At the beginning of the year, on national television’s Special Assignment, we saw Truman Prince, the Karoo’s most senior local civil servant, asking a girl walking on the roadside to “Show me your tongue”.
A few weeks later he was arrested on charges of riotous behaviour and assault and was charged with defamation for swearing at three fast-food stop workers using the Cape lingo for women’s genitalia. Later it turned out that this former teacher had fathered a child with one of his 16-year-old pupils.
The African National Congress suspended him at the end of February, but Prince is still in office and being paid from the public purse. How did such a travesty occur? On April Fools Day the council (which had initially suspended him) reinstated him by reaching a “plea bargain” that consisted of a final written warning. There is no precedent or legal basis for this as plea bargains are the domain of the court system alone.
But this man, dubbed the Prince of Pigs by Western Cape tabloids exemplifies the B-class of politicians who ride the wave of populism in small towns.
In 1996 the ANC, desperate to remove the New National Party from control in Beaufort West, cut a deal with Prince, who brought his civic organisation into the party and was made mayor.
In turn, he treated the fruits of delivery as his personal political pocket; the town as his fiefdom. Beaufort West is the centre of regional government and it has received a lot of central government attention as one of President Thabo Mbeki’s targeted rural development nodes. On a visit to the town last year I witnessed Prince’s mode of operation. His TT cruiser stood out among the dorpie’s bakkies and skorokoros. If you wanted a job, you went to his office, and he put supporters to work on state projects like a recycling plant.
That’s why, in the face of overwhelming evidence against him, he remained in office. Civil society, the protestations of the South African Local Government Association and an attempt by provincial minister for local government Marius Fransman to suspend him, have failed to dislodge the Prince as institutional process has proved weaker than popular approval.
Last week, the ANC provincial headquarters in Cape Town summoned the representatives of the Karoo Council to appear before it in a clear attempt to enforce discipline. Among the delegates was David Maans, Prince’s spokesperson, confidant and defence, who a week earlier had helped organise a 400-strong march to support him. The banners proclaiming loyalty to Prince, who maintains he’s a victim of circumstances were reminiscent for me of the thousands who marched to support the druglord Colin Stansfied in Cape Town in 2001. He was long lauded as a Robin Hood.
For years Prince has positioned himself at the centre of political and social life, first as Beaufort West’s mayor and then as its municipal manager.
This week Prince was re-elected southern Cape representative to the national executive of the South African Football Association.
He has risen to greater public recognition than the dorpie’s previous best-known son, heart surgeon Chris Barnard.
His ANC disciplinary hearing was again postponed on Wednesday. Will Friday’s council meeting turn his D-Day into yet another Dodge Day?