South Africa

There can be little doubt that the past year has been the most trying in Thabo Mbeki’s oft-tumultuous presidency. Tonight he gave his State of the Union address before parliament. He certainly had plenty of fodder from which to work: The electricity crisis, crime, poverty, the daunting prospect of hosting the 2010 World Cup, and simply a general sense of malaise.

Mbeki provided a positive spin, called for the nation to pull together to confront the issues facing South Africa, and praised his countrymen for their resilience in the face of recent difficulties, especially the power delivery nightmare.

The response to Mbeki’s optimism has been skepticism in many, but far from all, circles. Helen Zille,  leader of the Democratic Alliance, whose job it is to be critical, took her job seriously, criticizing the president for “business as usual.” The editors of The Mail & Guardian approached Mbeki’s address fatalistically as did other observers. One imagines that those critics were likely not placated by Mbeki’s address and that Mbeki’s supporters found much with which to be pleased. In other words, status quo ante is likely to prevail.

Well, that didn’t take long, did it? The African National Conference delegates who had gathered in Polokwane were barely settled back into their posh suburban homes near Cape Town and Johannesburg, Pretoria and Durban, Port Elizabeth  and Pietermaritzberg and all points in between when the news came across the wires. The National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) has decided that there is enough evidence to pursue corruption charges against their new ANC president, Jacob Zuma.  

So what does this mean? Well, it certainly means that the NPA has a peculiar sense of timing. Seeing how it is difficult to believe that new evidence has emerged in the last few days, or even weeks, why now? Why did this not happen weeks ago? Why not on the eve of the Polokwane meeting? Or why not until after the new year?

And the question lingering as a subtext to all of this is what role did Thabo Mbeki have, if any in all of these machinations? The historical adjective most applied to Mbeki is “Machiavellian.” Is this an example of Mbeki’s Machiavellian nature? What about Zuma? Has he accumulated enough power to have been able to manipulate the system to forestall charges until after his election as party presidency? To bring the charges early enough that he can beat them (assuming he can beat them — far from a foregone conclusion) early enough to allow him to recover for the national election that he surely sees as being in his pocket in 2009?

And what of the popular response? Among his most ardent followers the charges will almost surely appear to be a plot from the Mbeki faction and further evidence that their man is not only a hero, but also a martyr. In an odd way, these charges may well bolster Zuma’s populist bona fides even as they confirm his own Machiavellian streak among his opponents. But surely the charges will also arouse worry, maybe even shame, among some rank and file members of the still-divided ANC.

On more than one occasion I have tried to temper the importance of Polokwane by noting that with a long time to go before the 2009 elections there was lot of political football to be played. The possibility that the NPA would bring charges always ranked high among the potential tectonic shifts. Who suspected that the plates would crumple so soon after Zuma’s ascension to the party’s top post? So much for Zuma’s hoped-for new era of good feelings in ANC politics.

The shocking murder of South African reggae star Lucky Dube has stunned South Africans and once again brought the issue of violent crime to the forefront of national debate.  One of the common themes discussed even as mourners gathered to celebrate the life and work of a native son-turned global superstar and the accused wallowed in jail awaiting their arraignment it became clear that this high-profile death might also provide the tipping point for more rigorous action to address the issue of crime which, even if sometimes politicized and overstated, is very real indeed for South Africans of all races and economic backgrounds. Even criminals serving time for committing violent crimes have expressed their outrage at Dube’s death at the hands of carjackers.

It is, of course, a shame if it truly does require a high-profile murder to force prompt action on crime. And it is quite possible that botht he lip service and the outrage will fade, that even this death (which we ought not to value any more highly than any other deaths in the country) will not be enough to bring about systemic change on the matter of crime and concomitant questions of policing and the legal system. Still, one way to salvage something from this particular tragic death would be to use it not only to continue the ongoing national discussion about crime, but to translate that plan into action.

As this fine editorial in the Mail & Guardian  argues: “Murder is always foul, no matter who the victim. And when it is of an internationally renowned personality like Lucky Dube, it reverberates beyond the immediate family’s grief” and inevitably leade to calls for action. But the editors caution readers away from fleeing into the arms of a renewal of the death penalty, and, I believe, rightly so:

In our anger, no matter how righteous, we need to remind ourselves of the reasons the Constitutional Court outlawed the state’s power to kill criminals. They include the fact that nowhere has it been demonstrated conclusively that the death penalty is a more effective deterrent than other punishments; and that it offers no possibility of redress if the victim’s innocence is established at a later stage — a real possibility in South Africa, given the inefficiency of our law enforcement system.

The judges accepted that Old Testament “eye for an eye” retribution is backward-looking and has no place in a rights-based constitutional state — and that the weight of public opinion, which has never been tested, is a matter for the legislature, not the judiciary. (It is a curious contradiction that white conservatives who argue the will of the majority on capital punishment reject it on such issues as the radical redistribution of land and wealth.) There is, in addition, the fact of our divided and repressive history, which meant the vast majority of those hanged were black. The number of executions rose exponentially under apartheid, reaching 180 a year by the late 1980s; Nelson Mandela himself once stood in the shadow of the gallows.

