Freedom day good news, the bargaining season, Vavi and other matters

Herewith is an extract from my weekly news summary/analysis of what I thought was important in the main weeklies.

Freedom Day, April 27 – nineteen years on from the first democratic election … a good story by-and-large

City Press has a useful op-ed page by the always excellent Ferial Haffajee (who is also the editor) based on the South African Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR) handbook 2012. Interestingly, while SAIRR has become an ever stronger critic of the ANC, CEO Frans Cronje acknowledges that “the last 20 years have seen a revolutionary improvement for all South Africans” – a fact that is apparent from the graphic representations (each one manually scanned from the City Press … so apologies for the quality) below.

Graph above – number of people living on less than $2 a day

Graph above – the (not so gradual) roll-back of Bantu Education – the number of Blacks passing matric grows more in response to changing economic requirement of the labour force.

Graph above – enrolment in tertiary education – significant changes but a long way to go. Notice the growth in African share.

Graph above shows wealth distribution patterns – everyone getting wealthier, although demographics have a strong (even reinforced) apartheid structure

Graph above – the middle class has grown (as far as I can make out from the explanation, this is LSMs 1-10 and how they have fared (grown or shrunk) since 1994 – indicating growth of middle class: bars six and seven.

Graph above: the demographics of wealth ownership improve as everyone gets richer – whites still streets ahead in the stakes and foreign ownership is an interesting outlier.

So what

Worries about an Arab spring, and social unrest are often based on the assumption of intractable negative social trends. Haffajee, a strong social and political critic of government herself, says: “Over the years of covering South Africa’s freedom, I’ve come to learn this about us: We don’t count our lucky stars often enough, nor do we give ourselves credit for the things we do well. Why this is, I am not sure. But the answer probably lies inherent in the way power was peacefully transferred, but not decisively won.” These graphs run counter to popular wisdom in a number of ways, perhaps the most important one to point out for domestic consumption is that the idea that whites are the new oppressed, and the losers in the last 19 years (as argued in powerful sections of the media and Solidarity trade union, for example) is obviously, even elaborately, wrong.

Businesses unanimous in condemning draft Licensing of Business Bill

A proposed bill will force small businesses and traders to register with, and be licenced by, local councils and municipalities (“every greengrocer, car dealer, pharmacy, and livestock seller … it includes every service provider, from lawyers to hospitals and hotels, car parks, airports, freight carriers and advertising agencies” – Free Market Foundation quoted in Business Report, the Sunday Independent’s business section). The report links the bill to the latest Global Entrepreneurship Monitor that shows SA entrepreneurship levels to be the lowest in sub-Saharan Africa.

So what?

The entrepreneurship survey is deeply disturbing – although not wholly surprising and we agree with Business Unity South Africa when it says (as quoted in the same story) that the bill “will … retard the growth and development of SMEs and further harm a sector which is presently struggling with a high business failure rate.” However, we understand the real target of the Department of Trade and Industry which is floating the legislation is to restrict illegal hawking, particularly of the flood of cheap, illegally imported manufactured goods. Legislation often has unintended consequences, which is the reasons there is extensive public consultation before laws are placed on the statue books. The DTI’s instincts are to fiddle in the economy, but its intention here is undoubtedly correct, it just needs to find the best mechanism.

Wage bargaining and the strikes season is upon us

The City Press business section says “major wage talks scheduled for the mining, motor manufacturing and chemical industries haven’t even begun properly.”

“A full blown teachers’ strike is now on the cards after teachers’ union Sadtu last week presented President Jacob Zuma with a 21-page mix of labour and political demands” – City Press (those demands include the removal of Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga and her director-general Bobby Soobrayan.

The Motor Industry Bargaining Council (MIBC), where Numsa dominates sets wages for 160 000 workers in the sector and this year will open with a demand for a 20% across-the-board increase, an industry wide minimum of R6000.00 a month and a ban on labour brokers – later this week.

The Chemical Industry also starts next week (sectors involved are “fast moving consumer goods, glass, industrial chemicals and pharmaceuticals” – City Press.)

The most widely anticipated talks are those coming up in the Chamber of Mines for the gold mining industry (and concurrently in the coal sector) – the first since illegal strikes rearranged the labour landscape and ushered in a plethora of worker committees refusing to work through unions. “The handsome increases some of the mining strikes won last year, by bypassing the formal system, will exercise the minds of everyone at the table …” City Press.

The article also says “the Chamber of Mines is meeting with Amcu again this week to try and arrange its place in the forum … where Amcu will have to share Num’s mandate for the populous lower bands.”

“The plan for a new platinum forum echoing the gold and coal forums at the chamber has not made any progress. This while mining companies will see their standing wage agreements expire this year” – City Press.

So what?

South Africa has a predictable strike season, the timing of which coincides with the expiration of bargaining chamber agreements in different sectors of the economy. Every year it appears that a wave of strikes is enveloping the country, but at some time during the gloom, journalists twig to the fact that this happens every year – much of the flurry in normal and predictable. Strike action during these times can appear to cascade through the economy and we need to be clear what is ‘normal’ and what is ‘abnormal’.  The platinum and agriculture strikes last year were abnormal and have, to an important degree, contributed to destabilising the system – by creating unrealistic base expectations and by encouraging workers to bargain outside of the unions and structures of the central bargaining system. This does lay the grounds for serious uncertainty this year. Adding to the tension is the apparent attempt of Zuma and his strategist and allies in Cosatu to get rid of popular Secretary General Zwelinzima Vavi. As we discuss below, this could contribute to serious disturbance in industrial relations this year – disturbances that are distinctly not part of the normal cycle.

The growing tension in the ruling alliance is putting Cosatu under intense strain

The Sunday Times says it has seen and analysed Cosatu’s schedule of rallies and official speakers for May 1 and argues: “May Day celebrations will once again expose the deep division in Cosatu” – a significant part of the tension concerns Num leaders refusing to address rallies in the Eastern Cape, an important labour sending area for platinum mines and likely strongholds of Amcu where Jacob Zuma’s Num allies are might to be embarrassed, heckled or driven from the stage.

City Press attempted to tote up the “for and against Vavi” unions indicating membership numbers – using figures drawn from the Cosatu 2012 national conference official ‘organisation report’- and it’s own insights into which groups of union leaders are Zuma allies/Vavi critics. It is not an extremely useful exercise because each union has for-and-against sections, with only Numsa and Num being large and significant unions with more clearly defined “for and against” positions. However the forces against Vavi appear to have the numbers if they need them, although it is not clear that this translates directly into votes in the forum that will make the decision.

Pro-Vavi	Membership Numbers	Anti-Vavi	Membership Numbers	Unclear	Membership Numbers
Numsa	291025	Ceppwawu	80658	CWU	18666
Fawu	126930	Num	310382	Sama	7758
Denosa	74	Nehawu	260738	Pawusa	17146
		Popcru	149339	Sadnu	8655
		Satawu	159626	Safpu	593
		Sadtu	251276	Sasawu	67402
				Sasbo	7074
				Sactwu	85025
Total members	418029		820979		212319

So what?

This morning an opinion column written by this analyst exploring attempts by the Zuma allies to get rid of Zwelinzima Vavi will be published in the online newspaper The Daily Maverick. Here is an extract that contains the most salient “so what?” for financial markets:

 “Shafting Vavi could conceivably split Cosatu – and even lead to the formation of a new left or worker-based political party. Take Numsa, all the other trade unions and bits of trade unions that support Vavi and add the individuals and organisations Vavi has been accused of flirting with (in the National Anti-Corruption Forum and earlier in the Civil Society Conference – October 27 2010) and dig out all those leftists long ago alienated from the ANC (think the brilliant and creative Zackie Achmat and those connected to him); go wild and add Amcu and some not yet indiscernible political formation emerging around Amcu or even around Agang … and you have the grounds for a real and serious challenge to the ANC. At the very least shafting of Vavi might not equal clearing Cosatu of his influence. It might equal clearing the ruling alliance of Cosatu … leaving Zuma Incorporated clinging to a fading Num and a few cronies.… it is a risky game. One of the by-products could be another catastrophic year on the industrial relations front. If Cosatu splits, it won’t be a neat division between different unions … the fault lines will run through individual unions and the disturbances generated by the Amcu/Num contest could become a model for the whole economy.”

The SACP joins criticism of the National Planning Commission – final nails in Trevor Manuel’s coffin

To add to the general factional confusion in the Ruling Alliance, close Zuma allies, the SACP has published a discussion paper that has a “sharp, pointed and nuanced interrogation” of the NPC (which produced the much vaunted, in financial markets and by business, National Development Plan).  “We cannot have a free-floating NPC, with an apparent presidential endorsement and using the budget of the presidency” says the SACP discussion document.

So what?

Actually, to my surprise, I agree with the main SACP criticism: the plan “does not have a strong organic link into government and its diverse planning apparatuses and processes.” Without such links, the NDP was always going to be a fig-leaf covering up the paucity of any actually strategy for economic development in the Zuma administration. The SACP can’t hide the fact that what it mostly dislikes about the NPC or the NDP is business’ participation in the formulation of the ideas and that Cosatu is starting to come out ever more critical of the document. I expect the NDP to go the way of a myriad similar (although never quite as thoroughly and carefully wrought) such plans from South Africa’s recent past.

