Alexkor, the state’s diamond mine in the Northern Cape, has long been notorious in the local diamond industry as a haven for corruption and systematic theft.
In a bad year, up to 50% of the mine’s gems are believed to have been stolen, tucked into the waistcoats of carrier pigeons and sold off tax-free. Such wholesale pillaging could of course only have been pulled off with some complicity of mine management, the Alexkor board and its Broederbond masters in Pretoria. It is therefore unsurprising that Alexander Bay gained the reputation as a favourite destination for civil servants anxious for the sea air and a tax-free supplement to their pension.
With such a history it was a welcome development when the new government privatised the mine’s management early this year, as a precursor to a full sale.
Sadly, what should have been the start of a new era at Alexkor now shows disturbing parallels with the past. That Bridget Radebe, the wife of a Cabinet minister, should have won the tender for the mine’s management contract is worrying but not grounds for disqualification. Bridget Radebe’s husband, Jeff, was minister of public works at the time, and therefore unconnected to Alexkor.
Since June, however, Jeff Radebe, in his capacity as minister of public enterprises, has been in the driving seat. During this period, Bridget Radebe’s consortium, Nabera, has failed to fulfil its main contractual obligation to put up R120-million by July.
Jeff Radebe’s department has extended Nabera’s deadline at least twice – without the formal approval of the Alexkor board and in contravention of the contract.
Several unconvincing explanations have been put forward in defence of the lax treatment of Nabera. They include the claim that the mine is in a parlous state. If that is the case, why is there so much interest in Alexkor, and why is Nabera so keen to hang on to it?
Nabera says it has the money lined up, but that its bank wants a guarantee by the government to repay the money at the end of the two-year contract.
That is irrelevant: what matters are the contents of the contract, which does not allow for such a separate guarantee. Now that the contract has been breached, the government should follow rules of normal business conduct, return to Nabera’s rival shortlisted bidders, who have the money, or tender again.
Instead we have a situation in which a Cabinet minister is getting the taxpayer to give money to a consortium, headed by his wife, which has reneged on its contractual duties.
We can only wonder if the good minister of public enterprises has been imbibing too much sea air.
Mark of leadership
If any incident in South Africa this year has cried out for calm heads and clear thinking, it was last week’s tragedy at Tempe military base near Bloemfontein.
A young army officer, apparently distraught after the death of his father and deeply angry with some of his colleagues, shot dead seven fellow officers and military support staff, wounded another five and was then shot dead himself. The fact that the young man was black and a former anti- apartheid guerrilla, and that his victims were all whites who came from the army he would have seen as once defending apartheid, is cause enough to speculate that racial tensions played a part in the tragedy. It has also raised questions about the stability of our integrated new South African National Defence Force (SANDF).
In addition to the police probe already under way, Minister of Defence Mosiuoa Lekota and chief of the SANDF Lieutenant General Siphiwe Nyanda are setting up an army board of investigation and a ministerial inquiry into all the circumstances surrounding the incident. Lekota has given the impression of being determined to uncover the truth, however uncomfortable.
More than that, Lekota has shown himself to be precisely the calm, clear head that the situation has demanded. He responded immediately to the incident by flying to Tempe with Nyanda and there addressing first the command structure and then the troops, both still in deep shock. He told them that those who “express sentiments that deepen divisions or encourageEhostility will be cowards and disloyal to the national defence force”.
It is the kind of maturity and poise we have come to associate with Lekota.
It was recognisable even when he was a young activist in the black consciousness movement in the 1970s. And his maturity proved contagious this week. Opposition parties – with the exception, it seems, of one leader of the Pan Africanist Congress who appeared isolated even within his own organisation – recognised the gravity of the situation and held back from trying to exploit the tragedy.
BUT LEKOTA HAS SHOWN OVER THE PAST WEEK THAT HE ALSO HAS OTHER QUALITIES. THE OFF-THE-CUFF BRIEFING HE GAVE TO MEMBERS OF PARLIAMENT’S JOINT DEFENCE COMMITTEE ON TUESDAY WAS A BRILLIANT PERFORMANCE BY A MAN WHO, JUST THREE MONTHS INTO OCCUPYING ONE OF THE MOST DEMANDING PORTFOLIOS, IS ALREADY THE MASTER OF HIS BRIEF. YOU COULD HAVE HEARD A PIN DROP IN THE COMMITTEE ROOM DURING HIS ADDRESS. HE PROVIDES EVIDENCE OF A COMFORTING DEPTH OF LEADERSHIP IN PRESIDENT THABO MBEKI’S GOVERNMENT.