Just as moral examples played a decisive role in leading us through the 1990s, maybe the ANC needs moral examples again to deal with its own demons. (Photo by Per-Anders Pettersson/Liaison Agency)
As one of the leaders of a fledgling community development forum, I recently had close encounters with some of the politicians in local government.
I have been aware that our people do not trust their political representatives. I spend every summer holiday in my home village and I experience many of the problems that lead people to believe that their political representatives have abandoned them.
I have even witnessed politicians deceiving their constituent communities. What shocked me is the flagrancy of their deception, almost as if they do not care about being caught lying to the people.
But at the same time as they are repulsed by the open contempt and constitutional delinquency of their politicians, these communities have normalised their own acute moral corrosion.
When they say that history repeats itself, it is usually an injunction to avoid past mistakes. But I think there are times when history must repeat itself, when lessons from the past might be the only saving grace to move forward. And we do have an abundance of moral history.
We had a dream for a non-racial, non-sexist, democratic society, wherein the government would be based on the will of the people. It was fragile and flickered dimly through the turbulent 1990s.
On 10 April 1993, the South African Communist Party leader and chief of staff of uMkhonto weSizwe, Chris Hani, was assassinated. At that time, South Africa was still taking tentative steps towards reconciliation. It had only been three years since the unbanning of the ANC and other liberation political parties.
It did not look like the negotiations would be successful. Adjacent to this was the rise of the Afrikaner right wing, who threatened a violent uprising if there was one person one vote.
The World Trade Centre talks held under the auspices of the Convention for a Democratic South Africa (Codesa) had also deadlocked again.
It seemed as if the masses had resigned themselves to accept that it was “Not Yet Uhuru”, and the struggle would have to continue.
Hani’s assassination confirmed their deepest fears that the apartheid regime had no genuine interest in giving up power.
It also made them suspicious that the ANC did not have the wherewithal to force an agreement from the apartheid regime.
The nation was still reeling from the Boipatong Massacre less than a year prior to the Hani assassination.
It is therefore not an exaggeration to say that it was nearly impossible to stop the calamitous tide of political violence after Hani’s assassination.
But, on 14 April 1993, four days after Hani’s assassination, ANC president Nelson Mandela addressed the nation.
He was not standing on the podium at a stadium when he made that address.
His regal figure was projected to the nation from the centre of our television sets, his message politically transcendent and stately.
Against a heavy current of a justifiable national disposition for vengeance, Mandela had neutralised the impending Armageddon.
The tide was too ferocious for the state to intervene without causing unprecedented bloodbath, and the righteous anger of the people too strong to dissuade with political stratagems and rhetoric alone.
Mandela’s most important weapon was what many political leaders today have lost. The moral character which, through moral example begot Mandela’s moral influence.
But moral character, from which moral examples flow, would not have had that force of persuasion if it was not a sign that human nature can be overcome.
After all, Mandela himself was not shy of military conflict. He was instrumental in advancing the cause for an armed struggle, stating during a BBC interview in 1961 that it was futile to talk peace and nonviolence with a government whose only reply was savage attacks on unarmed and defenceless people.
By appreciating his human nature, we can appreciate that his magnanimity must have taken a great deal of effort, as he suppressed his natural proclivities and did not succumb to anger.
“Act as if you would wish that your actions could be made universal law,” charged Immanuel Kant in his Metaphysics of Morality. In other words, how would you conduct yourself if you knew that your deeds would serve as examples to be emulated by others? Would you say that through your moral examples you created a desirable society in which you can thrive?
This Kantian maxim has no greater significance than when human instinct entices political leaders to take actions that seem justified but would have calamitous consequences if their followers emulated them.
We cannot privatise the virtues of the ANC to a single person but collectivise its vices to the ANC as an organisation. Otherwise making an argument for moral rejuvenation in the ANC would be misguided without first appreciating the contribution of the ANC to Mandela’s moral virtues.
Even more difficult would be holding the ANC responsible for moral degeneration in society without first recognising the organisation’s moral leadership at some point.
It is the ANC that should say whether its choices are in accordance with that Kantian maxim by which to act as if your actions are worth emulating as examples of moral virtue.
The ANC should say whether fraud and corruption in the state passes that Kantian maxim, by which to ask if fraud and corruption would still be tolerable if every citizen were to act fraudulently and corruptly.
The ANC should say whether its disinvestment in morality has passed the Kantian maxim, by which moral disinvestment unleashes acts of immorality in society at large.
The disinhibition that results from abandoning moral virtues manifest in different actions that share the common character of immorality.
The same way that moral disinvestment removes the shame of kleptomania, it removes the shame of being openly racist in a democratic society.
And what moral argument is possible to dissuade communities from stealing, when political leaders steal from the poor with apparent impunity?
A legal system is in place to deal with the criminal aspects from the deeds of immorality.
But the rule of law alone failed to sustain the morally repugnant apartheid regime, and was rendered useless to prevent an onset of the impending bloodbath following Hani’s assassination.
It was the moral examples of political leaders that influenced the people to let their consciences be the police of their characters.
The Kantian maxim has no specific preponderance over other philosophical treatises on morality. But when the ordinary citizen says, “if the president or the ministers are doing it, why can we not do it too’’, that is evidence that the actions of leaders — moral or immoral — are examples for moral conduct or misconduct in society.
The ANC may not be directly responsible for all the symptoms of moral corrosion in society. But we must bear in mind that there was a time when moral virtue in society reflected moral virtue in the ANC and other liberation movements.
To what extent moral virtue or vice in society can be attributed to the ANC is not the issue. What is important is that at the dawn of democracy, the ANC proved capable of exerting moral influence on society through the moral examples of its leaders.
It does not matter if it was goodwill or political necessity that drove Mandela and his comrades to subordinate their instincts to the pursuit of moral examples needed to create moral communities.
What matters is they were aware that an ideal society required a certain moral character on the part of its members, and were willing to demonstrate how to attain that moral character.
Just as moral examples played a decisive role in leading us through the 1990s, maybe the ANC needs moral examples again to deal with its own demons, to slay the beast of racism that is shamelessly rearing its head, and to morally engineer societies capable of being policed by their own moral consciences.
It is not too late if political leaders are prepared to shed the pride masking their moral deficiencies and allow themselves to be vulnerable and open to correction.
The point of departure is for the ANC to take moral responsibility for today’s moral decay, just as it did for moral renewal of our societies at the dawn of democracy.
It begins with individuals choosing those actions they would be proud to present as moral examples worthy of emulating. And moral influence is not persuasive because we are perfect. It is persuasive because we can show how to overcome our vices despite our imperfections.
Mzwandile Manto is the secretary general of the Mgwali Development Forum.
The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Mail & Guardian.