The judges agreed that the most effective crime deterrent is the likelihood of being caught and convicted — and it is for this that we should be campaigning. As one of the M&G’s letter-writers argues this week, getting to grips with crime means that ordinary citizens have to come to the party. Report crime and refuse to collaborate with it.

Leadership is an issue. To uproot South Africa’s culture of impunity, we need leaders of the criminal justice system who do not consider it acceptable to be on friendly terms with self-declared crime bosses, or who engage in misconduct that, although not technically illegal, leaves the Bench besmirched. We need a unified and apolitical push on crime by the authorities, where different agencies are not at war with one another and are not used to pursue sectarian political agendas.

The credibility and integrity of the system is as important as its proper resourcing in terms of cash, skills and equipment.
Violent crime is a terrible scourge in South Africa and the murder of Lucky Dube has thrown it into brutal relief. As a gentle soul and a peace-loving Rastafarian, Dube’s memory is best-served by bringing his killers to book and ensuring that no murder goes unsolved.

There are no panaceas. There are no quick fixes. But that does not mean there are no fixes. The outcry from citizens of all backgrounds for the return to the death penalty are a natural outgrowth of frustration with the system, but this palliative would not have much effect on crime rates. The desire to seek vengeance is not the same as the desire to seek justice and public safety. South Africans must keep this in mind even as they continue to bury their own.

 Hamba Kahle, Lucky Dube.

There is a new story about political intrigue, firings, scandal, corruption, and crime reverberating through South Africa with the issue of an arrest warrant and suspension of National Police Commissioner (and head of Interpol) Jackie Selebi. This might represent Thabo Mbeki’s stiffest political challenge yet, which is in itself saying something. 

The Mail & Guardian editorializes hopefully on the prospects of Africans developing African solutions to African problems, using the Ibrahim Index  as a springboard and less hopefully on the Salebi mess.

Meanwhile, recent data from an internal ANC audit of party membership indicates that Jacob Zuma is the front-runner for the party’s presidency. One wonders if this sort of news might not hasten Cyril Ramaphosa to leave the private sector and return to public service. Ramaphosa, who has remained steadfast that he will not run for the ANC leadership, stands as my (mild) upset candidate to emerge with the party and national presidency. 

What are the odds of reforming Nigeria’s corruption ridden oil industry? The Economist lays out the long odds.

The Boston Globe has an editorial about how scientists increasingly can trace DNA — “genetic markers” – to tell us a great deal about not only the origins but also the movement of human beings from our earliest origins in Africa to today.

Is South Africa indifferent to the Darfur crisis? Pambazuka News believes so. There is little question that the country ought to be doing more to address the situation. Also at PN, Rotimi Sankore presents a rather sophisticated cri de couer about the Zimbabwe situation in which, ultimately, Robert Mugabe’s endless reign of power is the crucial problem.

Opposition parties are making hay out of recent crime statistics indicating that some forms of crime are on the rise:

“We are alarmed at the increase in murder (2,4 percent), the 118 percent increase in bank robberies, 52,5 percent increase in robberies at business premises, the 21,9 percent increase in cash-in-transit heists, and the sharp increase in robberies at residential premises (25,4 percent),” Inkatha Freedom Party [IFP]  spokesperson Velaphi Ndlovu said in a statement. “It once again proves without doubt that crime is out of control in South Africa and that the levels of crime remain alarmingly high, despite empty government promises,” he said.

Inkatha’s spokesmen are balancing legitimate fears with the typical opportunism of politicians, to be sure. But they also are reacting to the realities that KwaZulu-Natal, for example, the IFP’s locus of power, is experiencing increasing rates of criminality. (Though the Western Cape remains South Africa’s “murder capital,” and leads in other alarming categories as well.)  Despite the dispiriting news on the crime front, Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula has made it clear that he will not resign.

One positive indicator comes from Hillbrow, where crime rates have been dropping, and where, perhaps more significantly, the perception of crime (which is as big a problem as actual crime in South Africa) the perception of danger has waned. And perhaps Hillbrow can offer a lesson for the furure: Increased police presence and community vigilance has seemingly directly correlated with the positive changes. The obvious solution is better policing and more police, though national, provincial, and municipal governments are financially stressed to the point where such solutions are easier to envision than to implement. Still, given the direct and indirect costs of crime, it would seem that more and better policing would increasingly become one of the domestic policy priorities in the year to come.

Your faithful scribe is almost but not quite back home and thus to something resembling normalcy. Full-scale blogging should resume next week. In the meantime, here are some Africa-related links:

In Zimbabwe the Interception of Communications Bill only awaits Robert Mugabe’s signature. My guess is he’s thrilled to do so, helping seal Zimbabwe’s totalitarian status. Meanwhile MacDonald Dzirutwe avers in the Mail & Guardian that Mugabe’s newest get-tough economic policies are likely to represent only a short-term palliative with deleterious long-range effects.

It is now Congo-Brazzaville’s opportunity to hold elections that raise all sorts of questions about probity, organizational skills, effectiveness, and the like.

