tag:theconversation.com,2011:/global/topics/trevor-manuel-23323/articlesTrevor Manuel – The Conversation2021-08-11T14:57:37Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1658942021-08-11T14:57:37Z2021-08-11T14:57:37ZWhy cabinet reshuffles in South Africa are bound to disappoint<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/415467/original/file-20210810-15-pltebo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South African president Cyril Ramaphosa's announcement of changes to his executive were met with mixed reactions. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">GCIS</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>These days, there are two types of cabinet reshuffles in South Africa – those which disappoint immediately and those which keep the disappointment for later.</p>
<p>The cause of the disappointment is not the reshuffles themselves but the expectations which the country’s media, politicians and citizens’ organisations place on them. This fundamentally misunderstands the roles which ministers play in a democracy, making it inevitable that reality will never match their hopes.</p>
<p>Thanks largely to a media whose love of sensation dwarfs its interest in truth, President Cyril Ramaphosa’s <a href="http://www.thepresidency.gov.za/speeches/statement-president-cyril-ramaphosa-changes-national-executive%2C-union-buildings%2C-tshwane">early August reshuffle</a> is very much the “disappointment later” kind. </p>
<p>Before he announced changes to his cabinet, a story of what was at stake embedded itself in the media and sections of business.</p>
<p>It insisted that there were cabinet ministers whose incompetence had <a href="https://www.thesouthafrican.com/news/riots-latest-is-ayanda-dlodlo-of-state-security-guilty-of-misleading-the-country-on-riots-looting-unrest-in-south-africa-bhei-cele-intelligence-product-report/">worsened the recent violence</a> which gripped two provinces recently, or whose ineptitude was obstructing economic growth. Everyone knew who they were and the only interesting question was whether Ramaphosa would do what “the national interest” required.</p>
<p>According to sections of the media, Ramaphosa did what he was meant to do. Lurid headlines announced that he had <a href="https://www.businesslive.co.za/bd/national/2021-08-05-ramaphosa-wields-the-axe-and-puts-allies-in-key-positions/">“wielded the axe”</a>, replacing opponents with allies across the board. This, of course, is why there is no immediate disappointment. But later disenchantment is inevitable – and not only because the claim that he used the reshuffle to remove all in his path and replace them with firm allies is a fantasy.</p>
<h2>The reshuffle</h2>
<p>Ramaphosa’s reshuffle replaced three ministers who were no longer available and whose positions had to be filled. (<a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/southafrica/news/jackson-mthembu-dies-of-covid-19-related-complications-20210121-2">One passed away</a>, another was <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/politics/zweli-mkhize-resigns-over-digital-vibes-scandal-8643a0df-74f1-4696-856d-408ea37610d2">embroiled in scandal</a> and the third <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/business-report/economy/tito-mboweni-resigns-enoch-godongwana-named-sas-new-finance-minister-ef544c03-4f4b-46ba-8cfd-c4b1363d655e">asked to step down</a>.) </p>
<p>In each case, the political loyalties of the new minister are the same as their predecessor’s. He fired the defence minister, Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula, which was hardly surprising since she had <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/south-africa/2021-07-18-defence-minister-seemingly-contradicts-ramaphosa-says-there-is-no-evidence-of-an-insurrection/">contradicted him publicly</a> on the causes of the violence in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng in July, has no significant support base and was not considered crucial to her portfolio. Before her dismissal, the minister was an ally of the president, so it not clear why her sacking meant he was purging enemies. Mapisa-Nqakula was the only minister sacked – others who were subjects of overheated speculation before the announcement were shifted between portfolios. And even she has not arguably lost anything – she is scheduled to become Speaker of the National Assembly, a post which, at least in theory, is higher in status than a cabinet job. </p>
<p>Shifting ministers between ministries is a boon to lurid pundits everywhere since they can place whatever spin they like on them. But about the only minister who has clearly been demoted is <a href="https://www.pa.org.za/person/lindiwe-nonceba-sisulu/">Lindiwe Sisulu</a>, who has moved from foreign minister to human settlements to tourism, probably because she is said to be <a href="https://www.businesslive.co.za/fm/features/2020-10-01-can-lindiwe-sisulu-be-the-ancs-next-president/">campaigning</a> for Ramaphosa’s job. </p>
<p>But, for the rest, who is to say whether a move from communications to small business or public administration to water and sanitation is a shift upwards, downwards or sideways? What is clear is that Ramaphosa did not shift the balance of power in his cabinet at all and that his chief goal seems to have been to show he had heard complaints about particular ministries without rocking any political boats.</p>
<h2>The role of ministers</h2>
<p>But this is only part of why later disappointment is inevitable. A more important reason is that the standard story of what reshuffles mean is based on very unrealistic ideas of the purpose of cabinet ministers.</p>
<p>Firstly, it confuses the opinions of a small group with the “truth”. Ministerial appointments are political – a minister is the political head of a department, not a technical advisor. This is why, contrary to a <a href="https://mybroadband.co.za/news/government/292442-the-qualifications-of-south-africas-ministers.html">widely held belief</a> in South Africa, ministers need not hold any qualifications in their ministry’s area of interest. Post-1994 South Africa’s most widely admired finance ministers (in the market place), <a href="https://www.weforum.org/people/trevor-manuel">Trevor Manuel</a> and <a href="https://www.gov.za/about-government/contact-directory/pravin-jamnadas-gordhan-mr-0">Pravin Gordhan</a>, hold, respectively, a diploma in engineering and a pharmacy degree.</p>
<p>It is also why it is never “self-evident” that a minster should be hired or fired – since people hold differing political opinions, they will not agree on who is a “good” or “bad” minister. Outgoing finance minister <a href="https://www.gov.za/about-government/contact-directory/finance-ministry/tito-mboweni-mr">Tito Mboweni</a> was valued in much of business because he was seen as a <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-53935683">champion of markets</a>. For the same reason, sections of the <a href="https://omalley.nelsonmandela.org/omalley/index.php/site/q/03lv02424/04lv02730/05lv03161.htm">governing alliance</a> and anti-poverty campaigners could not wait to see the back of him. Which side was speaking for the “national interest”? </p>
<p>The claim that a minister must stay or go is, and must always be, an expression of opinion only. A president who ignores that view is not rejecting “the national interest” – they simply have a different view of what that is.</p>
