A Nation in Crisis: An Appeal for Morality

By Paulus Zulu

Schabir Shaik, Jackie Selebi, Tony Yengeni, 'Oilgate', Jacob Zuma, Judge Hlophe and the JSC, 'Travelgate' - what has happened to morality in South Africa?

With this book, respected academic and community leader Paulus Zulu cuts right to the heart of our current malaise.

Drawing equally on Western concepts and on African traditional thought, he provides a searing indictment of the state of the nation, casting new light on corruption, incompetence and mismanagement.

This enlightening analysis makes for compelling reading.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tafelberg
• Release date: Sep 1, 2013
• ISBN: 9780624065371

Paulus Zulu

Professor Paulus Zulu is the Director of the Maurice Webb Race Relations Unit at the University of KwaZulu-Natal and serves on the Board of the Human Sciences Research Council. He has been a member of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, Vatican City Rome, since 1994.

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Preface

THE ELEVENTH of February 1990 seemed to shrink decades of fear and hopelessness and push them into the distant past. Suddenly the future was held in that moment. Nurtured in the decorum of Christian mission morality and poise, I have never been one to toyi-toyi in the streets. But when the news of the release of Nelson Mandela was beamed onto television screens that memorable Sunday, I suddenly found myself in the midst of a throng of tens of thousands of youths that came toyi-toying in the street past our house in Umlazi, near Durban. Laqhakaza ikusasa lenu bantabami, (Your future is blossoming my children), cried an elderly woman standing at her doorstep watching the throng of celebrating youths go by. Viva gogo! (Viva granny) they shouted back, and viva bab’u Zulu! (Viva father Zulu) they turned to me as we proceeded. They had come to know me closely as we negotiated the tumultuous years of schooling in the turbulent eighties. The elderly woman must have been eighty or thereabouts and had lived through the pain and the hope. The pain was over and a new era had dawned. Apartheid was no more. The old order had come to an end although the birth of a new South Africa was still to take four years of negotiations and this period would prove to be a painful gestation.

There was an aura of certainty regarding the nature of the new era. Had the people of South Africa not made that crystal clear at that mammoth yet humble gathering in Kliptown near Johan­nesburg in 1955? Then, and through all succeeding generations, they had pledged to themselves that:

• the people shall share in the country’s wealth;

• all shall be equal before the law;

• there shall be work and security;

• the doors of learning and culture shall be opened; and

• there shall be houses, security and comfort.

All those gathered in 1955 went on to affirm that: These freedoms we shall fight for, side by side, throughout our lives. Until we have won our liberty. {Text of the Freedom Charter: Kliptown 26 June 1955}.

However, the 1960s and the succeeding decades were to become an even more oppressive era as apartheid became more desperate in an effort to defend the right of white people in general, and Afrikanerdom in particular, to rule what they saw as the last bastion of democracy in Africa. Developments in the early 1980s were such that, although not instinctively an activist, pragmatically I had to choose sides. The two counter-forces positioned within the political terrain were such that neutrality was akin to abandoning ship while the country sank. On one side there was the apartheid regime propped by co-opted homeland administrations partly politically short-sighted and partly self-serving, while on the other stood the United Democratic Front as the last hope for emancipation. The future lay with the United Democratic Front and, as a group of professionals; we resolved to work together with them. The big questions were where and how.

We positioned ourselves in such a way that we steered away from the immediate danger of detention, imprisonment and probable death. While bravery is praiseworthy and noble in fighting for a cause, making ourselves cannon fodder for the forces of darkness would have been counter-productive. The apartheid regime had drawn more than enough blood already. As a social scientist I joined the South African Black Social Workers Association (SABSWA) which was heavily involved in community work in the townships around Durban. In 1984 the township rent boycotts broke out and were soon followed by a massive breakdown, if not a near collapse, in education as the school-going youth took to the vanguard in the struggle for liberation. Liberation first and education later became the operating slogan.