Bits and pieces

• City Press spent a day in the DRC’s Eastern Region with the M23 guerrilla movement, meeting them in Bunagana on the Rwanda border. The UN is deploying a brigade as a result of UN resolution 2008, which accuses the M23 and other rebels of mass rape, murder sprees and of recruiting child soldiers. The M23 insisted to City Press that Khulubuse Zuma (a nephew of the president) won valuable oil concession on the shores of Lake Edward and in exchange Jacob Zuma has committed “elite troops and top-drawer fire power to the UN force to smash M23.” The M23 guerrilla movement is trying to play into South African politics by accusing Zuma – sounds like one group of wolves trying to accuse another to cover up their own predatory behaviour. I have seen no evidence to back the idea that the troops are being sent to protect the Zuma family’s interests.
• The Dina Pule saga continues to become ever more deeply incomprehensible. City Press claims Dina Pule  has alleged that famous soccer club owner Jomo Sono is behind a smear campaign against her to attempt to blackmail her into awarding his (Sono’s) company a the multi-billion rand set-top-box decoder contract. Pule is due to appear before Parliaments ethics and member’s interests committee on Thursday or Friday and the sooner political clarity comes to the telecommunications sector, the better.
• Regional leaders are expected to hold a summit soon to discuss Zimbabwe’s readiness to hold elections, amid warnings that time is running out to ensure the poll is free, fair and credible – Sunday Independent. Lindiwe Zulu, President Jacob Zuma’s foreign policy adviser and a key member of his facilitation team in Zimbabwe confirmed that Zanu-PF had recently thrown up obstacles to ‘proper monitoring’ of the Zimbabwe negotiations. “But she said her team had persuaded Zanu-PF that as SADC was supervising negotiations, it had the right and obligation to attend whatever Jomic (Joint Monitoring and Implementation Committee) meeting it chose to. Zanu-PF conceded the point” – Sunday Independent.
• Senior managers at PetroSA have been accused in the Mail & Guardian of conspiring to loot billions from the national oil company. It is a big story, dense with details and looks extremely damaging to those who stand accused. I will be monitoring the implications.

Cosatu’s splitting headache, the ANC and DA try on new party dresses and those awful Mandelas

In high anxiety at my failure to publish here for several weeks (what with 12 days visiting fund managers in the UK and Europe and new commitments to the Daily Maverick – see here and here for the first two of those) I have decided to again post a modified version of my usually bespoke  ‘SA Political news commentary’ … to show willing; to demonstrate that I am not entirely unembarrassed that my last post, which was also a news commentary, was on March 18.

Perhaps I am edging towards closing down this blog … but I am not quite done yet, and for those who have stuck with me this long, I thank you.

So here,  written to a deadline of 06h30 yesterday, slightly modified for my hanging-by-a-thread website:

SA Political News update 23/04/2013

Cosatu and the ruling alliance: corruption claims and counterclaims

According to the Mail & Guardian (April 19-25), the battle for control of Cosatu is becoming ever more vicious. The article states that behind the noise is an apparent attempt by the ANC to close down a powerful left faction in Cosatu that has been critical of both corruption and the alleged adoption of ‘pro-business’ policies by the ANC and government. The main issues over which the battle is playing out are:

• Allegations made (according to the M&G) by “an informal caucus … of senior leaders from Nehawu, the NUM, Popcru, Sadtu, Cepawu [they mean CEPPWAWU, I think - ed], the SACP and the ANC[1]” that Zwelinzima Vavi, the popular Cosatu Secretary General, has engaged in corrupt activity and is disloyal to the ANC-led alliance, including by failing to adequately support Jacob Zuma for re-election at Mangaung.
• A flood of accusations made through the Cosatu linked NGO Corruption Watch that many of the leaders of unions involved in attacking Vavi are themselves corrupt – Mail & Guardian in a story that works more by insinuation rather than actual content – see here  for the story that was later denied by Corruption watch here).
  
• The proposal made by Fawu (Food and Allied Workers Union) for a special Cosatu congress to resolve this issue, opposed by the group named in the first bullet, but supported by Numsa, Samwu and several smaller unions[2].
• Support for and against the National Development Plan.

So what?

Business might be tempted to fold its arms and sit back and delight that the old ‘thorn in the side’ Cosatu is being riven by tension. However, it is worth recalling that some industrial relations consultants also delighted in the emergence of Amcu in the platinum sector as a counter to Num for similar reasons – and look how that played out. The serious political conflict in Cosatu could as easily result in higher levels of labour unrest, with higher levels of unpredictability, in a wide variety of industries than in a generally more compliant labour movement. Several multi-year wage agreements are coming up for review before the end of this year (including in the automobile, chemical, gold mining, coal mining, retail motor industry and tyre sectors – which historically have been trendsetters – Business Times). Add to this my uncertainty as to whether the tight three-year public sector wage agreement set last year will hold under strain caused by a combination of:

• the (welcome) reforming zeal of Public Service and Administration Minister Lindiwe Sisulu,
• government’s apparent attempt to roll back the power of the South African Democratic Teachers Union, and
• the generally difficult economic circumstances for union members,
• the successes of the wildcat strikes, particularly in the platinum sector last year, perhaps having established a new baseline for increase expectation throughout the economy

and it is not inconceivable that we could have another year of potentially devastating labour unrest.

If the government’s (and the ANC’s) intention was to have a showdown with organised labour over economic growth and stability that would be one thing. But I suspect that the evident intervention in Cosatu is based on the sectarian interests at the ruling faction of the alliance rather than in any real desire to pursue the national good. If that faction faction successfully expels Vavi they might precipitate a split in Cosatu and the long awaited formation of a new ‘left’ political formation … and just by the act of pushing, through what appears to be a dirty tricks campaign, for this outcome the ruling faction risks rapidly escalating labour unrest.

The DA and the ANC try on their best dresses (or maybe not)  for Election 2014

The DA has launched a campaign attempting to burnish its anti-apartheid credentials, including publishing a pamphlet with a picture of Nelson Mandela embracing deceased party stalwart Helen Suzman under the caption: “We played our part in opposing apartheid”.

At the same time, the Mail & Guardian has published excerpts of what it calls ‘draft DA election material’ which explicitly compares the ANC to the National Party. The M&G’s quotes from the draft document include the arguments that under Zuma’s ANC there is a “rise of Zulu nationalism and racist rhetoric” and “as was the case with apartheid, the ANC is using the police to suppress criticism of its government”.

In the City Press and Sunday Independent, the ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe has separate opinion pieces that argue that the DA’s attempt to appropriate Nelson Mandela is “an abuse of the human and humble character of this icon”. He adds that the DA “remains a brazen advocate for white domination and privilege, and for elaborate schemes for its retention in the guise of liberal policies”.

So what?

The general election next year is likely to be messy and disruptive – sustaining the apparently endless flow of unsettling news coming out of South Africa. From this far out it appears possible that the ANC will be arguing that the electoral issues are essentially identical to what they were in 1994 (white domination and the legacy of apartheid) and that the DA will be arguing that that is just an excuse for delivery failure – it would be difficult to conjure up a more divisive and unhelpful framing of the issues 20 years after the first democratic election.

The unravelling of the Mandela legacy

The weeklies have a flood of stories that pick away at the fabric of the Mandela story. A reality TV show “Being Mandela” is reviewed in the Sunday Times under the heading “Opening up the canned Mandelas – comic kugels[3] help deflate the myth”. The show “unveils the vacuous, pampered lives of two of Nelson Mandela’s grand-daughters, Zaziwe Dlamini-Manaway and Swati Dlamini” – Sunday Times.

The Sunday Independent leads with a review of “struggle stalwart” Amina Cachalia’s new book “When Hope and History Rhyme” in which, among many other matters, she reveals aspects of her own alleged romantic relationship with Nelson Mandela post his marriage to Graça Machel.

All of this comes as a bitter fight among Mandela’s children (with, among others, Nelson Mandela nominees George Bizos and Tokyo Sexwale) for control of various trusts that Nelson Mandela set up on his children’s behalf comes to a head in the Johannesburg High Court – The Sunday Tribune.

So what?

There may be some inherent advantages to the exposing of myths and legends as … myths and legends – but there really appears to be no upside to this depressing deflation. None of these stories changes the reality of the 94 year old South African former president’s contribution to the South African democracy and state-craft in general, but the incessant exposure does add to the gathering gloom around the South African story.

Bits and pieces

• The Youth Employment Accord has finally been signed after three years of squabbling in the National Economic Development and Labour council (Nedlac). Not unexpectedly, it does not include a youth wage subsidy in the form of a tax-break for companies employing first time youth workers. Frankly, at first glance, the accord, as reported in the Sunday Independent, Sunday Times and City Press appears vague enough to leave some confusion as to how it might result in its proposed creation of 5 million jobs for youth by 2020. No real surprises there.
• The weeklies were full of scholarly – and not so scholarly – debate about the resignation of Judicial Services Council member Izak Smuts. The debate boils down to whether there is a tension between the quality of judicial appointments and the need to make the judiciary more demographically representative. This is an intrinsically South African debate that cuts across every sector of society and will likely be with us for many years to come – for better or for worse.
• ANC MP, Ben Turok, explains in the Sunday Times the terms of reference and limitation of the nine member “inquisitorial” panel appointed by parliament to investigate the “ethical conduct and conflicts of interest, potential or otherwise” of Communications Minister Dina Pule with regard to the various allegations that she has allowed her romantic partner to make significant capital out of her ministerial post. That parliament is investigating this matter can only be a good – albeit long overdue – thing.