<p>The belief that all happy outcomes – better policing and intelligence or economic growth – can be achieved simply by replacing one minister with another is also a sure recipe for disappointment. As the political head of a department, the minister is responsible for giving it political direction and supporting it politically. These can be important tasks – but they do not mean that the strength or weakness of a department depends on who its minister is.</p>
<p>Most of the “heavy lifting” in government departments is the job of public servants. Ministers can nudge things in particular directions and give political support to officials whose work they value. But they cannot do much more. Two examples illustrate this.</p>
<h2>Reality versus hype</h2>
<p>Perhaps the most effective minister in South Africa’s democratic life was the late <a href="http://www.thepresidency.gov.za/national-orders/recipient/zola-sydney-themba-skweyiya">Zola Skweyiya</a>. As social development minister, he was responsible for <a href="https://www.vukuzenzele.gov.za/legacy-dr-zola-skweyiya">extending social grants</a> to millions of people. But Skweyiya could have done none of this without the work of his senior civil servants. His role was crucial but it consisted largely of supporting senior officials.</p>
<p>By contrast, there was much enthusiasm before the reshuffle for the <a href="https://www.power987.co.za/featured/ramaphosa-must-fire-bheki-cele-khehla-sitole-cope/">removal of police minister Bheki Cele</a>. The reason was obvious – the police performed abysmally during the recent violence. But, whatever Cele’s merits, replacing him would make not an iota of difference to the police’s performance. </p>
<p>There are two reasons why policing the violence was so inept. First, South Africa has never had a competent police service – not under minority rule, when the police’s chief task was preventing black people from expressing themselves or policing racial laws, and not after it. The police are also <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2021-07-06-battle-lines-have-been-drawn-between-saps-factions-and-we-are-the-casualties/">deeply factionalised</a> and so it is never clear whether officers are failing because they don’t know how to act or because they choose not to.</p>
<p>None of this will change simply because a minister changes. Change will need a thorough strategy to alter the operational arms of the police and root out factionalism. If that did happen, political support from a minister would help to make a difference. Simply replacing one politician with another would not.</p>
<p>So, cabinet reshuffles are always much less important events than the hype which surrounds them would suggest. If the national debate understood that, it might save itself repeated disappointments.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/165894/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Steven Friedman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Cabinet reshuffles are always much less important events than the hype which surrounds them would suggest.Steven Friedman, Professor of Political Studies, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1383782020-05-19T14:28:53Z2020-05-19T14:28:53ZEconomic policy remains hotly contested in South Africa: this detailed history shows why<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/334659/original/file-20200513-156625-1r5p84n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Persistent rampant povery has been blamed on the compromises made by the African National Congress during negotiations to end apartheid. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EFE-EPA/Nic Bothma</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Economic inequality in post-apartheid South Africa <a href="https://www.wits.ac.za/media/wits-university/faculties-and-schools/commerce-law-and-management/research-entities/scis/documents/Estimating%20the%20Distribution%20of%20Household%20Wealth%20in%20South%20Africa.pdf">has deepened</a>. This is not what was expected. Firstly, the African National Congress (ANC) won an overwhelming victory in the 1994 elections and promised to significantly reduce inequality in the world’s most unequal country. Secondly, the country’s constitution, <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/drafting-and-acceptance-constitution">adopted in May 1996</a>, foregrounds the promotion of social and economic rights. </p>
<p>This paradoxical outcome has led to a ferocious political-economic debate on the nature of South Africa’s transition to democracy.</p>
<p>On the one hand, there are those who argue that in the 1994 settlement the leaders of the liberation movement sold out their <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/sites/default/files/archive-files/patrick_bond_the_elite_transition_from_apartheibookos.org_.pdf">socialist commitments</a> to the white minority, in particular, <a href="https://www.loot.co.za/product/sampie-terreblanche-lost-in-transformation/rgfm-2362-g810">international and local capital</a>. This conserved the pillars of the apartheid economy, the <a href="https://www.ee.co.za/wp-content/uploads/legacy/Sharife-Bond-MEC-in-New-SA-Review-2.pdf">minerals-energy complex</a>. </p>
<p>On the other hand, there are those who argue that the ANC had no alternative to the Washington consensus approach to the economy in the 1990s. They say it was always a party of a mixed economy, the right to trade freely and the growth of a black business class. </p>
<p>Among the exponents of this view are <a href="https://www.worldcat.org/title/thabo-mbeki-the-dream-deferred/oclc/180845990">Thabo Mbeki</a>, the key figure in shaping ANC economic policy as deputy president from 1994 to 1999, and <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books/about/Choice_Not_Fate_The_Life_and_Times_of_Tr.html?id=xWu5CO_vXB8C&redir_esc=y">Trevor Manuel</a>, finance minister at the time. </p>
<p>Simply put, the Mbeki camp maintains that a fundamental continuity exists in the economic and social policies developed after 1994. Critics say there has been a policy reversal in post-apartheid South Africa. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/334349/original/file-20200512-175246-17w210o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/334349/original/file-20200512-175246-17w210o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334349/original/file-20200512-175246-17w210o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334349/original/file-20200512-175246-17w210o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334349/original/file-20200512-175246-17w210o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334349/original/file-20200512-175246-17w210o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334349/original/file-20200512-175246-17w210o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Former South African President Thabo Mbeki.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AMISOM Photo / Ilyas Ahmed</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A new book, <a href="https://witspress.co.za/catalogue/shadow-of-liberation/">Shadow of Liberation</a>, by Vishnu Padayachee and Robert Van Niekerk, respectively Distinguished Professor of Development Economics and Professor of Public Governance at the University of the Witwatersrand, challenges both approaches. It revisits how economic and social policies were made from the late 1980s to the mid-1990s. The authors draw on 35 in-depth interviews with participants in the policy process. This pool of original data is complemented by a rich archive of primary and secondary sources. Together, these data sets reveal a fascinating story about who shaped these policies and how. </p>
