August 21 to 27 2009

Let them have interests

Media reports about conflicts of interest in the public sector, including the Mail & Guardian‘s stories, ‘And the job goes to …” and ‘A little business goes a long way” (August 7), have generated much heat but sadly no light.

I will not debate what I said and did not say to the M&G. But when I compared my written responses with your reporter and what was published, I could not but think of Steven Brill’s famous words: ‘When it comes to arrogance, power and lack of accountability, journalists are probably the only people on the planet who make lawyers look good.”

Your treatment of such an important story deserved better — an educational rather than sensational approach. Senior public managers are required to disclose their private interests to the Public Service Commission. Regulations are being finalised to incorporate in the disclosure framework public-sector middle managers and those involved in procurement processes. Your omission that a conflict-of-interest policy in the public sector does exist, and is largely being followed, was disingenuous.

Admittedly, there are senior public officials who have not disclosed, but calling into question the integrity of directors general or other senior public officials simply because they have private interests is unmerited, especially when such interests have been declared and have not resulted in any impropriety.

This misinformed criticism is often because the media, and some politicians, don’t distinguish between actual, perceived or potential conflicts of interest. But there is a deeper problem — the misconception that a conflict of interest is in itself wrong.

Australia’s Independent Commission against Corruption (ICAC) and the Crime and Misconduct Commission (CMC), in their guidelines on how to manage conflicts of interest in the public sector, state: ‘Conflicts of interest are not wrong in themselves — public officials are also private individuals and there will be occasions when their private interests come into conflict with their duty to put the public interest first at all times — but such conflicts must be disclosed and effectively managed.”

They continue: ‘There is nothing unusual or necessarily wrong in having a conflict of interest. How it is dealt with is the important thing.” So, even when there is an actual conflict of interest, this is not a licence for slander if the relevant individuals can demonstrate they have disclosed and are managing the conflict effectively. Putting their interests in a blind trust, resigning their directorships in the entities in which they have interests and/or abstaining from involvement in official decisions that could be compromised by their private interests are some of the measures available.

There is developing in South Africa a dangerous, perhaps even unconstitutional, storyline about public officials and conflicts of interest. It says that if you are a public servant you must not be allowed to have private interests. At a more vulgar level it suggests that if you are public servant and have private interests you are by design corrupt. I do not think South Africa’s liberal Constitution would shore up such views. Liberals (such as the M&G) have forgotten how to be liberal.

The ICAC and the CMC, again, provide some useful perspective: ‘An approach that is too strict or attempts to corral private interests too tightly may impinge upon the [constitutional] rights of the individual, or prove unworkable. There is also the risk that overly strict provisions will discourage employees from disclosing conflicts of interest or deter people from working in the public sector.”

Although one does not support the practice of public officials doing business with their own departments, and although it is clear that a review of the effectiveness of the conflict-of-interest policy in the public sector is needed, one must caution against overzealousness taking precedence over other considerations (such as the right to free economic participation and the need to attract private-sector skills into the public sector). It cannot be implied that South Africa does not have a disclosure policy that most directors general, and senior public officials in general, abide by.

The 2 000 public servants whom the auditor general says have benefited by R600-million from state tenders cannot be a projection of the professional ethics and rectitude of the estimated 1.1-million public servants. There are far too many public officials who go on with their work without personal gain. Unfortunately, media bias tends to distort the news, sometimes embarrassingly so. But then, journalists don’t embarrass easily. — Vusi Mona, deputy director general, communications in the presidency

Nehawu, we want an apology

The letter ‘Woe unto the Pharisee” (Mail & Guardian, August 14 2009) is an intemperate and awful personal attack on Sue van der Merwe, deputy minister of international relations and cooperation. This attack is totally inconsistent with the values of the new South Africa.

A recent letter by Van der Merwe to the M&G defending the integrity of the director general of the department is dismissed as a ‘new irritating voice” and the ‘new ugly voice” by an anonymous Nehawu branch executive committee in the department.

According to this committee, Van der Merwe’s letter expressed ‘blind loyalty” to the director general. But a dispassionate reading of this letter shows that it did no such thing. The deputy minister is nevertheless traduced as a ‘union basher”, despite the fact that her entire history in South African society and politics reveals the exact opposite.

Van der Merwe is, furthermore, accused of ‘betraying a principle of respect and trust” between herself and Nehawu. But it would seem that the Nehawu branch executive committee is prepared to offer ‘respect and trust” only to those who unconditionally agree with everything it says.

Nehawu then engages in a long diatribe about pay and working conditions in parts of the department and seeks to blame Van der Merwe for this state of affairs. Even though the deputy minister has no control over such matters, she is abused as ‘a 1996 class project”. Again, all those who know Van der Merwe are well aware of her activism in support of the poor and downtrodden.

She is accused, for example, of not believing in the transformation of the department. She is an ‘Mbeki disciple” (whatever that means). All of this involves a crude attribution of motives and beliefs to a person whose activist contribution to liberation and transformation is beyond dispute.

The Nehawu branch executive committee in the department then descends to a level not known to our politics since 1994. It hurls another mindless and gross insult at the deputy minister in words that include ‘a prostitute in a new long dress is still a prostitute”. This is savage sexism and hate speech. It is a vicious attack on a person of impeccable private and public morality.

