A year since their last court appearance, the accused in the so-called “Amigos” R144 million provincial government racketeering, corruption and fraud trial are no closer to standing trial.
When they appeared briefly in the Durban High Court on Tuesday, their case was adjourned for another year – to February 8, 2016 – because the main accused, Cape Town billionaire Gaston Savoi, had launched another “interlocutory application”, this time for a permanent stay of prosecution.
Savoi, who also represents his company, Intaka Holdings, and his colleague, Fernando Praderi, were again absent from court – with the blessing of the State.
Their advocate, Jimmy Howse, placed on record that this was the arrangement with all adjournments and warrants of arrest that were issued but stayed.
Before Acting Judge Eric Nzimande were the former head of the provincial Treasury, Sipho Shabalala, his wife, Beatrice, former heads of health Busisiwe Nyembezi and Ronald Green-Thompson, former health officials Victor Ntshangase and Alson Buthelezi, and advocate Sandile Kuboni.
The reason for the case’s adjournment in February last year was that Savoi was waiting for the outcome of his Constitutional Court challenge to sections of the Prevention of Organised Crime Act. He argued that these were vague and open to “personal and political manipulation” – and used as an example the withdrawal of charges against his former co-accused, ANC politicians Mike Mabuyakhulu and Peggy Nkonyeni.
The Constitutional Court handed down judgment in March last year, dismissing his attacks and finding unanimously that the definition of a “pattern of racketeering activity” was clear.
On the issue he raised about the act allowing “hearsay evidence”, the court said this did not render the trial automatically unfair and the trial court was best placed to deal with this issue.
Savoi has now launched another application in the Pietermaritzburg High Court for a permanent stay of prosecution.
Legal sources said there had been several “skirmishes” around this, particularly about provision of documents from the State. While all the papers had now been filed – and it was hoped it would be argued in March – the dispute had not been finally resolved and it would not be heard until later in the year.
“Of course, depending on the outcome, one or other party may wish to take it to a higher court on appeal, which will push any trial date further in the future,” a source said. Next year’s date remains a provisional one.
Savoi is accused of paying sweeteners to officials – including an alleged R1m to the ANC – to score contracts for the supply of water purification and oxygen plants to the departments of health and local government.
Initially there were 23 accused facing 54 counts. But the new indictment now lists only 17 charges.
In documents in support of an asset forfeiture application, the State put up transcripts of text messages in which some of the accused referred to each other as “Amigo”.
Source: Iol
Showing posts with label ANC. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ANC. Show all posts
Wednesday, January 21, 2015
Thursday, September 11, 2014
Marikana Commission: Riah Phiyega's impossibly hazy memory
National Police Commissioner Riah Phiyega appeared at the Marikana Commission on Wednesday to clarify questions on how decisions were made from the top. Instead, she further tarnished the SAPS position in the inquiry, painting top officers as uninterested in operational matters and effectively laying the blame at the feet of ground commanders. By GREG NICOLSON.
Riah Phiyega listened to chairman Ian Farlam. “You swear that the further evidence you give to this Commission will be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?” In a floral skirt, teal blouse and blazer, with matching pearl earrings and necklace, Phiyega agreed.
The national police commissioner appeared in front of the Marikana Commission again on Wednesday for the last time before the inquiry wraps up. As the top cop in August 2012, when 34 mineworkers were killed in a single day and 10 people were killed in the preceding week, Phiyega's testimony is crucial to the Commission's goal of pursuing truth and restorative justice. She is ultimately responsible for the police operations. She's also the link between alleged political influence and SAPS actions.
On Wednesday, however, Phiyega stonewalled Farlam who for most of her appearance quizzed her on issues that either hadn't been resolved or had come to light since Phiyega's previous lengthy appearance. To most questions, she simply said she doesn't remember what happened over two years ago. In her silence, she painted a picture of a leader unwilling to cooperate with the inquiry, senior police officers who failed to perform their duties, and an SAPS that has tried to mislead the Commission.