<p>The book is the first attempt to comprehensively document and interpret the origins and evolution of the ANC’s economic and social polices. </p>
<h2>Evolution of ANC economic policy</h2>
<p>The authors argue that the ANC lacked economic expertise – and spurned what little it had. In particular, it rejected the evidence-based analysis and recommendations of the MacroEconomic Research Group, which it had commissioned. They argue that it was less a case of the ANC “selling out” and more one of being outmanoeuvred. Policy makers were, Padayachee and Van Niekerk conclude (p. 135),</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Intellectually seduced in comfortable surroundings and eventually outmanoeuvred by the well-resourced apartheid state and by international and local pro-market friendly actors.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The story of the evolution of the ANC’s economic policy is a complex one. The authors take us on a long journey that begins in the 1940s. The rest of the journey is spread over nine chapters. Chapter 2 shows how the party’s economic and social roots lie in social democratic policies. These ideals can be found in the bill of rights in <a href="https://www.marxists.org/subject/africa/anc/1943/claims.htm">African Claims</a>, developed in 1943.</p>
<p>African Claims was a document with a recognisably social democratic impetus. It argued for state intervention to secure social rights to health, education and welfare for all. This was to be based on universal political and social citizenship. These aspirations can also be traced to what the authors call the
“Keynesian, social democratic welfare state, based on the social rights of citizenship” in the <a href="http://scnc.ukzn.ac.za/doc/HIST/freedomchart/freedomch.html">Freedom Charter</a> adopted in 1955 (p. 22). </p>
<p>The next chapter connects the past to the dawn of democracy and the formation of the ANC’s economic planning department. The authors argue this consisted of a small group – Trevor Manuel, Alec Erwin, Maria Ramos, Neil Morrison, Moss Ngoasheng, Leslie Maasdorp – who came to believe that there</p>
<blockquote>
<p>was no alternative to neo-liberal globalisation (p. 67). </p>
</blockquote>
<p>The pace quickens in chapters 4, 5 and 6 – the empirical heart of the book. The authors show how the ANC distanced itself from the post-Keynesian MacroEconomic Research Group in December 1993, and then abruptly dropped the popular “growth through redistribution” <a href="https://www.gov.za/sites/default/files/governmentgazetteid16085.pdf">Reconstruction and Development Programme</a> in April 1996.</p>
<p>At the centre of the book is a powerful critique, not only of the policy outcomes, but also of the way in which the policies were made. Yet the critiques sometimes feel incomplete. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/334328/original/file-20200512-175224-1gss1sz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/334328/original/file-20200512-175224-1gss1sz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=924&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334328/original/file-20200512-175224-1gss1sz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=924&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334328/original/file-20200512-175224-1gss1sz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=924&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334328/original/file-20200512-175224-1gss1sz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1161&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334328/original/file-20200512-175224-1gss1sz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1161&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/334328/original/file-20200512-175224-1gss1sz.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1161&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>There is a substantial body of literature on the “politics of economic reform” that could have been drawn on to deepen Padayachee and Van Niekerk’s argument that widespread consultation and negotiation is vital for successful economic reform. In fairness, the refusal to negotiate the <a href="https://www.gov.za/documents/growth-employment-and-redistribution-macroeconomic-strategy-south-africa-gear">Growth, Employment and Redistribution</a> macroeconomic strategy for South Africa in the <a href="http://nedlac.org.za/aboutus/">National Economic Development and Labour Council</a> is rightly criticised and the authors show admirable awareness of the issue. </p>
<p>The late post-Keynesian American economist Hyman Minsky’s famous observation, made over 30 years ago and rightly quoted by the authors, makes the point:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Economic issues must become a serious public matter and the subject of debate if new directions are to be undertaken. Meaningful reforms cannot be put over by an advisory and administrative elite that is itself the architect of the existing situation (quoted on p. xi of the book under review). </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Tragically, it is precisely what unfolded in South Africa in the 1990s.</p>
<h2>Speaking to the present</h2>
<p>Although the book examines events nearly three decades ago, it speaks to the present where the demand for <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-odd-meaning-of-radical-economic-transformation-in-south-africa-73003">rapid economic reform</a> has become widespread. </p>
<p>The lesson I draw from the book is that economic reform cannot be undertaken by a small group of people. Instead, policies must be formulated and implemented through negotiation and consultation of a social compact beyond the state and parliament to include unions, <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/sustainable-democracy/B90F11ECCF2A20383ACAA887D20AFCFD">employers and other interest groups</a>. </p>
<p>What I argued <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02589009808729620">in 1998</a> remains true today: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Labour retains the power to block the imposition of economic reform – both at the national and workplace level. Any attempt to impose neo-liberal solutions unilaterally is likely to take the country down the path of ungovernability and civil war – it will ensure rather than avert chaos. If, at the same time, socialist solutions seem unfeasible, this conclusion points towards a class compromise between capital and the labouring poor: a Southern version of social democracy. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>The insights in Shadow of Liberation complement this claim, while developing new interpretations based on evidence from face-to-face interviews with the key actors as well as new archival material. It is a necessary read for a new generation of policymakers as they confront the challenge of economic reform. Above all, this book is a major contribution to the growing body of literature on the appropriate policies required to reduce inequality in the global South. </p>
<p><em>This is an edited version of a longer article published in the June issue of the <a href="https://www.african-review.com/">African Review of Economics and Finance</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/138378/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The Southern Centre for Inequality Studies is funded by the Ford Foundation. I also receive funding from the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung.