SABSWA moved in quickly to fill the vacuum, and we resolved to make schooling our priority. As an academic at the University of Natal, by then a progressive institution defiant of apartheid, I was well positioned to lead a committee to keep the education fires burning. We started Saturday classes catering for the last three years of high school, with an enrolment of around a thousand young people from the townships around Durban. Besides teaching the curriculum with an emphasis on English as the language of instruction, and mathematics, science, and commerce as vital subjects, we emphasised discipline and morality as key ingredients in liberation and development. Under the banner of history, which was part of the normal curriculum, we taught liberation history, and the history of the ANC as the principal and oldest liberation movement in particular.

The intensity of the township riots and the counter-revolution by the state and its co-opted agents added an extra role to my politico-educational work. A University of Natal colleague, an anthropologist, and I monitored and documented the resistance and counter-resistance, and particularly the state-sponsored violence against the forces of transformation. I published under cover of my mother’s maiden name, Zilondile Gwala, especially in the Indicator Journal – a journal of social trends published by the University of Natal. Through both the school work and the political analysis, I could claim to have been close to what the invisible public felt about their lot, their hopes and aspirations, and what the politics of liberation had in store for them. The stronger the forces of liberation appeared to be, the higher the hopes for the liberation ship to dock filled with the long-promised cargo. Indeed, the commitments made at Kliptown three and a half decades earlier seemed to be within reach. So when that eventful announcement by De Klerk on the second of February 1990 was broadcast on the screens, it was the dawn of a new era.

After South Africa attained democracy in 1994, all citizens affirmed the sentiments of the Freedom Charter in the preamble to the Constitution of 1996, which was strikingly similar in spirit. We the people of South Africa . . . believe that South Africa belongs to all who live in it united in our diversity. The preamble healed the wounds of the past, laid the foundations for a harmonious society that respected the dignity of all persons and promised to improve the quality of life of all citizens and free the potential of each person. It ended in a multilingual plea to the Almighty: God protect our people. (The Constitution of the Republic Act No 8 of 1996)

The Mandela presidency became widely known as an era of reconciliation and nation building. With the tone set by Mandela’s morally towering personality and magnanimity in victory, as well as the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, this government was characterised by an inclusive approach, both constitutionally and in practice. Also, honour and decorum in matters of state were generally observed. But besides this, the Reconstruction and Development Programme showed that the political elite were concerned with issues that affected ordinary men and women. If this was a honeymoon, it carried with it an infectious aura and a pervasive inclusiveness. Nineteen years into the transition both the honeymoon and the hopes have been confronted with severe challenges, if not the threat of obliteration.

Developments over the past five years or so have created grave doubts regarding the resolve of the government to uphold the sacred values enshrined in the Freedom Charter and expressed in the Constitution, both of which are auspicious and healing documents. As a nation, we are in the throes of a moral crisis which underlies a crisis of confidence in government and in the country. This is expressed in the anguish and near despair articulated by a large section of patriotic South Africans. The reason is crystal clear. Pick up any newspaper or tune in to any electronic media channel, and you will find a gaffe by a senior official if not some shocking report on corruption or mismanagement in Government.

The reasons for widespread cynicism are easily accounted for. For instance:

• within the space of three days, a Member of the Executive Council (MEC) in one province shrugs off an unaccounted expenditure of R750 million, of which R450 million purportedly disappeared in the procurement tender system, and then, in a different province, 53 teachers are dismissed for fake qualifications that cost the department R14.5 million in inflated salaries;

• in the space of two years, a national commissioner of police is jailed for corruption, and his successor, suspended for mismanagement, with suspected corruption;

• in one fell swoop, two national ministers are fired, one for corruption and the other for mismanagement, with suspected corruption;

• a province is placed under administration after running down its annual budget in the midst of alleged gross corruption in the tender system;

• in another province, the national department of education steps in because the provincial department is about to bring the entire system to the ground; and

• a commission of enquiry is appointed to investigate alleged corruption in the procurement of arms for the national defence force.

• at the time of going to print parliament is embroiled in controversy over an expenditure of over R200 million on purported security improvements to the private residence of the state president in Nkandla. The South African state president has two official residences, one in Pretoria and one in Cape Town. What confounds the nation is that the Department of Public Works which is responsible for the construction refuses to provide detail claiming that the state president’s private residence is a national key point and that releasing detail would constitute a security risk.

In the words of Hamlet, all is not well in the state of Denmark.