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[1] In order in which it appears in the quote, and supposedly constituting an anti-Vavi, pro-NDP, pro Zuma  faction: the National Education Health and Allied Workers’ Union, the National Union of Mineworkers, the Police and Prison Civil Rights Union, the Chemical Energy Paper Printing Wood and Allied Workers Union, the South African Communist Party and the African National Congress

[2] And this group, supposedly constituting the pro-Vavi, anti-NDP faction, anti Zuma faction: National Union of Metal Workers of South Africa and the South African Municipal Workers Union (plus a host of smaller unions including the Food and Allied Workers union).

(Note for both footnotes 1 and 2 – it is undoubtedly more complicated than this, but we need to start somewhere to attempt to make sense of the chaos.)

[3] Wikipedia (accessed 22/04/2013) explains the use of this term in South African slang as follows: “Amongst South African Jews, the word “kugel” was used by the elder generation as a term for a young Jewish woman who forsook traditional Jewish dress values in favour of those of the ostentatiously wealthy, becoming overly materialistic and over groomed, the kugel being a plain pudding garnished as a delicacy. The women thus described made light of the term and it has since become an amusing rather than derogatory slang term in South African English, referring to a materialistic young woman.”

Zuma’s brittle grip tightens

Early on Monday mornings I send my clients a review of the previous week’s political news which might be of relevance to financial markets.

This morning I thought the issues were of more general interest.

Thus …

Summary:

It is difficult not to see the main items in this review as connected:

• The ANC yesterday disbanded its Youth League’s executive and the executive of its Limpopo provincial structure – both epicentres of the unsuccessful campaign against Zuma in the lead up to Mangaung;
• An investigation into Cosatu secretary general Zwelinzima Vavi’s affairs and political loyalties deepens and widens – although, just because it is a stitch-up doesn’t mean there is no fire within the smoke;
• Zuma’s approval rating among city dwellers drops to an all-time low and disapproval ratings rises to an all-time high.

Main body text:

ANC disbands its Youth League executive soon after axing its Limpopo Provincial Executive Committee

Yesterday, it was reported that at its 4 day legotla [1], the ANC National Executive Committee disbanded, as expected, the Provincial Executive Committee of the party in Limpopo. More surprisingly the NEC of the ANC then went on to axe the NEC of the ANC Youth League – which most observers had thought abased itself adequately to Jacob Zuma after failing to unseat him at the Mangaung national conference. (Note I am reliant on news reports for this … the ANC NEC is due to hold a press conference at 12h00 today where it will give a fuller report.)

So what

The Limpopo ANC and the ANC Youth League were the launching pads of the challenge against Jacob Zuma that had been led by Julius Malema. Disguising itself behind the ‘nationalisation of mines’ call and funding itself through tender abuse in Limpopo the challenge peaked in mid-to-late 2011, just before Julius Malema was suspended. While the leaders of the ANC Youth League were clearly surprised by their axing yesterday, they can probably count themselves lucky that they are not being taken down the same path as their erstwhile leader Julius Malema, which might well end in prison for corruption charges.

While the Limpopo ANC, and to a lesser degree the ANC Youth League NEC, were riddled with corruption, it would be a very generous interpretation of what happened yesterday to see it as a “clean-up” of the ruling party. The  more appropriate prism would be to understand this as an attempt to get rid of centres of resistance to the leadership of Jacob Zuma and the faction he represents. In a less jaundiced view, it is also an attempt to establish a basic degree of coherence in the party before the national elections which will be held midyear 2014.

Cosatu – 3 commissions to investigate Vavi

Zwelinzima Vavi is facing 3 simultaneous commissions into aspects of the criticism that members of Cosatu’s national executive committee made against him two weeks ago – including that he has been involved in corrupt activity and that he is disloyal to the ANC. This comes against the backdrop of ANC secretary general, Gwede Mantashe, attacking Cosatu for failing to defend the ANC against “a neoliberal agenda” and he has warned that anarchy is taking root in Cosatu: “my conclusion is that Cosatu is on a dangerous downward slope” – (Mail & Guardian March 15). (This added after publication – Carol Paton, in her excellent article in Business Day about this matter a few hours ago said: “One of the most distasteful dimensions of Cosatu’s internal fight has been the partial role played by several journalists, who have published information from parties to the conflict designed to smear Vavi. For example, allegations have appeared in the press to the effect that Vavi sold Cosatu’s former headquarters for R10m less than the market price. But such a direct allegation has not been made in a Cosatu meeting.

So what?

The answer is best provided by a quote from “a senior Cosatu leader” in the same article: “All this is a smoke screen. The main cause of divisions in Cosatu is ANC and SACP politics. The two organisations are trying hard to capture Cosatu, but Vavi is the obstacle. He is the only one prepared to defend the interest of workers. Dealing with him will ensure that they capture the federation.”

Not unlike the decision by the ANC NEC to close down internal opposition in Limpopo and in the Youth League, at least part of what is happening in Cosatu is an attempt to close down criticism of Zuma (especially after Vavi called for an investigation into the R230 million state spending on Zuma’s home in Nkandla) and criticism of the ANC more generally. This is the Nkandla faction crushing the last vestiges of the attempts to unseat Zuma at Mangaung – as well as an attempt to establish coherency in the ruling alliance in the lead-up to national elections next year.

(The allegations against Vavi – aside from ‘collusion with opposition’ parties – includes that he sold Cosatu’s old head-office for R10 million less than its market value and that he awarded a tender to a company at which his stepdaughter was employed. Just because there are other agendas at play, says nothing of the veracity or otherwise of these charges. Vavi himself has welcomed the commissions, stating that he believes they will clear him of all charges – although, interestingly, he attempted, unsuccessfully, to have ANC stalwart Pallo Jordan and Minister of Economic Development, Ebrahim Patel as commission leaders.)

(This added after publication: Carol Paton writing in Business Day argued a few hours ago as follows: “One of the most distasteful dimensions of Cosatu’s internal fight has been the partial role played by several journalists, who have published information from parties to the conflict designed to smear Vavi. For example, allegations have appeared in the press to the effect that Vavi sold Cosatu’s former headquarters for R10m less than the market price. But such a direct allegation has not been made in a Cosatu meeting.” I wish I had put that  in earlier.)

 

Zuma approval rating among city dwellers drops to all time low

The Sunday Times reports that President Jacob Zuma’s approval rating among urban dwellers is lower than ever and his disapproval ratings are at their highest – and, in general, views are firming up on this matter.

%	Apr ‘09	Jun ‘09	Sep ‘09	Nov ‘09	Feb ‘10	May ‘10	Sep ‘10	Nov ‘10	Feb ‘11	Mar ‘11	Sep ‘11	O/N ‘11	Feb ‘12	Apr ‘12	Aug ‘12	Feb ‘13
Approve	52	57	53	58	43	51	42	49	49	48	45	55	55	46	48	41
Disapprove	29	13	19	23	41	33	44	34	35	38	41	38	35	46	44	51
Don’t know	19	31	28	12	17	16	15	17	16	14	14	14	10	8	8	9
Net positives	+23	+24	+34	+35	+2	+18	+2	+18	+2	+15	+14	+1	+20	0	+4	-10

Zuma’s approval ratings amongst city dwellers over time (TNS Research)

TNS conducted home interviews with “1290 blacks, 385 whites, 240 coloureds and 115 Indians and Asians.”[2]  54% of black people were still happy with Zuma’s performance, but only 13% of whites. The president still has 64% of the vote from “younger Zulu-speaking adults, of whom 64% – down from 71% in August last year – were happy with his work” (Sunday Times).

An important indicator comes near the end of the story: “Zuma’s biggest drop in approval was recorded in Soweto, where the figure of 42% was the lowest since he assumed office. The Port Elizabeth figure of 22% was also an all-time low.”

So what?

National general elections must be held some time between April and July in 2014. For the first time “born frees” (young people born after 1994) will be eligible to vote. This first wave of born frees will consist of approximately 6 million people, “using the 76% turnout of the 2009 elections, these new voters could make up more than 20% of the vote by 2014 … for context, the Democratic Alliance won 17% of the vote in 2009. From 2014 onward, the born-frees will come in waves of just over 5-million each national election until they make up nearly half of the voting population by 2029” -  (Osiame Molefe in the online news source Daily Maverick).

There is growing excitement that, perhaps, this category of voter, and urban African voters more generally, might be open to political choices unthinkable only a few years ago. Much of the growing expectation in the Democratic Alliance and the energy behind Agang comes from this source. Could younger and urban voters (especially Africans) vote for a party other than the ANC in 2014?