</span></em></p>Book sheds new light on the evolution of the economic policy of the African National Congress, South Africa’s governing party.Edward Webster, Distinguished Reserach Professor, Southern Centre for Inequality Studies, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/872072017-11-15T13:29:16Z2017-11-15T13:29:16ZCape Crusaders: why some South Africans (still) support the Kiwis, not the Springboks<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194590/original/file-20171114-27635-vu78ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The All Blacks after beating the Springboks 57-0 in New Zealand on September 16, 2017.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Nigel Marple/Reuters</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Politics and sport are inseparable. To paraphrase the famous military thinker <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/opinionista/2017-06-21-battle-lines-war-is-the-continuation-of-politics-by-other-means/#.WgrBsluCwdU">Carl von Clausewitz</a>, sport could be politics – or even warfare – by other means. This is even truer of sport at a national level: teams represent the political entity of a nation-state. This close relationship between sport and politics has always been apparent in South Africa, during apartheid and after.</p>
<p>An example with its roots in apartheid still plays itself out during every southern hemisphere rugby season. It occurs during <a href="http://www.sanzarrugby.com/superrugby/">Super Rugby</a> when South African club/ provincial teams play against their New Zealand, Australian, Argentinian and Japanese counterparts, and also when the former three teams’ national teams <a href="http://www.sanzarrugby.com/therugbychampionship/">play</a> against South Africa’s Springboks.</p>
<p>It happens specifically when New Zealand’s <a href="https://crusaders.co.nz/">Canterbury Crusaders</a> or its national team, the <a href="http://www.allblacks.com/">All Blacks</a>, play against their local opposition at Cape Town’s Newlands Stadium. These matches invariably scratch open old political wounds as the so-called <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/capeargus/why-i-support-the-crusaders-1494658">“Cape Crusaders”</a> – wearing the Crusaders’ red or All Blacks’ black replica shirts – support the Kiwi team.</p>
<p>The debate around the Cape Crusaders prominently came into the <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/sport/rugby/2011-06-19-why-i-turned-my-back-on-the-boks/">public eye</a> in 1996 when Trevor Manuel, then South Africa’s Finance Minister, said he supported the All Blacks when they play the Springboks. </p>
<h2>Political and personal choice</h2>
<p>The Cape Crusaders are a sub-culture of South Africans of mixed race, also called <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/article/race-and-ethnicity-south-africa">coloureds</a>, mainly in the Western Cape province. They started supporting the Springboks’ opposition during apartheid: a deeply political and personal choice. </p>
<p>The apartheid government treated coloured people as inferior human beings. The white government brutally <a href="http://overcomingapartheid.msu.edu/multimedia.php?id=65-259-6">evicted</a> them from neighbourhoods around the country, <a href="http://www.saha.org.za/news/2010/February/district_six_recalling_the_forced_removals.htm">moving</a> them far afield from the white areas.</p>
<p>This policy of apartheid manifested in a number of other hurtful, discriminatory <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/dated-event/reservation-separate-amenities-act-no-49-commences">ways</a>. At Newlands for example, coloured people were <a href="http://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/10580588/Ghost-of-apartheid-haunts-Cape-Town-rugby">not allowed</a> to sit with whites. They were allocated their own stand behind the poles; the worst seats at the field.</p>
<p>Some started to support the opposition of the white and mostly Afrikaans-speaking Springboks, who represented and resembled their oppressors. This started with tours by the British and Irish Lions in the 1960s and 1970s. But ultimately the main team to support were the All Blacks, who came to be the Springboks’ big foes in the latter half of the twentieth century.</p>
<p>The support for the All Blacks and also the Crusaders (with eight titles the most successful team in Super Rugby) still <a href="http://www.rugby365.com/article/53012-cape-crusaders-cause-new-row">remains</a> to this day for many coloured people, despite apartheid officially ending in 1994 with South Africa’s first democratic election.</p>
<p>Talk to Cape Crusaders at an All Blacks vs Springboks test match – as I did during the Soweto test in 2012 – and you will hear that their decision is rooted in a personal history of discrimination and oppression. Their decision to support the Crusaders or All Blacks is more often than not rooted in past trauma, such as violence or intense racism perpetrated against their family or community by big, burly white Afrikaans policemen. </p>
<h2>The fatherland begins at home</h2>
<p>The Cape Crusaders’ choice is therefore usually rooted in two reasons: Firstly, because their father or grandfather supports them. The support of a national team is about patriotism for many; but for others, loyalty to your father is more important. This is a motivation for support of sport teams in general. The fatherland begins at home.</p>
<p>Secondly, the Springboks still carry the same symbolic baggage of white Afrikaans oppression to Cape Crusaders. The racial composition of the Springbok squad has <a href="https://www.irishtimes.com/sport/rugby/international/south-african-rugby-still-a-black-and-white-issue-1.2608188">changed</a>. But the rub of the matter is that most men in the team still resemble the former oppressors, even if only physically. </p>
<p>The political but especially the psychological import of this baggage brings back painful memories: of the policemen who came to your door during apartheid and dragged a bloodied family member away in handcuffs, or of the government bulldozers that came to flatten your house.</p>
<p>There is usually a <a href="http://www.sarugbymag.co.za/blog/details/the-cape-crusaders-debate">public outcry</a> in the media about the Cape Crusaders’ continuing support of Kiwi teams. The main gripe is that they are being unpatriotic by not supporting the South African team involved. They are even branded as <a href="https://www.news24.com/MyNews24/Why-South-Africans-support-the-Crusaders-and-the-All-Blacks-20130402">traitors</a>; some say that they should put the past behind them and <a href="http://www.thebounce.co.za/articles/sports/hey-cape-crusaders-it039s-time-to-move-on/3710">just move on</a>.</p>
<p>Statements like these reveal ignorance of the Cape Crusaders’ choice being rooted in a violent and unjust past. It is also too convenient to make such a statement if you or your kin was the former oppressor. And the idea that being South African means you support South African sport teams is far too thin a definition. This kind of talk also treats history as a series of stops and starts, with the view that the end of apartheid in 1994 brought an end to oppression and injustice.</p>
