Even honourable men speak with forked tongues
Had you attended school a century ago the curriculum would have been different from that taught today. You would have been exposed to the writings of poets and philosophers and taught ancient languages such as Latin and Greek. Nowadays the average school
Some 150 years after Burke’s observation, evil is triumphing in South Africa. We have a pseudo democracy wherein mediocrity is encouraged and accountability is virtually non-existent. We live in a society where education ministers defer their duty to provide textbooks to learners in Limpopo and trot out lame excuses for not dealing with a forced learner stay away in the Northern Cape. We tolerate agriculture ministers who are more concerned with contributing to the President’s preferred rural development project than the plight of commercial farmers. We boast a minister of higher education who is hamstrung by concurrent tenure at state and trade union. And our safety and security minister hangs back on the fringes as the national police commissioner’s zero tolerance approach ends in bloody massacre.
From liberation struggle to struggle for enrichment
Burke’s “when bad men combine” describes South Africa’s current political dispensation. And the handful of good men serving (sic) in government today are too afraid, or too conflicted, to intervene. One of the problems with the ruling African National Congress (ANC) is that its good men – its great leaders – belong to the movement’s 100-year history. The names Nelson Mandela, Oliver Tambo and Walter Sisulu still command respect throughout South Africa and internationally. And Mandela, through his calls for peace and reconciliation, has endured to citizens across socio-political, race and gender boundaries. But it ends there.
Can you name the good men – and by this we mean untarnished by allegation – in senior government positions today? Some have placed ex-finance minister Trevor Manuel on a pedestal, but his name is tarnished by the ever-present arms deal. Others believe his replacement, Pravin Gordhan, is beyond reproach. Perhaps he is… But for Gordhan to join the “few good men” brigade he must be able to stand up against the powerful and the corrupt. To date all the minister has done is talk a good game.
At the recent Discovery Invest Leadership Summit Gordhan described the Euro-zone’s complex socio-political environment as follows: “Political decision making around economic matters is becoming more and more difficult because the balance the politicians have to find between winning the next election and satisfying a particular constituency on the one hand, and on the other hand making the right economic decision that will take a particular region or country in a different direction, is a balance that is not coming through very clearly.” This scenario holds for South Africa too – except that political leaders are more concerned with retaining power within the ruling party structures than serving the communities they were put in charge of. No wonder Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu says that our democracy has become a nightmare. (Tutu was speaking at a recent Cape Town book launch).
A head in the sand stance on corruption
Gordhan talks tough on corruption. “Corruption is a disease which our hospital and health system is not going to solve,” he said. “It is going to require an important set of decisions that all of us make morally as South Africans – that when you see any talk of bribes, any request for bribes, any tendency towards corruption – then it is not just your head that must turn and react, it is also your gut that must turn!” He called on every South African to join with the millions of honest civilians and public servants to make their voices heard. His plea to ordinary South Africans to root out corruption is laced with irony – because Gordhan, himself a citizen of this beautiful company, has more evidence and inside information on the scourge than any of us can hope to access.
Civil society, ordinary citizens, the opposition and the media has been doing exactly as the minister asks. But each time an allegation is levelled, every time that evidence is presented, the machinery of the ANC – now entrenched in so-called non-political oversight organisations – stands squarely in the way of law enforcement. It is more likely for the head of public prosecutions to face the firing squad than the fraud accused. When the Scorpions got too good at what they did it was government that closed them down. When Vusi Pikoli threated to take on Jackie Selebi it was Pikoli who fell on his sword. When the KZN head of prosecutions refused to drop charges he was replaced and the charges subsequently dropped. The list is endless. To make matters worse the ruling party is hell bent on pushing through the Protection of Information Bill to make journalists and whistle blowers cower in the corner rather than report fraud.
The ringing of hollow words
“Leaders and people with a conscience – activists – have to both fight corruption and the underlying factors that lead to corruption,” he added. “We have to fight greed and conspicuous consumption… Because if we give into a culture that says we want [the best of] everything now, then we are creating the wrong kind of culture”. These are hollow words from a good man among evil men… It seems Gordhan, like so many of our politicians, is speaking with a forked tongue. He condemns corruption on the public stage and then comfortably slips back into a world where corruption is tolerated – if not encouraged!
Would an honourable and educated man – who must have myriad opportunities in the private sector – retain his position in an organisation that is responsible for Arms-gate, Oil-gate, Travel-gate, Mdluli-gate and Nkandla-gate to name a few? It is no wonder the country’s citizens dismiss the minister’s calls. “You are in a corrupt party that is running this country into the ground,” writes an irate Fin24 reader. “[As a senior member in the party] you support it in its corruption. If you felt strongly about corruption you would be in a different party”. More to the point, another reader opines: “You are a member of a corrupt government – and you know it – so why don't you act?”
Editor’s thoughts: Finance minister Pravin Gordhan is an impressive speaker. He articulates his thoughts and ideas clearly and concisely. Yet when asked at the Discovery Invest Leadership Summit who South Africa should consider a model leader – someone who showed exemplary leadership in the post-Sisulu, Mandela and Tambo era – he faltered. There can only be two reasons why Gordhan failed to offer up a name. Either he was tiptoeing around the ruling party leadership debate, or he simply cannot identify such a leader from among the current ANC rank and file. Are there any leaders the calibre of Tambo, Sisulu and Mandela in the ANC ranks today? Please add your comment below, or send it to gareth@fanews.co.za
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