Jacob Zuma has established a rigid hold on the ANC, but the TNS and other market research could indicate that it is precisely this victory that makes the ANC a less appetising choice for younger and urban voters. If Jacob Zuma leads the ANC in an election in which the ruling party gets much less than 60 % of the vote, his hard but brittle hold on the party could shatter.

ANC strategists are seriously worried about both the Eastern Cape (especially, but by no means exclusively, the Nelson Mandela Bay metropolitan area) and the Northern Cape. The idea of whole of the Cape (Western Cape is already in Democratic Alliance hands) in opposition hands and a party the equivalent to the Movement for Democratic Change in Zimbabwe giving the ANC a run for its money in urban areas throughout the country is a nightmare scenario.

Analysts have consistently been surprised at how well the ANC has performed in national elections (62.65% in April 1994, 66.35% in June 1999, 69.69% in April 2004 and 65.90% in April 2009) so treat any wild predictions with a degree of scepticism. However, the TNS survey of Jacob Zuma’s ratings is an indicator that shifts are in progress .

Bits and pieces

• Business Times quotes a succinct put-down by Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan of the ratings agencies: “[You must] understand that we in South Africa did not create this crisis …when … the financial sector began to create … derivatives, based on sub-prime mortgages … [they] had an AAA rating given to them by the same agencies.” Last week S&P affirmed South Africa’s foreign currency sovereign credit rating at BBB and kept the outlook negative, arguing that external imbalances and underlying social problems remain.
• All the major weeklies expressed deep levels of concern about what they see as out-of-control police violence in the country – most obviously evinced in the killing of Mozambican taxi driver Emidio Macia in Daveyton, but also brought into public focus by police commissioner Riah Phiyega’s spoon-fed testimony to the Markikana commission on Thursday last week. Police minister Nathi Mthethwa is one of Zuma’s closest allies and his department is, truly, in a parlous and dangerous state.

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[1] A word in South African English borrowed from Sesotho, usually meaning a consultation or community meeting with government and the community or within a political party

[2] Categories and language routinely used in South Africa where the racial categorisation of the past is correctly understood to have a significant influence in the present and is routinely used in the media and academic analysis.

Cosatu, the Democratic Alliance and the middle classes – is it love, actually?

Think of the various interests of classes and groups in our society as constituting an ecology in which political parties and organisations find niches to graze, hunt and be sustained.

The system can change and niches shift, narrow or broaden –  and in response the denizens that live in each niche must adapt or become extinct.

Alternatively, major fauna can begin to change for other systemic (or extra-systemic?) reasons and new spaces and niches close or open in response.

And a shockwave goes through the ecosystem and a number of species appear and/or rabidly (oops) rapidly evolve, while others disappear.

Like all metaphors this one is going to break down the closer it gets to the real world, but I think something like this is happening to our political ecosystem – as the ANC’s DNA drifts towards the lumbering, complacent and patronage-networked side of the spectrum.

The gaps that are opening are in the middle classes, in the cities and amongst urban professionals – niches which (that?) are being vacated by the ANC as it settles its rump into the comfort of a sort of conservative, patriarchal, kleptocratic, bureaucratic and ethnic politico-ecological pouf-cushion.

I make  this observation as I watch (on eNews channel) the DA marching on Cosatu’s head-office in Johannesburg in a historical reversal of roles that I am struggling to get my head around.

I saw a Twitter post from Ranjeni Munusamy last night in which she said: “After the #DAmarch tomorrow, maybe nuclear powers will march to Greenpeace offices. Will make just as much sense”.

I get her dismay completely, but I suspect that is just my old assumptions about the shape of our political ecology dominating my brain.

Why shouldn’t the DA be going up directly against Cosatu?

They are, increasingly, competing for exactly the same constituency - the constituency recently, in effect, vacated by the ANC.

That is what all this business about Zille attempting to recruit Vavi into the DA has been about.

They have been flirting - because they feel how close they are to each other – and now they are fighting, for exactly the same reasons.

On Sunday Ferial Haffajee wrote an extremely interesting piece in her City Press, pointing out that Cosatu is increasingly dominated by public sector unions  - and therefore increasingly represents “a middle”, rather than “a working” class.

The story uses this graphic:

… which I think comes from a Uasa Federation study by economist Mike Schussler that points out that the employed in south Africa enjoy relatively good living conditions with an average salary of R13 200 and further that public sector workers are significantly better off than their private sector counterparts.

Haffajee writes:

Cosatu has created a middle class where one did not exist in the 18 years of democracy. That it is funded by the public purse (funded in turn by you and I, the taxpayers) is neither here nor there. What is remarkable is how a federation that started as decidedly blue collar has altered the identity and social position of its members so quickly and so effectively that it could turn the public policy of tolling on its head.

So what is happening right now?

There is an inevitable frisson in the relationship between Cosatu and the DA.

Cosatu and the Democratic Alliance border the niches vacated by the ANC, namely the unemployed and the middle classes. (The unemployed and the middle classes, perhaps more than any other groups, have  the most to lose from the ANC’s, at best squandering, at worst looting, of societal resources available for growth and relief.)

As the opposing crowds gather in the streets of Johannesburg, the blue DA marchers versus the red Cosatu defenders - those for the youth wage subsidy and those against it – we might be expected to conclude that these are bitter class enemies.

I still think not – to my eyes I cannot distinguish them ethnically or class-wise … (but I accept that I might just not have cracked those codes).

The ANC – as well as agents of the state, I think – will strive mightily to prevent Cosatu from finding the DA – and vice versa.

As romantic literature suggests, love and hate lie alongside each other like geological strata – always in the process of metamorphosing, one into the other.

(Note – I think my various metaphors here don’t adequately take account of the differences in Cosatu – and ultimately break down on that point. I do think the public sector side of the federation is more middle-class and the private sector side more radical and competitive. However it is easier for the ANC to keep the public sector unions – the DA’s natural allies in class terms – on side because, ultimately, those unions are dependent on the state budget over which the ANC has control. Obviously there is a cost involved in the ANC buying off those middle class unions, and it is a cost ultimately borne by the unemployed … but that is an argument for another post. I am not sure if the DA will be able to capitalise on this contradiction, but it is not impossible that is precisely what the party is trying to do in Johannesburg as I write this.)

Pictures of a possible future

I occasionally publish slides that I have used for clients as part of my attempt to examine political and investment risks to them.

Below are 3 from a presentation I delivered soon after the ANC NGC.

See if you can identify all the people concerned – a sort of politics general knowledge test ( you know the ones: if you score 10 you are probably a CIA/MI5 agent; if you score 9, then get a life and stop obsessing about politics …. if you score 2 you are living in a special care facility etc.)

As an aid here is a link to Stalking horses at the NGC – the blog I posted at the time. To help refresh your memory ‘the NOM’ was meant to describe the group that had coalesced around the ANC Youth League’s call for the nationalisation of mines.

Stalking Horses at the NGC

I have been sickly and trying to pay the bills.

All my ‘paid for’ commentary on the NGC is done and I can finally get back to home ground where I feel more comfortable to make some wild accusations – and I will, finally, be more explicit in this post about who I think the bad guys are and who I think the less bad guys are.

At the outset, forgive me; this is long and requires a degree of effort to plough through. I believe your efforts will be rewarded in the end – but I would think that, wouldn’t I?

The NGC, just like the world itself,  becomes a cacophony, impossible to follow and impossible to interpret, without a guiding theory or a framing shape to look through.

The “theory” I am going to use here is that the NGC was the terrain on which two broad factions in the ruling alliance clashed. How you slice-and-dice a thing, conceptually, is always important for what you conclude, so much of what appears below is an attempt to unpick what and who those ‘factions’ consist of.

To think that what was happening at the NGC was “about” the nationalisation of mines call will lead to ‘error’ (you can see Lenin in my heritage when I use terms like that). Instead the NGC was “about” a more fundamental and complex power struggle.

The picture is additionally complicated when we consider that there were over 2000 delegates at the NGC (1500 from branches, 500 from the leagues/Cosatu/SACP/SANCO/PECs and 800 deployees/non-NEC ministers/DGs/premiers/CEO’s of SOE’s) and the interplay was vast and varied.

So instead of trying to cover everything I am going to look through the prism of an alleged power struggle between two broad factions or groups of interest.  This will ultimately be another attempt to “follow the money”.