<p>History is a process that continues in the present and many facets of apartheid still continue albeit in a different guise. The past that people speak of is still very much with South Africans, especially in terms of the poverty and domestic trauma found in many coloured communities. A hasty judgement about the Cape Crusaders reveals historical amnesia and simply reinforces racial prejudices.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/87207/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Charles Villet does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>South Africans supporting visiting New Zealand rugby teams took root in a tumultuous time as an expression of defiance against apartheid.Charles Villet, Philosophy Lecturer, Faculty of Social and Health Sciences, Monash South Africa, Monash UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/847072017-10-01T08:06:19Z2017-10-01T08:06:19ZSouth Africa’s National Development Plan can be resuscitated: here’s how<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187863/original/file-20170927-24182-9ookzp.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South Africa's Deputy President, Cyril Ramaphosa and former finance minister Trevor Manuel were instrumental to the making of the country's National Development Plan.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">GCIS</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Something is surely wrong when many influential people endorse or reject a document none of them have read. The document is South Africa’s <a href="https://www.brandsouthafrica.com/governance/ndp/the-national-development-plan-a-vision-for-2030">National Development Plan</a>, which was adopted by Parliament five years ago and is the product of a National Planning Commission which was led by former finance minister Trevor Manuel and current deputy president Cyril Ramaphosa. </p>
<p>The National Development Plan has become almost an article of faith for business leaders and business friendly commentators. In what has become a knee jerk reaction, they routinely <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/business-report/economy/busa-implement-ndp-plans-1468184">demand</a> that the government “implement it”. In an equally knee jerk reaction, unionists, activists and commentators on the left <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/politics/sacp-hits-the-planning-commission-1507352">denounce</a> the plan as a programme to appease business by sacrificing workers and the poor to the market.</p>
<p>But the plan’s praise singers in the market place and its opponents in unions and citizens’ organisations have something important in common: neither has ever read the document which runs to almost 500 pages. If they had, they would know that the label they pin on it does not fit. The plan is not a clear step-by-step programme for change. It is a broad, sometimes internally contradictory, document which is a basis for negotiation far more than a road map.</p>
<p>Those who see the National Development Plan as a coherent document seem to have forgotten the political battle which was triggered when it was initiated by President <a href="https://www.gcis.gov.za/content/newsroom/media-releases/cabinet-statements/president-thabo-mbeki-outcome-july-cabinet-lekgotla">Thabo Mbeki’s administration</a> shortly before Mbeki was removed from office.</p>
<p>The ANC’s alliance partners, the Congress of South African Trade Unions and the South African Communist Party, blamed Mbeki and Manuel for appeasing business. As Cosatu noted in a document released in late 2009, they believed that Manuel would use the National Planning Commission to impose a <a href="http://www.cosatu.org.za/show.php?ID=2518">business friendly approach</a> on government and the alliance. </p>
<p>They suspected, probably correctly, that the Mbeki government had wanted the commission to become the centre of government planning. After Mbeki was replaced by Jacob Zuma, they mobilised successfully against this and the result was an agreement that the commission would simply provide support to government and that the NDP would be not a detailed plan but a broad vision for where the country would want to be in 2030. So the National Development Plan is not a firm plan because it was never meant to be one.</p>
<h2>A mixed bag</h2>
<p>Those who see the plan as a route map tend also to forget that the men and women sitting on the commission represented a range of interests and that it was, therefore, a compromise between them. This partly explains why it offers something to everyone – a point which is clear to anyone who takes the trouble to read it. </p>
<p>One who did is former South African Communist Party deputy general secretary Jeremy Cronin. In a reply to left-wing unions who saw the plan as the work of the devil, <a href="http://www.sacp.org.za/main.php?ID=3829">Cronin argued</a> that it was impossible to endorse or reject the entire document because both the opponents and friends of the market could find support for their positions in it.</p>
<p>Cronin rejected the chapter on the economy, which he saw as too friendly to markets, but endorsed the chapter which saw a key role for the state in changing the shape of the cities and sections which suggested a strong government role in development. If Cronin worked for the Chamber of Business, he would no doubt have endorsed the economic chapter and rejected the passages on the state’s role. The key point in his analysis, however, was that, whichever side of the economic debate you were on, you would find passages in the plan to endorse and others to oppose.</p>
<p>The point was illustrated some years ago when organised agriculture denounced a government proposal for regional land redistribution committees. This, it turned out, came not from the left of the union movement or the friends of state capture but from the ‘business friendly’ National Development Plan.</p>
<p>Why do both sides endorse or reject the National Development Plan without bothering to read it? The answer may well lie in the personalised nature of South African politics. </p>
<p>Business and its supporters trust Manuel and Ramaphosa and so they assume that they must have produced a strongly market friendly document. The left distrust them and so they assume the same thing. This might be amusing if it did not prompt a sterile debate which does nothing to focus minds on what needs to change if the economy is to grow and include many more people. </p>
<h2>Useful bits and pieces</h2>
<p>Even if the National Development Plan was a clear map, it contains so many ideas for change that not even the most efficient government in the world could implement it in less than a decade or two. Given this, when parliament – and the government – promised to implement the plan they could not possibly have been committing to implementing all of it. If they were serious about implementing its economic and social proposals, they would have needed to signal clearly which ones they favoured. And, since this would inevitably have affected the interests of key economic interest groups, they would have needed to negotiate the changes with them.</p>
<p>The government has not done this and so it seems likely that what it does mean is that it will seek to implement those sections of the plan which affect it directly. </p>
<p>The plan might offer something to everyone on social and economic issues but it does also have a clear way to improve how government functions.