And the incidents cited are typical day-to-day events, as reported in the media. This deluge of negative reporting about the moral health of our nation was punctuated by a wave of patriotism during the FIFA World Cup tournament from the 11th of June to the 11th of July 2010. No sooner had the international contingent boarded the last flight out, than corruption, nepotism, and cronyism in Government and avarice and profligacy among the political elite were dominating news headlines as before. Indeed, there is a disconnect between those in political office and the general citizenry, a disconnect which, arises from a politics which lacks the animating vision of the good society, and of the shared values of citizenship.¹

Some in Government and some analysts have complained about negative reporting. The Access to Information Bill together with the envisaged Media Tribunal are seen in some quarters as official attempts to muzzle the media and prevent the publication of negative activities by politicians and government officials, while government feels the media – especially the print media – often exceed their ethical bounds. However, as the amaXhosa say, ayinuki ingosiwe (literally translated, meat does not smell unless roasted); the English equivalent is, there is no smoke without fire. Indeed, research shows – and government itself, with the African National Congress (ANC) as the governing party, admits openly – that corruption and mismanagement afflict Government and the country at large. And as our leaders, the Government bears the brunt for the good and bad that happens. This book, therefore, addresses the present political leadership and South Africans in general on the problem of the moral issues that tarnish our democracy and threaten to demolish the achievements of 1994 and destroy the future of our children.

This book is not intended as a lamentation over the ills of the children of liberation. However, it invites the inheritors of ubuntu, Christian social teaching, the Koran, Buddhism and other major religious and philosophical traditions to come together and reflect on their moral and civic duties. We should all retrace the journey from Kliptown and before and in the process realise the extent of the alienation that we have collectively caused through errors of commission and omission. Much resentment prevails, resentment that the liberation movement has betrayed us. The dream is deferred. A better life for all has translated into a better life for the political and bureaucratic elite. We eat in a descending hierarchical order and those at the bottom have to contend with empty pots.

The book takes us on a journey around a future museum of the first nineteen years of post-liberation moral history. When tragedy strikes, the good is often interred with history and only the evil of men and women lives on. My hope and purpose in writing this book is that the tragedy can yet be averted. Without that hope, it serves no purpose. The ANC of the founding fathers and mothers is a beloved moral beacon to South Africans. Naturally, it takes resolve and conviction to be critical of your own beloved moral beacon. But we dare not muddy this paragon of liberation with filthy feet, and we dare not present ourselves before the sacred ancestry with perfume to mask the stench.

Finally, a country’s human rights record is not judged by the GDP per capita that it generates nor by conspicuous consumption, but rather by the absence of beggars in the streets.

Introduction

A guide to this book

THIS BOOK examines the tension between justice and democracy in South Africa’s transition. From the French revolution to almost all subsequent transitions, ‘revolutionary’ or otherwise, societies have upheld three principles as pivotal to democracy: liberty, equality and fraternity. Liberty refers to the freedom to be human, and to act within specific constraints. In other words, we are free on condition that we recognise and respect the freedom of others. Equality refers to equal treatment of all. In nature and in life, the distribution of natural endowments is arbitrary, i.e. there is no natural law that prescribes equal attributes – physical, intellectual and motivational – so society calls for equality of opportunity as an expression of the principle of equality. In human rights terms, fraternity recognises the freedom to belong, to form and join organisations, fraternities and movements of your choice. However, in moral philosophy, fraternity goes beyond the instrumental social formations and encompasses spiritual aspects of being such as empathy expressed in organic solidarity and the willingness to engage in activities involving mutual benefits and reciprocal relationships. It is critical for democracy that the recognition of these three pillars stems not only from the provisions of a constitution, which is often a negotiated document, but from a concept of justice reflected in the moral conscience of the nation. The rationale is simple. Like all human provisions, constitutions may, and usually do, reflect the power relations operating at a given point and time. So it is necessary for justice to take eminence, providing the gold standard for assessing all values including the three pillars of democracy.

