The ANC - an incompetent government

[Gooner]

By Deon de Lange, Anel Powell and Sapa

"Go to sleep earlier so that you can grow and be cleverer. Boil less water, use the microwave rather than stove, take a shower and not a shallow bath," was Minerals and Energy Minister Buyelwa Sonjica's advice to the country at a special joint parliamentary sitting to discuss the power crisis.

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I'm surprised the Minister didn't suggest the use of primus stoves!

Many of these Ministers in the ANC are way over their heads when it comes to managing their areas of responsibilities. South Africa is a train wreck waiting to happen. The sooner the government seeks the expertize of others overseas in managing key infrastructure projects, such as improving the electricity grid, the better it will be for all of Southern Africa.

Many of us outside SA are observing with interest how the ANC deal with the issues of the day. Many of us have our doubts that your problems of crime, corruption and poverty will show any improvement.

[Bowiefan871]

The ANC is a dangerous government built on the foundations of a former terrorist organization. Now I never took a course on South African history/politics so you could say my knowledge is not exactly rich on the matter, but of all the South Africans I know that are still living in the country(both white and black), none of them like the ANC. In fact they hate the government to the point that they are considering to leave the country. I really don't think there is any hope for South Africa. It is the land of crime.

True fact: Every 17 seconds a woman or child is raped in South Africa.

[Dr KGNKhumalo]

It is no surprise - very few governments are actually competent.

We have Labour here and the Republicans over there. We have none in Belgium and soon there will be none in Italy! None in Somalia and ignoramuses in Sudan. Picksters in Nigeria. I could go on and on!

[Leifur]

"The ANC is a dangerous government built on the foundations of a former terrorist organization. Now I never took a course on South African history/politics so you could say my knowledge is not exactly rich on the matter..."

These words could be out of my own mouth.

This is my first post on this great forum, but I have been interested in the history of Southern Africa for now quite some time, although that interest has increased a lot recently. I recall how all these events were portrayed in the media in those days, even though I was just a kid (a bit of a nerd). If there ever was evil upon this earth it was the old Apartheid government it seemed. From Leathal Weapon where all the bad guys were blond and south africans to Alfred J. Kwak, who fought an apartheid system, it seemed we had the perfect villain. You got the sense that just like few years before the world had got rid of communism the last vestiges of nazism (supporters of Apartheid were often portrayed with the swastica like emblem of the AWB who seemed to be the official emblem of Apartheid by how the pictures were displayed) were being eradicated. Mandela got hero´s (or more like sain´ts like) status for deciding not to have revenge upon the white folks.

Recently this perfect image of liberalism creating a perfect harmony from a war like zone has been shattered in my mind, and the wet dream of the new south africa has become something more of a reality. The funny thing is that the government of ANC keeps this image live and well, f.e. with advertisement campaigns and such, depicting their own political figures in favorable ligh(something not acceptable in the West I believe).

I have realised that the world isn´t black and white, one of those governments wasn´t all bad and the other isn´t all good, but who is? I mean not to absolute the apartheid government, after all they eventually got the country into its current situation by giving a terrorist organization legitimacy by dealing with them, and surely the apartheid government was responsible for a lot of bad things.

But what surprises me the most is how bad bargain they seem to have made with the black community. Today it seems to me from afar that the white and colored community have been completely marginalised and don´t even have control over their own communities and towns. It seems to me, although notably from afar, that they did not do anything to prepare the country for the transition to majority rule.

I mean, after seeing all the bad governments of the rest of Africa, and specially how utterly marginalised all right winged movements had become in countries like Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, Namibia and Mosambique, where leftwinged liberation movements seemed as the victors and thus obviously subsequently won the elections to, I honestly don´t understand what drove them to bargain with the ANC instead of trying to create a right winged movement among the blacks that could be more favorible in the long run, like we see f.e. in Africa´s best run country, Botswana.

But then again in real terms the Nationals weren´t practically right winged at least not economically. So can anyone explain to me what happened, and why they were in such a rush to bargain with the ANC, so soon after they had lost their principal backers, the Soviet union and the Nationals victory seemed at hand against that old foe? Why didn´t they just wait a few more years and try to create a more favoreable situation in post-apartheid South Africa? And what if any preparation did they do while they still had power for their eventual powerlessness?

And what should they have done?

[ches]

Originally Posted by Leifur

But then again in real terms the Nationals weren´t practically right winged at least not economically. So can anyone explain to me what happened, and why they were in such a rush to bargain with the ANC, so soon after they had lost their principal backers, the Soviet union and the Nationals victory seemed at hand against that old foe? Why didn´t they just wait a few more years and try to create a more favoreable situation in post-apartheid South Africa? And what if any preparation did they do while they still had power for their eventual powerlessness?

And what should they have done?

What do you mean a rush? The ANC was formed in 1912, just two years after the Union of South Africa created our country, and they were appealing for human rights, universal suffrage, etc. which the British skipped out the country without guaranteeing. The United Party buffed them off and then in 1948 when the Nats won unexpectedly the ANC's appeals got even louder and were rebuffed ever more violently. By 1961, after nearly 50 patient years of non-violent protest, Sharpeville saw the ANC and it's radical young leadership say "enough is enough" and began the work of forming a resistance army. By the mid-70s, apartheid was in arguably its most brutal stage with wanton killing of resistors habitual, death squads even formed to blackmail and coerce captured MK members into doing the dirty work. Come 1987 when PW Botha very reluctantly met with Mandela it was 75 years into the ANC's struggle for human rights, so again I ask, what do you mean in a rush?

After nearly 50 years of brutal oppression of all resistance movements, the ANC was really the only organization that was in any position to represent the people of South Africa at the negotiating table. People like Sisulu and Mandela had achieve iconic status and were highly revered even by those who were not yet born when they were shipped off to Robben Island. Robert Sobukwe and Steve Biko might have managed to form alternatives to the ANC, but the one was passively killed by the apartheid government, the other more actively being brutally beaten by the security police, left naked with severe brain damage for over 24 hours, and then driven, again naked, in winter, in the open back of a truck 1000 miles to Johannesburg before his body finally succumbed.

Personally I do not think that the ANC has failed - they have more than doubled the economy, for instance. The ANC certainly is not perfect, even before they somehow elected Zuma and his goons to all the leadership positions, and there are definitely many problems still facing South Africans on both ends of the economic spectrum and in the middle too, of course.

Really, the biggest mistake that was made was to let the trade unions, led by the astute negotiating mind of Cyril Ramaphosa, write the constitution. It is next-to impossible to fire someone so companies are very reluctant to hire leading to the huge unemployment, at least in the formal sector. People are hired on as day laborers or "temporary" workers, but not formally and lack job security and any kind of sickness or healthcare benefits. This has cascading effects throughout the economy.

I personally had hoped that reason would prevail and that Ramaphosa could be lured from the private sector back into government and take the position that Mandela had wanted him to hold - as leader of the party and future president - but it was not to be. Perhaps Ramaphosa knew that Zuma's mysterious and incomprehensible to rational minds surge to the top was unstoppable? If anything Zuma says can be believed, I hope that it is that the ANC is bigger than any one person and who is in charge doesn't matter. I hope that whomever was pulling his strings on his world tour prior to the party conference is able to keep his moral and economic corruption in check and our country on track.