By endorsing the document, the government was surely agreeing to take the steps the plan recommended when it discussed how to build a “capable state”.So it makes sense to hold the government to account for the degree to which it has – or has not – implemented the plan’s recommendations on fixing itself. </p>
<p>For the rest, it would make more sense to insist that the government signal clearly which other sections of the document it plans to implement than to insist that it implement (or reject) all of it.</p>
<p>This offers a key to the role the National Development Plan could play in moving South Africa forward. Business, labour and other interest groups are far more likely to find the plan useful if they identify those sections they would like to see implemented and then pressed the government to act on them, using the fact that they appear in the document as a lever. </p>
<p>They will obviously face opposition from those with differing interests but that is how democracy works. The National Development Plan would then be a catalyst for debate and negotiation on details, not a take it or leave it recipe.</p>
<p>Five years on, the National Development Plan could help focus attention on economic change. But only if both sides stop seeing it as a fetish rather than a way of starting a conversation.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/84707/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Steven Friedman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>South Africa’s five-year-old National Development Plan suffers from gross misinterpretation by different parties.Steven Friedman, Professor of Political Studies, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/669692016-10-13T07:57:03Z2016-10-13T07:57:03ZPrexit: as South Africa looks over the abyss who will blink?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/141532/original/image-20161012-16203-1homloc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South Africa's President Jacob Zuma (right) and Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa. The jury is out on whether Ramaphosa will break ranks.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mike Hutchings/Reuters</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Like the lemming that is about to throw itself off the proverbial cliff, South Africa appears unable to stop itself from preventing a self-inflicted act of such monumental folly that it could easily send Africa’s biggest economy into a tailspin. </p>
<p>It has been a long time coming. Nevertheless the announcement that finance minister Pravin Gordhan had been summonsed to appear in court <a href="http://businesstech.co.za/news/government/139621/these-are-the-official-charges-gordhan-faces-and-what-lies-ahead/">on charges of fraud and theft</a> was still shocking. It prompted <a href="https://www.enca.com/money/rand-plunges-as-gordhan-issued-with-summons">a sharp fall</a> in the country’s currency and provoked dismay from market analysts, constitutional watchdogs and political commentators alike. </p>
<p>How things unfold in response to this dramatic event over the coming days will have a huge long-term impact. In turn this will reveal a great deal about the balance of power within the ruling African National Congress (ANC), the prospects of deputy president Cyril Ramaphosa succeeding Jacob Zuma as president of both the ANC and the country, increased political risk and socioeconomic uncertainty, and whether South Africa will be able to avoid a damaging rating agencies’ downgrade before the end of the year. </p>
<p>The announcement has been a long time coming because ever since Zuma was forced on 13 December last year to <a href="http://www.fin24.com/Economy/pravin-gordhan-appointed-minister-of-finance-20151213">re-appoint Gordhan</a> to the position he held in the cabinet between 2009-14, the president has been waging a cold war against his own finance minister. </p>
<p>Five days earlier Zuma had, without any warning, <a href="http://mg.co.za/article/2015-12-09-nhlanhla-nene-removed-as-finance-minister">fired Nhlanhla Nene</a>. He had taken this bold decision to clear the path for the “capture” of the National Treasury, which is widely viewed as the one part of government capable of standing up to attempts by Zuma and his cronies to push through disreputable deals and policies intended to enrich a small group of Zuma insiders at the expense of the national fiscus and the wider population. </p>
<p>This history and context is essential to understanding what is happening now. </p>
<h2>Prosecution or persecution</h2>
<p>In his budget speech in late February Gordhan drew a line in the stand, telling Zuma “no more”. He unveiled a package of reforms essential to South Africa avoiding a downgrade by rating agencies. Such a move would have a dramatically adverse impact on South Africa’s sluggish economy, its prospects for growth, inflation and the cost of borrowing. In short, on the living conditions of the country’s poorest citizens. </p>
<p>Zuma has fought back through loyal proxies such as General Mthandazo Berning Ntlemeza, the head of police’s elite unit, The Hawks, and now, it would seem, the National Director of Public Prosecutions, Shaun Abrahams. It was Abrahams who held a press conference to announce that Gordhan would be charged. This was notwithstanding the fact that Gordhan had been informed in May that he was not a suspect in the Hawks’ investigation and would in any case be given an opportunity to make representations should that situation change. </p>
<p>For seasoned observers, the detail of the charge sheet was revealing. Earlier in the year Gordhan had faced a list of 27 questions relating to the establishment of a so-called “rogue unit” within the South African Revenue Service a decade ago. Gordhan was at that time commissioner of the revenue body. </p>
<p>But the charges Gordhan now faces have nothing to do with the rogue unit. This is probably because there is <a href="http://www.biznews.com/leadership/2016/08/30/hawks-case-against-gordhan-a-legal-sham-expert-insights/">no sound basis for them</a>. </p>
<p>And the goalposts have also been moved in relation <a href="http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/pillay-retirement-entirely-above-board-gordhan-20160824">to the payment of R1m</a> to former deputy commissioner Ivan Pillay. This is the cost to the revenue service of an early payout, which, by all accounts, is a common occurrence in the public sector.</p>