Here then is the prism through which I believe it is most useful to look:

1. The ‘nationalisation of mines’ (NOM) call was always a “stalking horse”. The term “stalking horse”  refers originally to  “a horse behind which a hunter hides while stalking game” (WordNet) and is defined in Wikipedia as “a person who tests a concept with someone or mounts a challenge against them on behalf of an anonymous third-party … if the idea proves viable and/or popular, the anonymous figure can then declare their interest and advance the concept with little risk of failure … if the concept fails, the anonymous party will not be tainted by association and can either drop the idea completely or bide their time and wait until a better moment for launching an attack.”  Oh yes, I love the language.
2. The ‘nationalisation of mines’ call (hereafter called NOM because in fact, it has less do with policy and more to do with power) is best understood as the political platform of a particular alliance of groups and individuals and interests that has as its objective the winning  to power in the commanding heights of the ANC and the South African State. The NOM is therefore something more (and less) than a policy proposal. It is a contingent strategy for winning power – and getting the ANC to nationalise the mines would be a desirable side-affect for some of the participants.
3. The first part of the NOM is the Youth League’s own specific ambitions, which have most obviously been expressed as a campaign to elevate Fikile Mbalula to the position of Secretary General of the ANC – the position currently occupied by Gwede Mantashe. Mantashe is despised by the League for a number of reasons, but mainly because he is part of those who believe the ANC Youth League is part of an ambitious rent seeking agenda. The League considers itself to be a “king maker” in ANC electoral processes and the organisation has energy and mobility and time to move quickly around the country to influence decisions at a branch and provincial level – a feature it demonstrated successfully at and in the lead-up to Polokwane.
4. The second part of the NOM are those mining tycoons who want their BEE deals bailed out by the taxpayer. Who could have failed to notice the unified voices of those gleaming billionaire siblings Patrice Motsepe and Bridget Radebe as well as Minister of Housing Tokyo Sexwale backing the NOM in the lead-up to the NGC or at the conference itself?
5. The third part of the NOM is the election campaign of Tokyo Sexwale to succeed Jacob Zuma. Has he specifically funded and backed the ANC Youth League so that it can be deployed in its traditional role of “king-maker” on his behalf – or because he wants his BEE deals bailed out … or both? It is impossible to prove – either that he has passed money/business/tenders the way of the League or why he might have done so – but that he has done so – with the intention of becoming president – is clearly the view of most of “the left” in the tripartite alliance.
6. The clearest unifying principle behind the NOM and the most distinct characteristics of its participants is that they are first in the queue to gouge a rent out of the ANC’s economic transformation agenda. The nationalisation of mines call is tailor-made for the broader agenda of the NOM:  there are real material benefits for the backers, it allows the policy bereft Youth League to appear radical and pro-poor – and anti-white capitalist – to its potential supporters; it forces the current top leadership under Zuma (for the sake of investment and economic stability) to deploy itself to defend against something that would naturally appeal to the rank-and- file’s populist instincts.
7. So who is the NOM challenging? Essentially “the incumbents”, which at one level just means Jacob Zuma, but at another level means everyone who has assumed a leadership role in government, party and the Tripartite Alliance as a consequence of Jacob Zuma’s elevation as well as the ideas and policies that have come to be crafted by that incumbent group.
8. The “incumbents” should also be conceived of as including all those tenderprenuers, Nkandla hangers-on and Zuma family members whose fortunes are linked to the fortunes of the incumbent leadership.
9. Do the members of the NOM even know who they are or what they are part of? Mostly they do – because there is an increasingly bitter conflict, for example, between the ANC Youth League and the SACP. When powerful factions clash, they strengthen themselves, make themselves more defined; they force anyone and any issue into the framework of their clash. We saw this in the Cold War, but more recently and specific to the groups here, we saw this in the struggle to stop Mbeki and elevate Zuma. eventually everyone knew whether they were “for” or “against” the motion. Attempts to stay sane, principled and above the fray are inevitably MIA in this kind of overblown factional dispute.

Given that framework, what actually happened?

NOM preparation

Firstly, the NOM did extensive (but insufficient) spade work around the policy that fronts their agenda. Julius Malema and Floyd Shivambu have been on an extended road trip, selling the idea for over a year. They have written for newspapers and addressed conferences. Malema threatened to withdraw Youth League support from any leader who did not support the call. The Youth League attended all provincial preparation conferences for the NGC and was successful in getting its view represented in every delegation from every part of the country. There are extensive reports that members were instructed to infiltrate ANC branches and emerge later as NGC delegates. The style associated with “winning” this view at various conferences was a combination of exclusive focus on the issue and heckling, booing and threatening any opposition – in the now time-honoured traditions of the League and its members.

What the financial backers of the NOM and members of the broader NOM agenda were doing in the lead-up to the NGC should not be underestimated. Individual backers of the NOM have extremely extensive resources. Such wealth and power gives individuals the ability to reach people and process far from themselves – and snap them like a twig.

Incumbent preparation

It is difficult to say how much work the incumbents did. I have made the assumption that securing the Tripartite Alliance was key to the incumbents preparing for the onslaught they knew was coming at the NGC. In this context the brokering of the ending of the public sector strike and the carefully worded apology from Cosatu to the Zuma/government for the language workers and their leaders had used during the strike was, in part, an attempt to establish the ground for a united front against the NOM agenda at the NGC. Comprises and certain concession were probably made to “the left” – but I will discuss this in the conclusion.

The NGC opening – political and organisational reports

Jacob Zuma’s Political Report and Gwede Mantashe’s organisational report were interesting for a number of important reasons but what is relevant for this post is both reports were correctly interpreted as a significant shot across the bows of the NOM. We can all delight in the fact that Winnie Mandela had to physically comfort the distraught Julius Malema after the dressing down he received during Jacob Zuma’s opening Political Report and take to heart her now immortal words ” … every parent is allowed to talk to their children … Every organisation is like a parent.”

Commission 5 victory and then plenary defeat

The sighs of relief ‘the incumbents’ might have breathed after the NOM’s early humiliation were soon replaced by anxiety when the NOM decided to put all of its eggs in one basket (this is one time that cliché is justified) by sending 45 of the Youth League’s 66 delegates to the Wednesday economic transformation commission. It appears that all supporters of the NOM including Tokyo Sexwale and several other BEE mining tycoons flooded the commission to ensure a particular outcome. The best article in the public domain I have seen about the commission is by Moipone Malefane and Caiphus Kgosana in The Sunday Times of September 26 – catch it here.

Joel Netshitezhe , Lesetja Kganyago  (DG in the Treasury),Trevor Manuel, Enoch Godongwana (Deputy Minister Public Enterprises) and old stalwart on this issue, Jeremy Cronin, were amongst the key ANC intellectual and economic thinkers who tried to hold the line at the meeting. Their appeal for thoughtfulness and care around an issue likely to costs government hundreds of billions of Rand were reportedly overwhelmed with bullying, heckling and unthinking repetition of the demand: adopt the call, as we have defined it, as policy!

Without having seen the exact statement that emerged from this commission it is clear that the Youth League (and everyone else present) was under the impression that they had scored a clear victory and the inner cabal reportedly headed off to the Hilton Hotel to celebrate victory in the style to which they had become accustomed.

The ANC Youth League’s (and the NOM’s) celebration was premature. The next day at the plenary session of the NGC Minister Geoff Radebe (husband of Patrice Motsepe’s sister, Bridget, and someone who had expressed support for the basic premise of NOM earlier) delivered a watered down version of the results of Commission 5 – and the ANC Youth League leaders exploded, ultimately sealing their fate by appearing to storm the stage in an aggressive manner.

Conclusion

Ultimately, through the support of delegates from across the alliance at the plenary, a watered down version of Commission 5 carried – essentially calling for thorough cross-country comparison and analysis of nationalisation as part of government’s ability to influence economic growth patterns in favour of the poor and unemployed. This study was mandated to report back to the 2012 Bloemfontein/Mangaung 100th centenary elective National Conference.

In the end it was not ‘the incumbents’ that were overwhelmed by the “shock and awe” campaign of the NOM. In the end it was the NOM that lost the skirmish – they overestimated the efficacy of their own preparation and they underestimated the coherency of the opposition – as well as degree of anger that is now widespread towards the ANC YL and its leaders.

The paucity of facts in the public domain does not relieve us of the obligation to think about what may be going on and develop a view as to the potential risks involved in any situation. Wile E Coyote might have said ‘what we don’t know can’t hurt us’, as he wandered over another cliff, but in the real world what we don’t know can sometimes be deeply threatening. So the explanations I have given here are my best attempts to muster an explanation for as much of the story as possible. I am sure that at some point in the future some of the guesswork and necessary assumptions might prove misguided – but that is life in the threat analysis business.

Three final points;

Firstly, it is okay to delight in the set-back of a particularly voracious self-enrichment agenda at the ANC NGC. But it is important not forget that the conference left unscathed similar agendas in many other places in ANC and affiliated ranks, including in the Zuma family itself.

Secondly, the defeat of the NOM is a tactical, tangential issue. Like the Governator, they’ll be back.

Finally, the victory was bought at the expense of some kind of compromise with “the left”. I expect the upcoming Cabinet review of a New Growth Path to be more sympathetic to a host of issues traditionally seen as part of an SACP or Cosatu platform (including Rand policy, inflation targeting, downward pressure on interest rates, nationalisation of the SARB, tax on short-term capital flows, industrial policy, National Health Insurance and the establishment of a state-owned bank.) The consensus within “the incumbents” is inexorably moving towards a rejection of some of the basic tenants of the Growth, Employment and Redistribution Macro-Economic Policy as defined by Mbeki and Manuel.

Our future is full of as yet undefined state intervention. I wouldn’t feel so bad about this if I didn’t agree with Cosatu that this state, in this place and time, is rapidly becoming a predator.

The end of the ruling alliance

Ruling alliance in happier times

Commentators and politicians are outdoing themselves announcing either the end or the permanence of the ANC/SACP/Cosatu alliance.

