There is often a sneering quality to the coverage and analysis of black economic empowerment (BEE), which threatens to debase a necessary transfer of wealth. It can lock critics and proponents into racialised corners, making it difficult to sort the empowerment wheat from the enrichment chaff.
BEE is spoken of in a language of limitation and of failure, instead of potential and success. The currency of this debate has quickly become that of ”usual suspects”; ”waBenzi” and ”elite”.
It is particularly galling because the commentators are usually privileged (white) people who live in leafy suburbs and who choose not to drive Mercs: in other words, elites themselves but with different motoring habits and of liberal and left politics.
Even if their modes of transport are beat up Jettas and their dress of choice scruffy Levi’s (or Fairtrade denims), they have had the benefits of inter-generational wealth transfer and the comfort of bequests and annuities that allow for good education for their children and ensure comfortable golden years.
This inter-generational wealth and dignity is so taken for granted that many of these commentators are blinded to the fact that for many of the compatriots they so label, the goals are just the same; I am, for example, the first generation in my family to have a retirement annuity. For many of my cousins and I, we are the first generation (most of us beneficiaries of employment equity) who will bequeath to our children.
Yet none of these realities is reflected in the dominant discourse around BEE: that it is necessary and is lifting many millions (and not just a handful) up by the boot straps. This is because most middle-class black people also give substantially to extended families.
I once asked the Congress of South African Trade Unions general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi, himself now middle-class, how many people he supported. We stopped when he tallied about nine in his immediate support network.
Of course, like all rapid wealth creation, and especially that which is so aggressively state-assisted, BEE is swashbuckling with all the elements of frontier capitalism.
It is replete with quick fortunes, backbiting, shady characters and eyebrow-raising business habits, many of which we cover in the Mail & Guardian. It is a capitalist process, after all.
Established business in South Africa has always had such eyebrow-raising habits: cartels are commonplace; corporate governance is new and not terribly well entrenched; there are few links between performance and pay and, until the era of unbundling, the usual suspects owned everything. Apart from a few laudable exceptions, the coverage of these practices by analysts and journalists was nowhere near as robust as that of BEE.
Double standards?
It certainly looks that way.
Without wealth transfer and the creation of a sizeable (about five million) black middle-class, South Africa will never have enough to redistribute to the very poor, whose ranks have grown.
Yet to label and malign the whole process, does not allow for a textured and nuanced debate the era requires. Of course, the accumulation of connection as symbolised by the former director general of communications, Andile Ngcaba, whose stake in Telkom earned him more than R800-million is ripe for criticism.
He bought a stake from the Thintana consortium, a Malaysian-American joint venture, to which he had initially sold a stake in Telkom as the director general of communications. Ngcaba has gone on to erect an empire of IT interests; he is there in every big deal.
It is influence-peddling, while the story of Oilgate is one of cronyist practice that saw an African National Congress-aligned company win lucrative state contracts, the profits of which it then funnelled back to the ruling party’s coffers.
These are areas of BEE ripe for investigation and which deserve citizen censure. This makes Ngcaba a ”usual suspect”, but not every black businessman is.
If, for example, the entrepreneur KK Combi proves himself adept at running his forex business and then wins the South African Revenue Service contract to do VAT refunds at airports, he is not a ”usual suspect”, but a businessman expanding his company.
And what of Gloria Serobe who has been this year’s über-dealmaker? Her Wiphold has been at the forefront of this year’s big deals: Telkom, Old Mutual and several others. She is wily and persuasive, but more importantly, Wiphold has an audited base of 300 000 members, all of whom have already benefited from the deals.
Even with her penchant for good champagne and better cars, is Serobe a ”usual suspect” or a ”waBenzi”? I would argue not.
The term was coined less as a comment on the car, more as a critique of the lack of social concern for the welfare of subjects by post-colonial Africa’s big men who happened to favour the sedan.
Women like Cheryl Carolus, part of the De Beers BEE consortium announced a fortnight ago, and Lulu Gwagwa of Lereko Holdings (with stakes in Imperial and Sun International) are also criticised for the ”political influence” they allegedly wield. But is it always fair?
Both were prominent in the anti-apartheid struggle but both left active politics at least two years ago.
They are not beneficiaries of the revolving door and, with the struggle now over, it is of little surprise that businesses are beating a path to the door of these smart and strategic thinkers. Where there is a potential for influence-peddling it is with paid state officials and party office-bearers moonlighting as business people. As BEE gains speed it is vitally important that commentators target the problems instead of tarring all its players with the same insulting brush.