<p>The National Prosecuting Authority was clearly forced to scrabble around for a different legal basis for charging Gordhan and have come up with fraud and theft. These charges will require the state to prove several elements beyond reasonable doubt, making its prospects of success even less likely. </p>
<p>So less of a prosecution and more of a persecution. And an example of what is known as “selective prosecution”. What, then, will happen next? </p>
<p>The assumption is that no-one in the National Prosecurity Authority, including its head Abrahams, seriously believes that they have a sound case. But this does not matter since the primary, and perhaps only purpose, of the charges is to provide Zuma with the pretext to remove Gordhan regardless of <a href="http://ewn.co.za/2016/08/26/HandsOffGordhan-Chorus-of-support-grows">the support he has received</a> from a range of organisations and individuals. These include business leaders, civil society, parts of the ANC and its alliance supporters including the South African Communist Party and the ruling party’s own chief whip, Jackson Mthembu. </p>
<p>All eyes, therefore, are on Zuma. There is no doubt that he is brave and bold enough to fire Gordhan. He may do this in a desperate “last man standing” bid to ward off forces within the ANC that want him to go. The chorus of voices for a change at the top has grown stronger with recent calls from, among others, <a href="http://www.biznews.com/sa-investing/2016/09/07/watch-anglogold-chairman-sipho-pityana-skewers-zuma-as-anc-bigwigs-look-on/">ANC stalwarts Sipho Pityana</a>, Trevor Manuel and Barbara Hogan. Along with others they have <a href="http://www.fin24.com/Economy/manuel-tells-zuma-to-be-honourable-and-quit-20161007">formed a new organisation</a> – Save South Africa – whose sole purpose is to persuade parliament, and the ANC majority within it, to remove their President. </p>
<h2>Who will blink first?</h2>
<p>How will the rest of the ANC leadership and Zuma’s cabinet react?</p>
<p>Attention will also be focused on ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe, who has been consistently vocal in backing Gordhan, and even more so on Ramaphosa, the deputy president of the ANC and the country. </p>
<p>This is a crucial fork in the road moment. Who will blink first? Ramaphosa, backed by Mantashe, needs to abandon his overly prudential approach, and finally make a decisive move. He must insist that Gordhan stays and, if Zuma threatens to fire Gordhan or does so, then Ramaphosa should resign as a matter of principle. </p>
<p>As much as anything, this moment is a test of Ramaphosa’s own leadership. He had a chance to act last December. But he is increasingly viewed as a man who never misses an opportunity to miss an opportunity. It may be now or never for him and for the ANC moderate traditionalists and social democrats who began to find their voice when Nene was fired, but who are persistently out muscled by the venal nationalists on the right of the ruling party, with whom Zuma has increasingly aligned himself. He has done so by exploiting the “transformation” agenda to secure the fidelity of pliable placemen such as Hlaudi Motsoneng at the South African Broadcasting Authority, among others.</p>
<p>The implications for the ANC are profound; it faces its own acute dilemma. Act decisively and force Zuma from power, and it may tear the party apart. Fail to act, and allow him to continue his self-serving project of state capture, and the outcome may be the same, but with even more collateral damage as South Africa plunges into a Brazil-like tailspin caused by overlapping leadership and economic crises, stirred by a militant student movement. </p>
<p>The stakes have not been higher since the heady days of the early 1990s when South Africa also looked over the brink. Now it is less about brink and more about who will blink: Zuma, or Gordhan, or Abrahams or Ramaphosa. Which of these men will do the right thing and accept, or defend, the hard-won principles of constitutional democracy and public accountability that have been so sorely tested since Zuma came to power in 2009?</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/66969/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Richard Calland is a founding partner of The Paternoster Group and Associate Professor at the University of Cape Town. He is author of "Make or Break: How The Next Three Years Will Shape South Africa’s next three Decades".</span></em></p>The stakes have not been higher since the heady days of the early 1990s when South Africa also looked over the brink. Now it is less about brink and more about who will blinkRichard Calland, Associate Professor in Public Law, University of Cape TownLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/521702015-12-10T12:05:52Z2015-12-10T12:05:52ZThe removal of South Africa’s finance minister is bad news for the country<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105253/original/image-20151210-7459-nufxka.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The South African currency, the rand, fell to its lowest level in four years after President Jacob Zuma removed the country's finance minister.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters/Siphiwe Sibeko</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>The fallout from President Jacob Zuma’s decision to remove South Africa’s respected Minister of Finance Nhlanhla <a href="http://mg.co.za/article/2015-12-09-nhlanhla-nene-removed-as-finance-minister">Nene</a> was felt immediately in the foreign currency markets where the rand suffered an immediate and dramatic <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-12-09/south-africa-removes-finance-minister-triggering-slump-in-rand">fall</a>. Caroline Southey, editor of The Conversation Africa, asked Alan Hirsch what the appointment of David van <a href="http://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2015/12/10/Who-is-David-van-Rooyen-The-man-who-must-fill-Nenes-shoes">Rooyen</a> means for the National Treasury and the country’s economy.</em></p>
<p><strong>South African Treasury has been lauded as the best run department in the national government. What gave it that reputation?</strong></p>
<p>Under the leadership of Trevor <a href="http://whoswho.co.za/trevor-manuel-918">Manuel</a>, the Treasury became not only the most outstanding government department in South Africa, but also a <a href="http://www.bdlive.co.za/economy/2015/09/09/south-africa-ranks-high-for-global-budget-transparency">globally recognised</a> high performer.</p>