In the category of “this comes as news to whom, exactly?” we must place a refugees International report that asserts that Sudan’s rape laws are making the human rights catastrophe in Darfur worse. I do not aim my sarcasm at Refugees International, but rather at a crisis that is so far gone that such obvious accounts still qualify as being significantly newsworthy.

In Accra we might soon find out if we are closer to seeing the emergence of a United States of Africa. Just five years after its inception as a new and better organization of African states, the African Union (AU) debates tightening their confederation even more.  

 In South Africa:

Petrol prices continue to pose problems, with recent price drops in some areas accompanied by price hikes in others. 

As the ANC meets to debate future directions, the party’s succession battle accelerates, with a question that has been a subtext for some time now rising to the fore – does the party leader of necessity have to be the political standard bearer? Meanwhile, Thabo Mbeki has not so subtly hinted to the South African Communist Party (SACP) that it might be time for the comrades to steer their own separate course. I have argued for years that the only serious challenge to the ANC will come from the left, not the right, from black politicians, not disenchanted whites. Apparently Mbeki is willing to accelerate the process.

The mass action strikes are finally over. A South African cabinet minister and a prominent labour leader weigh in on their meaning.

Finally, the Springboks have had their luggage pilfered.  Is this another angle for the South African crime epidemic? Not exactly. The thefts appear to have occurred in Australia, where the South African ruggers are preparing for the next part of their Tri-Nations away leg.  

Foreign investors, tourists, and FIFA (which organizes the World Cup) are three constituencies that South Africans fear will turn their backs on their country if crime and fears of crime (not the same thing) continue to dominate stories that emanate from South Africa. Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula is aware of the very real consequences of perceptions and realities of crime, and in response he has begun a public relations campaign to convince the world that South Africa is getting crime under control. Opposition leaders want Nqakula to do the same within South Africa. Similarly, President Thabo Mbeki is out to prove that he is not a “crime denialist.” He placed crime front and center in his Freedom Day address last month.

Nqakula, Mbeki and the leaders of the Democratic Alliance and other parties want to change the perceptions the world (and other South Africans) have about the country’s safety. Nonetheless, stories with headlines like “Naked man superglued to exercise bike“are not likely to help. Amusing, sure, but also horrifying — basically intruders hijacked the victim at gunpoint, made him bring them to his home, made him strip, superglued him to his exercise bike and also glued his hands together and his mouth shut, and robbed him. His partner came home three hours later to rescue him. This is likely not the sort of story that is going to reassure the solons at FIFA.    

Although it is hardly news that fears of crime in South Africa are “partly based on reality,” it is still worth pointing out that “Partly” implies that much of the fear of crime in South Africa is also overstated, at least to some degree. That is probably of little solace to those who have been victimized by violent crime, of course, but it still is worth emphasizing.

IRIN reports that there is yet another impediment to effective AIDS treatment in South Africa. Apparently rape survivors tend to get left out in prevention and treatment programs. In a normal society this might pass as a loose end left untied. but in a country beset by both AIDS and abominably high rape figures it goes down as a huge gap that, left unaddressed will leave a vulnerable segment of the population abandoned, hopeless, and staring at death.  

Given it’s role as the largest anti-apartheid liberation organization, its central role in the transition to democracy, and its virtually insuperable status in the country’s politics today it should come as no suprise that the African National Congress is far and away the most scrutinized (and criticized) political party in South Africa. From issues of politics and policy that some fault Thabo Mbeki’s party for not addressing satisfactorily (crime, AIDS, poverty, continuing inequality) to internal strife (the myriad crises surrounding Jacob Zuma) to the natural backlash against the party in power, it is not always easy to sit in power, even if in each national election from 1994th ANC has actually consolodated its hold. Even as the party garners greater criticism, it seems to draw more support. At least in large part this can be explained by the lack of a viable opposition party.

This past week some of the ANC’s brightest lights met n Durban to try to smooth out some ruffles that have emerged between the national party leadership and the party’s hierarchy and rank-and-file in KwaZulu-Natal, where Zuma’s sacking hits closest to home. The leadership emerged proclaiming unity, but some observers, (see, for example, this analysis) take a more cynical approach, believing that the Durban meeting reveals fissures within the party and an ANC that is “troubled,” and perhaps in a state of crisis. Naturally, at least some observers, notably from the South African Communist Party (SACP) and the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) want to use the opportunity that the times provide to push the ANC to move its politics leftward.

I have long argued that if a viable challenge to the ANC ever emerges in South Africa it will not come from the old recidivist challenges from the white right, but rather will come from a splintering of the ANC-SACP-COSATU alliance. Perhaps South Africa approaches a time when the ANC will either swing to the left or else it will fracture, with SACP-COSATU forming a new party.

But as a new boook by Padraig O’Malley, Shades of Difference: Mac Maharaj and the Struggle for South Africa, indicates, the ANC has always dealt with internal division. The party’s leadership has always shown itself to be imaginative and clever when responding to crises. My guess is that Mbeki and company will be able to convince dissidents in SACP-COSATU and in KwaZulu-Natal that their interests are best served within the party, not operating from outside of it.