This is Jacob Zuma on the subject – at the Kwazulu-Natal ANC General Council on Friday:

I have read so many alliance obituaries. If leaders express their views, people think that we are fighting … The alliance will be with us for a very long time. (Catch that here)

And this is my (humble) opinion on the subject:

This strike -  as a culmination of other things but also in and of itself – is the death knell for the ruling alliance. (Catch that here)

This business about claiming that the alliance is about to break or will last until the Second Coming is something of a secret code for insiders in the political analysis business. “Insiders” are smugly convinced that the tripartite alliance benefits its constituent elements and these constituents will therefore never leave – and we love to use the analogy of a marriage where the couple fights endlessly but is bound by children, finances and habit so tightly that the partners will be together until death parts them.* I discuss some of the ties that bind here.

“Outsiders” – including those who have never belonged to any of the organisations concerned, as well as foreigners and supporters of parliamentary opposition parties – listen to the noise coming out of  ‘the alliance’ and they take the noise-makers at their word: the alliance is heading for the rocks; it is obvious to anyone with eyes and ears.

The “outsiders” have it.

Philosophically, I am one of those who believes we are what we do. Thus, it is not what Zuma, or Malema or Nzimande or Vavi claim, it is what they, and their organisations, do that counts.

The ruling alliance is not, primarily, a name. It is a description of a shared history, set of values and, most importantly, an accepted set of policies and an agreed upon process for deciding about such policies; and is also the formal forums and organisational structures through which such decisions are taken and implemented.

The only thing of significance that “the ruling alliance” did was throw Mbeki out of office and replace him with Jacob Zuma. Everything that has happened since needs to be seen through the “you are what you do” prism. The constituent organisations have done nothing together except violently disagree, actively try to undermine each other (and each other’s leadership ) – and they have agreed upon nothing and done nothing in concert.

Except for the media appeals tribunal (catch my criticism of Jeremy Cronin’s defence of that here) which, bizarrely, is the single thing that the ANC, the SACP and Cosatu have agreed upon – although Cosatu is wavering even on this as the damage done by the public sector wage strike to their relationship with the ANC deepens and intensifies.

It is as if they are saying: “We (as ‘the alliance’) have nothing to offer – but we have a plan to slap anyone down who point that out.” Frankly, I am not surprised.

* (note) What the “Insiders” are actually referring to is a sense of identity invested in the struggle against Apartheid under the broad leadership of the ANC and, crucially,  that traces its ideological lineage through to the “Congress Movement” – from the United Democratic Front, the Natal Indian Congress, South African Congress of Trade Unions, the South African Communist Party, the Congress of Democrats, the Transvaal Indian Congress and the African National Congress.

(Hmm, I am adding this half an hour after posting the above, just to make myself as clear as I am able, and in case anyone missed the point: If the structures don’t exist, if the decisions are not taken or implemented, if there is real and intense conflict over policy then ‘the alliance’ has already ended – and it makes no difference what the various leaders and commentators say. This is the de facto situation, even if it is still possible to argue that, de jure, the alliance continues on and on.)

Waiting for a saviour to rise from these streets*

Just when all hope flees, as the last good politician still within government leaves his/her post to join the feeding frenzy and as the last decent officials trying to do a public service throw up their hands in disgust; and as the striking workers blockade the last functional HIV/AIDS clinic and trash the streets again; and as the broken bits of the Ruling Alliance go  for the kill in their eye gouging, groin stamping gutter fight – just as all hope flees, whose silhouette is it that appears, backlit and heroic, flying in low over the horizon?

"Franco": General Francisco Paulino Hermenegildo Teódulo Franco y Bahamonde Salgado Pardo de Andrade - and yes, he did keep his armies up his sleevies

Is it a plane?

Is it a bird?

No, it’s … hmm, I’m not really sure.

When things are going as badly wrong as they are going for us, the person to look out for is the one who seems to have been sent by history itself as the solution to all of our problems.

I am not suggesting, as my old Granny used to say: don’t worry, cometh the moment, cometh the man or all’s well that ends well. I am suggesting the very opposite.

This is more of a warning to be careful about decisions we make when we are desperate than it is anything else.

Societies, political parties and whole nations are uniquely vulnerable at times like these. Our desperate need is for someone who can raise an anti-corruption army, is prepared to control the unions, able to fix service delivery and able to make the difficult decisions that will allow job rich economic growth.

The darker and more dire things become – and goodness knows they are as dark and dire as anyone can remember – the stronger our wish fulfilment drive becomes.

Where is the good-looking one, with the strong jaw and the easy, comforting manner, and the very firm but gentle eye and the plan and the promise and the words – and the record, or at least one you can, in your desperation, convince yourself of?

This is the moment in which nice Germans welcomed Adolf Hitler and Spaniards General Franco. King Constantine II of Greece inducted the awful “Regime of the Colonels” in 1967 saying he was “certain they had acted in order to save the country” and there was  a (brief) Argentinian sigh of relief when Brigadier-General Jorge Videla overthrew the execrable, incompetent and authoritarian regime of “Evita” – as popular culture has dubbed Isabel Martínez de Perón.

I am not suggesting that a fascist opportunist and criminal is about to present him or herself as the saviour from our woes – or that things are so bad that we risk losing our judgement and welcoming him/her into the stockade. Well, not yet.

But explicitly and implicitly various political factions and individuals have presented themselves as alternatives, and the solution to our current problems.

There’s Zwelinzima Vavi – and whatever kind of workerist paradise he represents – who heroically criticised the media appeals tribunal and has laid about himself with a stout cudgel at all the worst of the cabinet ministers and officials trying to stuff the last tasty bits of the family roast into their distended bellies. And he’s available next year.

Deputy Minister of Police Fikile Mbalula suggested (of criminals) we should “shoot the bastards!” and in so doing presents a kind of law-and-order (and anti-communist) alternative, clearly being supported by the ANC Youth League and tenderpreneurs everywhere.

Lindiwe Sisulu dresses nicely and would be excellent if we ever panicked enough to need a kind of Cleopatra/Boadicea empress to save us.

Tokyo Sexwale is getting the kind of press that suggests he is an effective anti-corruption campaigner and an excellent Minister of Human Settlements i.e. he’s clean and gives good service delivery – and he’s  bright, presentable, charming, good-looking and available – very available.

(This added as an afterthought: don’t discount Kgalema Motlanthe as a sort of leftish compromise that we have grown used to and, obviously, Mathews Phosa with his charming Afrikaans poetry and his friendly demeanour and his market friendly comments and his bitter struggle with ANC leader and communist Gwede Mantashe. Also consider a scenario, one I discuss elsewhere, where none of the contending factions achieves dominance and everyone agrees to stick with the burdensome incumbent … all is still possible.)

The National General Council of the African National Congress (to be held in Durban from 20 – 24 September) will reveal the main factions and their key representatives for leadership. The last NGC resulted in a rebellion against Mbeki and foretold his rout at Polokwane. This one is likely to be as instructive.

The point I wish to make here is a simple one. Those who appear to offer solutions must be judged in terms of who they are, what they have done and what they really represent. Just because we are in trouble does not mean we can afford to lose our critical faculties. My long gone Granny would have had two more things to say on the subject: don’t throw the baby out with the bath water, and don’t jump from the frying pan into the fire.

* The title of this post comes from the glorious “Thunder Road” by the inimitable  Bruce Springsteen (it doesn’t really fit the story … but I really love the song:

You can hide `neath your covers
And study your pain
Make crosses from your lovers
Throw roses in the rain
Waste your summer praying in vain
For a saviour to rise from these streets
Well now Im no hero
That’s understood
All the redemption I can offer, girl
Is beneath this dirty hood
With a chance to make it good somehow
Hey what else can we do now?

A Looter Continua

In a rush on my way from Namibia to the Garden Route – it’s a hard life, but someone has to live it.

The big stories are:

• the continuing decline in employment numbers;
• the National Working Committee’s decision not to charge Zwelinzima Vavi but to criticise him for alleging that Minister of Telecommunications Siphiwe Nyanda is corrupt.

StatsSA’s Quarterly Employment Survey released on Monday showed that the formal sector had lost 79 000 jobs between December and March – or that the number of people employed in the first quarter of this year dropped 1% from the previous quarter. The point is simple: unemployment is a deep systemic threat to long term stability in this country and – to some degree – we are experiencing the removal of the short term stimulus associated with World Cup infrastructure build. That doesn’t make the World Cup a bad thing, but it does mean we need to moderate our expectations.

Vavi’s “let off” comes as no surprise. The core of Tenderpreneurs that have risen in the balance of power through clever play post the Polokwane Putsch would dearly love to shaft their irritatingly principled previous allies on the left but the time is not yet right. The ANC and government is not yet purely a device for extracting rent out of the economy. A luta continua.

And then, just because this Reuters picture lends itself so well to a previous line from these posts:

Sepp Blatter and Jacob Zuma were like twinkly old non-English speaking train robbers still dashingly on the run all these years later. They can’t speak English – or any kind of sense – but their delight at how much money they have managed to stash away is infectious.

I tag it on here – with my own caption:

For those who remember the gangster penguins in the wonderful "Madagascar": "Smile and wave boys, just smile and wave."

What would the ANC do without Cosatu?

You hear it bruted about that Cosatu provided the organisational structure and person-power to wrestle the ANC from Thabo Mbeki and his Xhosa-Nostra. You also might be told that the same strengths of Cosatu has won the ANC successive national elections.