<p>Manuel and his successive directors general, <a href="http://whoswho.co.za/maria-ramos-1023">Maria Ramos</a> and Lesetja <a href="http://whoswho.co.za/lesetja-kganyago-5083">Kganyago</a>, and their successor Lungisa <a href="http://whoswho.co.za/lungusa-fuzile">Fuzile</a>, built an ethos of teamwork, hard work and recognition for performance. They also paid serious attention to transformation of the leadership of the institution. High performers understood that promotions within the organisation were possible, and were a likely reward for outstanding performance. This led to a culture of the Treasury “growing its own timber” which further strengthened the new organisational culture.</p>
<p>Manuel and the director generals fiercely promoted and defended the organisation and its members, building a culture of loyalty based on trust rather than fear. The result was an organisation with high internal standards and a very high reputation with stakeholders. Its high reputation with stakeholders reinforced its pre-eminence in government. </p>
<p>Its reputation continued through to Nene.</p>
<p><strong>Many developing countries suffer from poor fiscal management. South Africa appears to have broken the mould. Why and how?</strong></p>
<p>It was absolutely critical for the minister to ensure that he had the full political backing from the President and other senior members of the executive. Manuel was able to obtain that. He was helped by the fact that he came into office at a time of debt crises in Latin America and poor macroeconomic performance in other parts of Africa which hammered home the need for strong central management of government finances. </p>
<p>Treasury asserted full control over financial management. The implementation of the recommendations of the <a href="http://www.treasury.gov.za/comm_media/speeches/2002/2002102501.pdf">Katz Commission</a> on tax policy were helpful too. It recommended that taxes should be simplified and that all taxes should go into a central revenue fund to be managed by the National Treasury. </p>
<p>Treasury was further helped by the country’s <a href="http://www.gov.za/documents/constitution/constitution-republic-south-africa-1996-1">constitution</a> which tightly limits the fiscal power of provinces, and cities (though to a lesser extent), and prevents Parliament from writing the budget. Parliament was essentially able to accept or send back a budget, not to amend its details.</p>
<p>But to maintain this newly won authority, the quality of management offered by the revamped National Treasury was critical.</p>
<p><strong>What have been the National Treasury’s two biggest achievements since democracy?</strong></p>
<p>It’s difficult to narrow it to two, but the most obvious achievements were the introduction of a spending framework that encouraged better planning, called the medium term strategic framework, supported by the Public Finance Management <a href="http://www.treasury.gov.za/legislation/PFMA/act.pdf">Act</a> and the Municipal Finance Management <a href="http://mfma.treasury.gov.za/Pages/Default.aspx">Act</a>, and the major repair job of our tax system, which became the South African Revenue <a href="http://www.sars.gov.za/Pages/default.aspx">Service</a>. Better tax collection and more skillful spending led to much greater budgetary discretion in the 2000s, which allowed for political imperatives to be addressed.</p>
<p><strong>What have been its two biggest failures?</strong></p>
<p>One that comes to mind is the integrated financial management system, a centralised and comprehensive software system that was intended to replace the Basic Accounting System. This was hugely over budget and massively behind schedule.</p>
<p>Another was the relative looseness of budgeting in the mid-2000s which meant that the cushion the country had when the 2008 financial crisis hit us wasn’t thick enough. It was politically very unpopular to run a budget surplus, and politically impossible to introduce a strict budget rule.</p>
<p>Thirdly, it could be argued that the introduction and implementation of the home-grown structural adjustment programme; the Growth, Employment and <a href="http://www.treasury.gov.za/publications/other/gear/chapters.pdf">Redistribution (GEAR)</a> programme in 1996 could have been better managed.</p>
<p><strong>What does the appointment of the new minister mean for the future of the National Treasury, and for the country?</strong></p>
<p>Minister Nene was an excellent finance minister who managed the budget carefully and stood up bravely when risks to the country’s financial integrity appeared. <a href="http://www.southafrica.info/news/business/credit-rating-151214.htm#.VmljILh97IU">Statements</a> made by ratings agencies last week hinted that Nene stood between South Africa and junk bond status.</p>
<p>The removal of Minister Nene is a significant act. The fact that he has been replaced by someone who is unknown and untested simply compounds it. The first risk is that the new regime has a massive negative impact on the country’s financial credibility. This will be hard to repair under the current political leadership. It will be even more damaging if the governing African National Congress does nothing to correct the situation.</p>
<p>Secondly, it is widely believed that Nene was removed because he refused to allocate national resources carelessly. There is therefore a distinct possibility that his successor was chosen because he is not expected to be so careful.</p>
<p>The country’s fiscal status could deteriorate, further damaging our reputation. This will further weaken the currency, raise the cost of borrowing and discourage local and foreign investment in an already investment-starved environment. It is a very serious situation.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/52170/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alan Hirsch is director of the Graduate School of Development Policy and Practice at UCT which has received funding for training programmes for public officials from the Treasury.</span></em></p>The removal of Minister Nene is a significant act. The fact that he has been replaced by someone who is unknown and untested simply compounds it.Alan Hirsch, Professor and Director of the Graduate School of Development Policy, University of Cape TownLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.