integrity and courage in the political debate
`If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken/Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools.” – From If by Rudyard Kipling.
I am reminded of these words by that archetypal Victorian, Rudyard Kipling, when confronted with the criticism centred on Tony Leon and the Democratic Party. They are equally applicable to the carefully calibrated spin of the ANC apparatchiks in the SABC and to the ad hominem denigration and distortions often emanating from supposedly impartial commentators on our political scene in the media.
So, that’s the nature of politics? The paraphrased advice recently proffered me by the editor of this newspaper is: “If [the DP] can’t stand the heat it should stay out of the kitchen.”
Fair enough, but South Africa desperately needs more light and a lot less heat. We need the clarity, integrity and courage that the DP brings to the political debate. They are right on the need to curb crime with a properly funded, effective police force operating in a legal and political climate which does not confuse the rights of victims with the rights of criminals.
They are right when they couple this to a vigorous economic policy of job creation, which removes the spur (and excuse) of personal survival as a cause of crime. They are right when they see the necessity of an expanding economy as having higher priority than the needs of the already employed, which is not to say that these don’t deserve attention. They are right in opposing the discriminatory policies pursued under the flag of transformation. Their perception that this slogan is divisive and reintroduces racial discrimination into politics, that it provides cover for the corrupt or incompetent, that its long-term effects are destructive of our potential and corrosive to political discourse, are spot on.
They are correct in advancing the fundamental ideas of personal freedom and accountability and free-market principles, mitigated by considerations of social solidarity and the reality of our oppressive history.
They are right when they place delivery at the front of the queue and in asking why many ministers and other government appointees do not have to answer for the mess they have made of their portfolios. And they are damn right when they warn against the authoritarian element surfacing within the ANC and the need to deny them the buffer of a two-thirds majority.
There is no need to demonise the ANC. It occupies a unique place in our political history, it stands for many social programmes which one can wholeheartedly endorse and has some highly capable, ethical and committed members. At the same time this country will not survive, never mind prosper, on the platform of good intentions and appeals to sycophantic sentiment.
It is an extraordinary feature of our political scene that the manifest failure of the ANC to deliver in such key sectors as job creation and crime prevention, the corruption and incompetence pervading its structures and its reluctance to live up to its rhetoric in dealing with this issue, its infiltration of such nominally independent bodies as the SABC , and the manipulative, sectarian and authoritarian components of its political behaviour, are brushed aside by many “progressive” commentators, whereas its ideological rhetoric is grasped as a substitute for reality.
Given our history, it is an amazing failure of nerve or judgment that these selfsame commentators do not recognise the need to deny any party in this country, certainly not excluding the ANC, the undue power which goes with a two-thirds majority. Or, notably in the African context, the vital importance of a principled and powerful opposition – irrespective of the party in power (opposition parties, please note).
It is pertinent to ask why even respected ANC members should stoop to the kind of unrestrained vilification of the DP displayed in the course of parliamentary debate. I suspect that it represents real ANC fear that the policies of the DP, its history of opposition to apartheid and its generally principled, rational and pragmatic stance will appeal strongly to voters, perhaps specially black voters, who wish to see political liberation translated into a successful, modern, democratic state. Perhaps that’s the “kitchen” Van Niekerk refers to. We don’t need it and can’t afford it. The only bulwark against the catastrophic triumph of such political trends is clarity and courage amongst the voting public and the media. South Africa deserves that. – Dr G Michael B Berger, Cape Town
The bad treatment received – especially by Mathews Phosa – from the ANC is certain to cost the ANC votes, including mine. Phosa may be no saint, but he has selflessly served the ANC.
I find it hard to understand how a principled organisation like the ANC can embrace and accommodate unprincipled opportunists like Dr Mbulawa (formerly DP) and David Chuenyane, Patrick Mckenzie, Mario Masher and John Gogotya (all previously NNP). All these careerists are being elevated at the expense of ANC stalwarts like Phosa, Cyril Ramaphosa and Tokyo Sexwale, who have all been forced out of the ANC for daring to aspire to higher office in the ANC.
Since I cannot vote for parties which continue to fight for minority rights (as if minorities are being discriminated against), my vote will certainly go to either the Pan Africanist Congress or the Azanian People’s Organisation.
The sad part is that there are other ANC comrades who’ve taken a similar resolution. Unless Thabo Mbeki is seen to stop the growing Stalinism within the ANC, our movement with its remarkable record of internal democracy will lose supporters. – Themba Zondo, Kwa-Xuma
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