We condemn these obscene attacks on the deputy minister and demand that the national executive of Nehawu repudiates the behaviour of its branch at the department and apologises to Van der Merwe. Why the M&G saw fit to publish this sexist and defamatory letter is incomprehensible. — Doug Blackmur, Vanessa Hood, Sicelo Mxolose, Kader Asmal, Sonwabile Ngxiza and Denis van Es, members of the ANC Mowbray PCO management committee

Hopkins has a bitchin’ idea

Congratulations to Pat Hopkins’s Raspberry Prose/Paper Bag Publishing on launching its first title, I Ain’t Yo Bitch (Friday, August 14). Like Hopkins, I believe that South Africa will continue to ‘lag [behind]” unless we substantially improve our ‘appalling” reading levels and I wish her every success with her initiative.

The success of this project can probably be multiplied by linking it to concerns about literacy levels in general, especially among South Africa’s youth. Educationists agree that reading and writing skills are best acquired in the learner’s mother tongue. It is thus inexcusable that almost no daily papers are available in South Africa’s indigenous languages. Once mother-tongue speakers of these languages have exhausted their primary school textbooks, what reading matter are they supposed to turn to? The undiminished popularity of the SABC’s indigenous-language radio services proves that there is a ready market for news, current affairs and even audience participation (phone-in programmes) in these languages.

At the same time the spectacular success of recently launched tabloids such as the Sun and the Voice proves that even seemingly hardened non-readers are prepared to change their ways, provided the right mix is on offer. As with ‘dime novels and penny dreadfuls”, tabloids are often criticised for their ‘formulaic content”, but this obstacle can be overcome: newspapers have always supplemented sport with politics, entertainment with financial advice and cartoons with recipes. In addition, they can tempt readers to improve their writing skills by inviting letters; they can even offer incentives by sponsoring prizes for the ‘best letter” of the week or month.

The idea is so obvious that I can’t understand why it hasn’t been done, at least not on a large scale. If handled cautiously by established publishers with the necessary infrastructure, the cost need not be prohibitive. If marketed correctly, for instance as a ‘national skills” project aimed at raising the general educational level of formerly disadvantaged South Africans, it could attract not only sponsors but also advertisers keen to associate themselves with righting the wrongs of the past. Or is it possible that, as Hopkins suggests for the book-supply chain, there are powerful vested interests hellbent on smothering any alternative to established practice? — Richard Bertelsmann, Cape Town

Let’s rescue SABC International

Kevin Davie’s article ‘SABC International goes down the tube” (August 7) clearly outlines the sad state of SABC International. This calls for urgent efforts to salvage it. The idea and vision of a continental conduit through which Africans can tell their African story underscores the importance of such initiatives. This has been appreciated by many key role players across the continent and abroad.

African voices are critical for Africa’s development. This is the potential that the SABC International has to nurture. What is now required for the continent is to maintain a medium that will provide an objective analysis of the challenges and opportunities from an African perspective.

Globalisation has largely been driven by the interests of the developed world, so an initiative that builds Africa’s confidence to own and drive its own development agenda and provides a continental voice about Africa’s positives in the eyes of donors, policymakers and other important constituencies, is critical.

The adage has it that ‘information is power” — anyone who has a voice and who can project it widely holds the key to tremendous influence. Africa needs an initiative such as SABC International to take the lead in producing accessible and vital information, giving voice to their populations so that they can hold their governments to account.

All efforts should be taken to salvage SABC International for the future of our continent. – Archbishop Njongonkulu Ndungane, president, African Monitor

Femidoms aren’t keepsakes

Bridget Hilton-Barber! Did you really take the last two female condoms from the border post in Botswana? (August 14.) Put them back! This is as irresponsible as leaving soda cans in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve. A local woman might need those condoms. They are costly, too. Responsible travel is more than eschewing python boots or turtle soup.

If you want a femidom keepsake, buy one at Clicks. And tell the tour operator not to allow his Dutch clients to pluck them for keepsakes either. Would they take the KLM airplane life jackets as souvenirs? This is so not rubbing it the right way. — Mercedes Sayagues

In brief

Eusebius McKaiser’s article illustrates the fact that ordinary Africans live on a different planet to their rulers and intelligentsia. Barack Obama was cheered in Ghana for saying that bad governance and corruption were more to blame for African backwardness than the West, but McKaiser quotes Gerald Kaplan, who can’t quite work out what went wrong. Perhaps if some African countries had suffered minority rule for longer they would have been left in a better position. If South Africa had been liberated 10 years earlier, it would probably be like Cuba now. A minister would be driving a 1950 Chevrolet, not a R1.5-million Mercedes. — S Kaye, Cape Town

Politicians have talked for years about stopping corruption but never put a solution on the table. Yet the traffic department is already using sophisticated cameras and is getting new technology to help apprehend defaulters. Why not use technology to stop corruption? All that is needed is a small microphone in the officer’s shirt pocket that records any conversation and sends it into a central office. — Frank du Toit, Ballito

How can a white person expect a fair trial under Judge John Hlophe? That alone should exclude him from any position. — Rob Tiffin, Paarden Eiland