A close analysis of the South African transition shows that, despite the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, there are problems with equality. Our public representatives (both elected and appointed) have engaged with the principle of equality more in the breach than in the observance. Empirical evidence shows that inequalities do not only exist materially, but legally. Surprisingly, the same observations characterised apartheid and, therefore, predate the transition. Which begs the question: what was the struggle to end apartheid for? I was once part of a serious conversation between Peter Berger, an eminent sociologist from Boston, and Fatima Meer, a political activist and an incisive sociologist in her own right. Berger posited poverty as a cause for popular disaffection and probably rebellion. "It is not poverty per se retorted Meer. When everyone is poor, people live peacefully side by side. It is when poverty is juxtaposed to wealth that the poor riot." Nineteen years into democracy, South Africa’s Gini-coefficient – a measure of material inequalities between rich and poor – is at its highest level. While South Africa has historically been a country of mansions and shacks, the post-apartheid persistence of the same inequalities calls for deep introspection.

The most often pronounced term in South Africa is human rights. There is seldom if ever any mention of obligations. The approach of this book is that a human rights-based conception of democracy without the corresponding obligations could become problematic when pitted against the principles of justice and fairness. In some instances, what is placed under the rubric of human rights are merely social constructs dependent upon time and space. Viewed in terms of justice such conceptions of human rights would be found wanting.

One day I went to draw money from an automatic teller machine. The queue was long. A woman drew money from the ATM. She took the money, opened her bag and put it in, and started to read her statement. She took some time, conceivably long enough for two people to used the ATM after her and completed their business. It felt like an eternity. Bothered by this avoidable delay I intervened: Would you not have done better to read your statement on the side and saved the queue? It is my right, she responded. Irritated by the shallowness of her understanding of human rights, I decided not to let her get away with it. It is not your right to delay the queue. What about common decency and a bit of consideration for others? She sulked and left. This is just a simple illustration of the potential conflict between a superficial and one-sided conception of human rights and justice, as it so often happens in a more serious arena in South Africa.

When South Africa attained democracy in 1994 we achieved freedom and fraternity but lost out on equality, firstly, because it is more difficult to achieve. Secondly, we lost out on equality because democracy is merely an arrangement of systems, and a means to nobler ends or values and not an end in itself. Recognition of equality requires a moral conscience that encompasses obligations within its conception of rights. This calls for nobler concepts such as justice and, in political terms, distributive justice. Lower levels of distributive justice result in higher levels of inequality. This will become clearer in the chapters that follow.

The subject of this book is public morality. You could ask what significance public morality has in the sociology and politics of a country or its government. Given that South Africa has experienced both external and internal colonialism for over a period of three hundred years, its attainment of freedom and the way it conducts itself as a democracy is of special significance to itself and to the world. Africa is regarded as the basket case of the world, and, as a beacon of hope, South Africa can ill afford to go the same route. In their book, Adam et al affirm: Of course a moral discourse on the recent history of South Africa, as well as its current transition, is necessary if only to remind us of the values that have been undermined and the need to reaffirm them for the future, values such as tolerance, respect for life, objectivity, freedom, responsibility, accountability and transparency.² The main purpose of my book is to address how the public, the elite and officials have translated and internalised the values of responsibility, accountability and transparency, for these constitute the core values in the allocation and distribution of resources in a society. Adam et al maintain that not only do these values need to be affirmed, but they need constant probing and analysis particularly regarding their applicability to the problems of transition South Africa is encountering.³ The intention of my book is to help situate decision-making within the domain of the Freedom Charter as the vehicle that articulates the meaning of what South Africans believe constitutes social justice, or the common good. While the Freedom Charter may not be the moral bible for South Africans, it translates their corpus of values, including what true uhuru means, into wishes and aspirations.

Public morality refers to the values and norms that inform the behaviour of public officials and politicians in the course of their official duties. The colonial experience is pertinent in that during this period a specific moral order determined the code of conduct of public officials, and also prescribed the relationships between colonisers and the colonised. Over this protracted period, South Africa experienced first a comprador public morality imposed by the British colonial experience and later an apartheid public morality sanctioned by a self-protective and self-promoting Afri­kaner ethos. Rooted in the Afrikaner fear of the aspirations of the majority African population, apartheid was an attempt to justify a policy that was pronounced internationally as a crime against humanity. When the new dispensation took over in 1994, a new public morality evolved. It had roots in both the colonial and apartheid experiences, as well as in an internal African ethos tempered by Judeo-Christian and Greco-Roman traditions.

Public morality as used throughout this book