.
Prognosis: He faces a tough year dealing with the local government debt crisis which, along with municipal delivery, is still a long way from resolution or improvement.
Name: Sankie Mthembi-Mahanyele
Title: Minister of Housing
Grade: F
Her handling of the Motheo saga — in which one of her best friends was illegally awarded a R198-million housing contract — and the sacking of Billy Cobbett as director-general should have resulted in her departure from public office. Apart from a scattering of showcase projects, she has had little impact on the notoriously poor delivery of South Africa’s mass housing programme.
Prognosis: How does honorary consul in New Orleans sound?
Name: Lionel Mtshali
Title: Minister of Arts and Culture, Science and Technology
Grade: D
He has not developed his public profile much since he took over, but despite his headmasterly style, the new department appears to be making progress. He has left science and technology well alone, which is probably all for the best.
Prognosis: Don’t expect fireworks.
Name: Sidney Mufamadi
Title: Minister of Safety and Security
Grade: E
What can one say when crime remains rampant and the public are baying for a return of the death penalty? After three and a half years of trying, no amount of fiddling the figures can disguise the fact that he has failed. The appointment of Meyer Kahn as CEO of the South African Police Service has not improved the efficiency or effectiveness of the police and must be seen as a ploy to appease the business sector.
Prognosis: This department needs a tough, efficient minister. Mac Maharaj?
Name: Sipo Mzimela
Title: Minister of Correctional Services
Grade: E
If Mufamadi is too soft on crime, Mzimela is too hard on criminals. He has been accused of having little regard for the Constitution or accountability. Mzimela has plans to use abandoned mine shafts, ships and Johannesburg CBD skyscrapers as prisons. The dreaded C-Max top security prison offended human rights activists and was kept secret until a week before it became operational. It still didn’t stop dangerous prisoners from leaking out of jail.
Prognosis: If the IFP and ANC don’t get married, bridesmaid Mzimela will need a new job.
Name: Jay Naidoo
Title: Minister of Posts, Telecommunications and Broadcasting
Grade: C
He gains points for his sheer workload, incorporating two tough portfolios. Naidoo’s big issue this year has been setting a formula for commercialisation of government. His privatisation of Telkom appears to have gone smoothly, but though he has prodded the SABC back into commercial viability, he seems to have forgotten about the concept of a public broadcaster.
Prognosis: Should have an easier year, but could face a showdown with the Independent Broadcasting Authority over the independence of watchdogs.
Name: Alfred Nzo
Title: Minister of Foreign Affairs
Grade: C
Poor Nzo has never been able to catch up with the jet-setting Mandela, Mbeki and his deputy Aziz Pahad. However, he is competent and friendly in public, and his department has started to fill in the gaps in policy, adopting the worthy goal of international conflict resolution as a key policy plank. He has also strengthened South Africa’s position at the United Nations, raising the chances of a permanent seat in the security council. And he played a key role in banning landmines and fighting chemical warfare. For that alone, he can’t be all bad.
Prognosis: Unlikely that Mbeki will keep him much longer. His poor showing in the NEC elections means few will mind if he goes.
Name: Dullah Omar
Title: Minister of Justice
Grade: C
Omar has struggled to revive the grossly inefficient criminal justice system, which has suffered a haemorrhaging of experienced staff. His limited budget is nowhere near sufficient to keep his best prosecutors and state attorneys from quitting for the far more lucrative private sector. He has introduced tighter bail laws to counter the blistering crime rate, but it is moot whether these new laws will make any difference. At times his judgment appears impaired, as in his support for Allan Boesak and Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, and his inexplicable hardline on scrapping archaic anti-gay legislation. Omar is one of the most press-friendly ministers, unfailingly returning phone calls and dealing with questions in a courteous manner.
Prognosis: His balls are on the line over the ANC’s challenge for power in the Western Cape. If he pulls it off and manages to make inroads in improving the criminal justice system, he will be worth an A.
Name: Jeff Radebe
Title: Minister of Public Works
Grade: B
One could be forgiven for asking “Jeff who?” — so low is his profile. The same goes for his department. Just what is it that they do? If you always wanted to know but were afraid to ask: Public Works is a cornerstone of the government’s job-creation policy. And Radebe is trying. He released a Green Paper last month on the construction industry, which is seen as a key player in empowering small black business and boosting employment through the promotion of labour-intensive building methods. He can also claim a measure of success in persuading government ministries to award tenders on their job-creating ability.
Prognosis: Will have a much higher profile year at the jobs summit.
Name: Stella Sigcau
Title: Minister of State Enterprise
Grade: F
The minister in charge of fast-tracking the privatisation programme has failed miserably. Sigcau lacks a plan — and it shows. Her popularity is low: she was the only ANC minister not to win a seat on the NEC. The only advantage of her job is that it has its own built-in obsolescence.
Prognosis: No future in politics.
Name: Zola Skweyiya
Title: Minister of Public Service and Administration
Grade: C
Skweyiya earns praise for being forthright about a number of difficult public sector issues, particularly the honesty with which he revealed the disastrous state of provincial public services in his Ncholo reports. Also on the plus side, he introduced a code of conduct for public servants. He has struggled to cut the public service but his voluntary retrenchment packages were a disaster.
Prognosis: He is still struggling with his portfolios. Would be a mistake to promote him.
Name: Steve Tshwete
Title: Minister of Sport and Recreation
Grade: E
Do we really need a minister of sport? Tshwete has done little to distinguish himself this year, save for backing Cape Town’s failed Olympics bid and coming off second-best against rugby supremo Louis Luyt. His role as the ANC leadership’s hit man against Winnie Madikizela-Mandela further alienated the rank and file and he was thrashed by Patrick Terror Lekota in the race for national chair of the ANC.
Prognosis: Expect him to be in the pound seats for the World Cup soccer in France, but not for much else.
Name: Nkosazana Zuma
Title: Minister of Health
Grade: D
Cabinet’s apparent collaboration in the development of the Virodene drug and the circumvention of the drug control system were foolish. Zuma was implicated in the cover-up of the circumstances surrounding the deaths of four patients in the care of a Cuban anaesthetist. Squeezed for cash, hospitals throughout the country are closing or cutting back. She clashed with the pharmaceutical industry over the parallel importation of drugs. Her compulsory community service plan for medical graduates was also unpopular. While she displayed an admirable ability to stand up to big industry players, both measures were exacerbated by her failure to consult. Despite having the most mouth-friendly foot in politics, her basic policy framework remains progressive — cheaper medicine, support for primary health care, and campaigning for safe sex and against tobacco.
Prognosis: The remade Zuma and her department could turn the corner in the new year.
Compiled by the staff of the M&G. Wilmot James of Idasa played a consultative role