However, if you listen closely and to another set of people, you will hear that it was, in fact, the ANCYL that provided the infrastructure and capacity to undertake the Polokwane Putsch and that the architect of the 2009 general election victory was Fikile Mbalula, the ANCYL president prior to Julius Malema and clearly the candidate of the Youth League for higher office come 2012 (in the realm of the ANC) and 2014 (in the realm itself).

I think what happened at Polokwane required slightly different organisational capacities from those required in a national election, but common to both is: large amounts of money, a strategic centre that can plan and execute a national campaign that comfortably moves between the big picture and local, door-to-door type work and, finally,  a large group of deployable activists or cadres.

Cosatu cannot dream of competing with the ANC’s cash reserves. We have all heard that this might be the richest political party in the world. Chancellor House aside, I would be hugely surprised if the ANC had not put itself first in the economy wide asset transfer that is taking place in the name of transformation.

That much money automatically provides for a strategic centre and local and provincial machinery – and, to some degree, deployable party workers (paid rather than volunteers). You can hire the Saatchi and Saatchi to be a proxy for the strategic centre, you can buy in logistics from a host of service providers.

Cosatu structures are quite specifically related to the job of being a trade union federation and each individual union has even more specific structures and functions related to the business of organising workers around wages, working conditions and bargaining processes.

These structures and functions are not easily “deployed” either into national elections or take-over bids in the ANC – and nor are individual worker members who, by definition, have a day job. Cosatu has always recognised a practical tension between work place issues and national politics – as well as the fact that many of its members follow diverse politics or no politics at all.

When you are running an election every resource and edge feels important but Cosatu in not the prime driver of success in ANC politics – focused inwards or outwards – and many of the real advantages it brings can, in modern electoral and party politics, be paid for.

Perhaps the original question should have been:

What would Cosatu do without the ANC?

Cosatu has – by design and accident – put more emphasis on its political relationship with the ANC. In part this is because: globalisation of the labour processes market, mechanisation of the labour process, the Great Recession (following on the global debt crisis) and the rigidities of the South African labour market have combined to keep employment levels low and falling in this country.

Cosatu membership has, as a consequence, been stagnant or declining from a high of 1.869 million in 2000 and has shifted from productive sectors of the economy towards the public sector.

Cosatu have been tempted into politics because of the difficulties it experienced in the economy. Having chosen or being pushed in this direction, more and more organisational resources have been put at the disposal of the political strategy, further weakening the ability to organise on the shop floor around shop floor issues.

When the union backs the ANC publicly and uses union resources to fight ANC campaigns (or campaigns in the ANC) it is courting a weakening of its organisation, a loss of members and a polarising effect that can leave its leaders isolated. In turn its commitment to the political realm increases as more organisational eggs are put in that basket.

This is where Cosatu is. Even in the late 80′s, at the hight of anti-apartheid resistance, Cosatu was more cautious about ‘playing politics’ than its leadership is now.

In essence the Cosatu leadership is committing more and more irretrievable resources to a strategy that must ‘win’ the centre (the power to direct the state and government policy) if it is to hold on to its members.

Cosatu cannot ‘win’, ‘take over’ or dominate a multi-class organisation like the ANC. If I am right about this and right that this is the strategy that Cosatu has committed to then the trade union federation is destined to become little more than a competing faction in the already fractious ruling party.

I suspect that at some point Cosatu will have its own moral equivalent of Polokwane which will allow a workerist trade union federation to go back to basics and a more politicised Left group to link up with the SACP as a powerful faction within the ANC competing for power and direction with all comers.

Ruling Alliance breaking under the strain of corruption of “members of the cabinet and/or senior party leaders or officials”

Short of an angry and vindictive divorce you don’t really get a more serious breakdown between previous partners than described by the amazingly revealing Cosatu’s press statement yesterday threatening the end of the ruling alliance because ANC has laid disciplinary charges against Cosatu secretary general Zwelinzima Vavi.

This is what the statement reveals:

1. The powerful National Working Committee (here‘s a list of members of that august body) of the African National Congress has decided to lay disciplinary charges against Vavi;
2. Cosatu suspects (or knows) that the charges relate to a Cosatu statement, delivered by Vavi, in which the trade union federation criticises, amongst other things the fact that “newspapers continue to carry stories of allegations of corruption against Ministers and we are still to hear the President or Cabinet announcing that these allegations will be subjected to investigation ….” and further:  “Perceptions … runs deep in our communities, that government is soft on corruption, in particular if it is committed by members of the cabinet and/or senior party leaders or officials.”
3. The original Cosatu statement is a devastating critique of the Jacob Zuma led ANC and it was just a matter of time before those who believed they were the “members of the cabinet and/or senior party leaders or officials” singled out hit back;
4. The Cosatu statement (catch it here) accuses these “cabinet and/or senior party leaders or officials” of sneaking the attack on Vavi into the NWC meeting by waiting until those who would have stopped left.
5. The statement strongly implies that Zwelinzima Vavi is entering the leadership race for 2012 and that this somehow must be read together with the ANCYL push to get rid of Gwede Mantashe and promote Fikile Mbalula.

Business Day has a quote from Malesela Maleka of the SACP that perfectly summarised what is actually going on:

There is a small grouping in the ANC that is in a hurry to gain power, and alliance leaders stand in the way of their get-rich-quick scheme.

It cannot be such a small group if only “alliance leaders” are standing in the way, but this is succinctly put and reeks of the ugly truth.

The productive classes versus the unproductive classes

As promised another occasional slide that illustrates a major theme of the moment. I have put the meat into the caption – note the reversion to some traditional Marxist theory … fractions of capital and the working class fighting to wield the state?  Was that Althusser or Nicos Poulantzas … hmm, no, for them the state was a site of struggle and not an instrument …. gosh, I’ve forgotten more than I ever knew.

This slide illustrates discussion about the “real” conflict shaping our future – I use the Eskom saga and the nationalisation debate to illustrate how an alliance of the most  productive classes (the industrial working class and capital) is involved in a struggle with lumpen elements of the comprador bourgeoisie and ‘fugitives from justice’ over who gets to wield the state and to what ends

Absent from the slide itself are Zwelinzima Vavi and Bobby Godsell. Here they are wearing their respective  hats as, in Vavi’s case, a leader of the industrial working class; and in Godsell’s case Chairman of Eskom (but more revealingly Chairman of the World Gold Council). They are up against the ANCYL and the Black Management Forum.

The costs of defeat and the prize of victory concern the fate of Eskom: will it be looted or will it be used as an engine of economic growth and job creation?

The new songsheet of the Left

A quick run through documents and press statement emanating from the Congress of South Africa Trade Unions and the South African Communist Party reveals the existence of a new ‘song sheet’ our crimson brethren have devised to help them sing in tune with each other.

This is something more than a coordinated set of slogans and something less than a recipe for creating socialism, socialised production and a workers’ republic out of the ingredients of the conjuncture.

If I had to try to construct a Ten Point Programme out of the bits and pieces in the press statements and discussion documents of the last few months, but particularly the last few weeks, it would look something like this:

A ten point (interim) programme for The Left

1. Argue that macro-economic policy is increasingly in conflict with micro-economic policy.
2. Argue that IPAP II (industrial policy) from Minister Rob Davies of the DTI in combination with Minister Ebrahim Patel’s Medium Term Strategic Plan (2010/11 – 2012/13) form the first pro-poor, employment creation oriented plan to put South Africa on a “new growth path” in which state intervention will lead to job-rich and equitable growth.
3. Argue that the Rand is overvalued and wherever possible criticise inflation targeting and call for the nationalisation of the SARB as well as devaluation of the currency to effect a growth of valuable jobs in the export manufacturing sector.
4. Link the Treasury under Pravin Gordhan to the economic tradition fostered by Thabo Mbeki and Trevor Manuel and keep pointing out that many of the senior bureaucrats in that department were trained and placed by the former president and former Minister of Finance; as part of this thrust attack labour brokers and the subsidy for first time youth workers as part of ongoing attempts to segregate the labour market.
5. Co-ordinate calls for a national health insurance and free and universal education.
6. Defend Gwede Mantashe (your man at the heart of the ANC leadership) and isolate the most hostile elements among the conservative nationalists, populists, tenderprenuers and anti-communists – Julius Malema and Fikile Mbalula (the proposed challenger to Mantashe) are perhaps seen as core elements of this “most dangerous friend” group, although Billy Masetlha and Tony Yengeni are in there somewhere.
7. Start preparing a strategy linking this group with those attempting to buy their way into leadership of the alliance i.e. those who have inherited the Brett Kebble mantel. The general direction of the red finger of accusation appears to point at Tokyo Sexwale.
8. Fight to stay in the alliance and fight for your views within alliance forums; make sure the ANC and government takes the results of those forums seriously.
9. Prepare your cadres to influence the outcome of the National General Council later this year and the ANC’s elective National Conference in 2010 – and start preparing a set of policies and candidates to support. In the process continually cement relationships between SACP and Cosatu
10. Always maintain a mass profile (through work amongst the masses) that is distinct, pro-poor, anti-corruption and principled; this strengthens your hand in Alliance forums but, more importantly, is your insurance policy if or when you are eventually forced out of the alliance.

It seems logical that despite the vicious atmosphere in the ruling alliance Cosatu, the SACP and the ANC’s own left-wing are not about to abandon the field to the “proto-facists“, populists, tenderprenuers and powerful hangers-on from the “1996 class project“. Not so soon after their triumph at Polokwane. Not after “capturing” two key cabinet posts and finding themselves in a position to, perhaps, profoundly influence government policy for the first time since 1994.

Those hoping that the tension in the ruling alliance would lead to a blossoming of opposition politics in parliament will have to wait a little longer. For now the real prize is still within the ANC and the ruling alliance.

Cosatu and the ANC: the fat’s in the fire

I have been sitting on this for a few days partly because Cosatu’s Central Executive Committee statement on Thursday last week and the ANC response are as harsh as we have seen – and that includes the tone of voice that accompanied Cosatu’s huge strike against ‘Mbeki’s privatisation’ in 2002.

Cosatu has a long and interesting statement; one of the more important paragraphs read:

Regrettably, to our frustration and anger, the government continues with the tendency inherited from the previous administration to ignore policy directives it does not like and only implement those areas that the markets/capital are happy with. In this regard we are angry that the Treasury remain infected by the highly organised but conservative bureaucrats who have been driving neo liberal and conservative policies for the past 16 years.

The ANC replied:

ANC has grown weary of the latest media outbursts by COSATU, seeking to rubbish and undermine anything from the content of the President’s State of the Nation Address to the Budget Speech by the Finance Minister, as well as ANC policies. Taking pot shots at the ANC and its Government show signs by COSATU of veering towards oppositional politics and not sticking to Alliance politics and traditions.

The point for now is that this does not presage an actual splitting of The Alliance. Cosatu is going to mobilise its members to join and influence the ANC in the lead-up to the ANC’s National General Council later this year – much as they did in the lead-up to Polokwane in 2007.

Cosatu’s short term objective is to defend against the attack on Gwede Mantashe (emanating from, but not exclusive to, the ANC Youth Leage). The longer term objectives of Cosatu (and the SACP) are finally starting to emerge and I will deal with this in the next post.

For now Cosatu has attacked on a broad front:

• ‘tenderprenuers’, corruption and cronyism;
• relaxation of the labour market;
• failure of the ANC to stick with agreements that are reached in alliance summits;
• monetary policy, inflation targeting and the role of the SARB and
• a general lack of fit between micro and macro-economic policy.

For its part the ANC hadn’t quite finished with its fury at Cosatu’s CEC statement, and in particular Vavi’s niggling and constant accusation of corruption within the ANC and government.

Here’s the full text:

The African National Congress (ANC) has noted repeated allegations of corruption raised by the Congress of South African Trade Unions Secretary General, Cde Zwelinzima Vavi.

Cde Vavi speaks with conviction that “there is a tiny minority in the ANC leadership and membership which is corrupt and who use the ANC to enrich themselves”.

To this end, Cde Vavi has not raised this matter with the ANC in any of the fora of engagements we have and he has not provided any evidence of such allegations.

As a leader of the Alliance, we would have expected of him to have brought such a matter to the ANC leadership or even presented the list of such corrupt individuals. Together, we would have walk and matched to the nearest police station to ensure that such individuals are arrested. Cde Vavi would have assisted the ANC and government to root out the scourge of corruption in the country.

Cde Vavi’s failure to bring this weighty matter to the attention of the ANC and even his failure to report this matter to the law enforcement authorities, amounts to an insult to the standing and image of the ANC, its leadership and membership. These omissions on his part cannot amount to a fight against corruption but is reminiscent of grand standing.

Issued by:
Jackson Mthembu
ANC National Spokesperson

I don’t suppose it means much, but Jackson Mthembu was released from a police cell a few hours ago after been caught for drunken driving in Cape Town early this morning

Sexwale: Oh I just can’t wait to be king!

The spat over Tokoyo Sexwale’s report criticising Gwede Mantashe for not stopping the booing and humiliation of Julius Malema at the SACP conference in December is more important than it seems.

The direction a country takes (economically, socially and culturally) emerges from the interplay of too many factors to make the future even vaguely predictable. But it is always useful to look at the big bets being made by the most focussed and voracious players in politics and business. So, one way of understanding what is happening in the ruling alliance (and I accept there may be other ways) starts by assuming Tokyo Sexwale’s actions are always and at all times directed towards becoming president of the ANC in 2012 or failing that, in 2017 – not a weak assumption in my opinion. Becoming president of the ANC is the same as becoming president of the country (in 2014 or 2019 respectively).

Tokyo is placing himself – carefully and precisely – within the contest and conflict between “nationalists” and “communists” in the ruling alliance and he is doing so because he believes he can ride one side to victory over the other – and then ride that horse on to almost any destination he wants to hop off at. I am not sure that he can get what he wants this time around, but I would bet a considerable amount of money that these are his intention.

The conflict (which Tokyo hopes to exploit) between “nationalists” and “communists” is, in turn – and again in my opinion – also a proxy conflict, although one closer to, but still not perfectly reflective of, the real world.

(Please note that I am doing my own lumping of people below and – to some degree – I am using very loose definitions of “nationalist” or “communist”. The individuals hereby lumped would be unlikely to support my categorization or any of the implications I draw. I justify using the categories because right now there appears to be a significant overlap of both the language, actions and how individuals line up around the issues dividing the alliance within each group – giving the terms and/or concepts ‘communist’ or ‘nationalist’  particular force and effect for analytical purposes here.)

The nationalists

The nationalists include in their ranks those who believe the ANC must seek to represent all classes of South Africans and that the recent relative strength of the communists is damaging this endeavour. Here too are the anti-communists (for practical and/or ideological reasons) as well as the right-wing hang-em-high populists. The main component – and or the main hangers-on, depending on your perspective – of this group are the “TenderCapitalists” and those who otherwise hope to leverage their political access to take as much economic advantage of the state or quasi-state bureaucracy as possible.  Those in this broad category include Fikile Mbalula, Julius Malema, Billy Masethla, Tony Yengeni, Winnie Madikezela Mandela, Siphiwe Nyanda, Dina Pule, Ngoako Ramatlhodi, Nomvula Mokonyane.

This group and anyone trying to lead them, can draw on a rich intellectual tradition in the ANC that has always emphasised the dangers of the organisation adopting too narrow an ideology and thereby losing its ability to provide leadership to other classes (in the terms generally used in this and the communist traditions in South Africa these ‘other classes’ include peasants, the lumpen proletariat {i.e. the unemployed and the youth}, professionals and aspirant bourgeoisie and, more controversially, the actual bourgeoisie.)

At this stage the two organisations clearly dominated by this group are the ANC Youth League and the Umkhonto we Sizwe Military Veterans Association.

The communists

The communists are less diverse, but probably range from those driven purely by ideology and an instinct for collectivism (or being rooted in collectivist organisations like Cosatu) to those genuinely motivated to get the best deal possible for the poorest South Africans – even if their economic theory is never going to deliver this result. Those within this group include Gwede Mantashe, Blade Nzimande, Jeremy Cronin, Zwelenzima Vavi  and a host of less well known individuals. Both Cosatu and the SACP are dominated by individuals from this group.

If the main show (politically) in town is actually, as I assert, the conflict between the nationalists (as described) and the communists (as described) then the outcome of the conflict can be in no doubt. The nationalists come closer to being an economic class or at least an extremely powerful group of people who have one overwhelming set of interests in common: their desire, preparedness and ability to use the state to get rich. The communists have a set of idealistic ideas and a trade union movement. They don’t have a hope of blocking the relentless march of those who have caught the heady scent of easy riches.

What is depressing is that the communists had an inkling of the dangers they would face after they had successfully allied with the nationalists to oust Mbeki at Polokwane. This from The SACP and State Power – The Alliance Post Polokwane – Ready to Govern:

A negative scenario in which the left fails to hegemonise the post-Polokwane reality, and instead (and particularly after national elections in 2009) a new alliance of “1996 class project floor-crossers”, “compradorists” and “fugitives from justice” coalesces around a programme of awarding influential posts, tenders and contracts to themselves, while the factional destabilisation (and not democratic transformation) of the state, including the criminal justice system, persists.

Tokyo?

So back to the original premise. I think it is becoming clear that Sexwale, having made his money through Mvelphanda after being stopped in his tracks by Mbeki in the late 90′s, is back in the running and he has chosen the steed he hopes to ride to the presidency.

Can he pull this off? I think he is tainted by how rich he is and will be more so as accusations emerge that he is using his wealth and Mvelephanda contracts to reward certain factions and king-makers he hopes to woo.  I don’t know if the accusations are true, but they are certainly being bruted about. I think a run for the presidency by Tokyo would be formidable – especially now that Mbeki is no longer there to stop him like he was stopped in the 90′s.

So the long and the short is: he could make it, he’s got the wiles and the stamina and the financial muscle. But a post-Polokwane ANC president with a silver spoon in his mouth is a real stretch and Tokyo Sexwale’s bid will be up against it, no matter how skilfully he rides his powerful but ugly horse.