Farlam wanted to talk about the extraordinary meeting of the police management forum on 15 August when top provincial and national officers discussed Marikana. It was in this meeting when the decision was taken to implement the disperse, disarm and arrest plan the next day, which ultimately led to the massacre. Incredibly, the police didn't hand over any evidence of the meeting nor mention it when they made their submissions to the Commission. It only came out later.
“You're now seriously stating we would be in error if we find SAPS didn't cooperate [with the Commission]?” Farlam put to Phiyega. Only after a third party pointed them towards the meeting did the Commission find out about it. There was nothing untoward, she claimed, and when requested, they admitted the meeting took place. “It certainly appeared to us to be a secret when it came out at a later stage,” said Farlam.
Phiyega agreed the Marikana strike was the most challenging public policing situation during the democratic era, but she could not remember details of the meeting which approved the plan to tackle it. In the hour-long session on 15 August 2012, North West Provincial Commissioner Zukiswa Mbombo made a presentation for 10 to 15 minutes and the SAPS from different provinces also discussed sharing the necessary resources for the operation. Beyond that, Phiyega said she didn’t have a “photographic memory” and could not remember “pedantic details” about what happened in the meeting.
“It's very important for us to know why the decision was taken to proceed on Thursday morning,” said Farlam. “It's important for us to find out was exactly was said.” Phiyega didn't help, but she was clear about what didn't happen in the meeting. While most of the country's provincial police commissioners were present, some of whom come from policing backgrounds, Phiyega said no specific details of the plan to confront the mineworkers were discussed before it was approved.
“Are you seriously suggesting that the meeting endorsed the proposal without knowing what the details of the response were?” asked Farlam. Phiyega's response was that police know how to conduct disarming operations and they're are essentially the same. She said this despite two officers being hacked to death when a disarming operation went wrong on 13 August. Incredibly, reflecting on the meeting on 15 August, Phiyega could not recall any of the country's top police officers raising the fear of further bloodshed while they decided to approve the plan.
While shocking, it also seems extremely unlikely given the volatile situation in Marikana at the time and widely publicised problems with policing protests. Yet if Phiyega acknowledged they knew and spoke about the dangers, the next question is, so why did they implement the plan, or why this plan, and why wasn't greater precaution taken?
Farlam, however, seemed shocked. “The fact that the proposal was endorsed by the meeting, the fact that the people there all agreed to make resources available as required, surely means that they cannot evade responsibility and say, 'We knew about the plan. Sure go ahead. We'll make resources available. And if it goes wrong because it's managed badly or defective planning, that's nothing to do with us.' Surely there comes a time when responsibility must rest with those people in that meeting as well.”
He was equally surprised that Phiyega had no recollection of a conversation with SAPS expert witness Cees de Rover about political influence on police decisions at Marikana. “My questions have been straightforward on the issue; the answers have not been,” De Rover said last week, claiming Phiyega was evasive. Farlam said surely she would remember being asked if political pressure played a part in the death of 34 people in a day. Phiyega said she couldn't remember and refused to engage the chairman's questions.
Already evasive and difficult, the national police commissioner's credibility was shot when Farlam brought up the review panel. When Phiyega had appeared at the Commission before, she was asked whether the SAPS had established a review on certain issues related broadly to Marikana and Phiyega said she had not. But when a police hard drive was analysed, it emerged a review panel had been established and Phiyega's signature was on the call up instructions. No evidence the panel existed was voluntary handed to the Commission by the police despite their commitment to do so with all relevant information at the start of the inquiry.
It is impossible to look at Phiyega's cross-examination on Wednesday and believe she's being honest.
While she plays the amnesia card and tries to distance the country's top officers from the details of the plan to confront the miners, she opens up herself and other officers to allegations of incompetence and dereliction of duty. But by doing so she shifts the greater responsibility to the commanders on the ground who she says the SAPS relied on.
Phiyega is also putting a wall between the police and the politicians who got involved in Marikana. Last week, De Rover, a policing expert who has worked in over 60 countries, said he couldn't fathom a situation where politicians were not involved.
If there was any doubt that Phiyega was untruthful, Advocate Dali Mpofu showed her the transcript between the SAPS's Mbombo and Lonmin's Bernard Mokoena on 14 August 2012. In relation to the police ending the strike, the two speak of Cyril Ramaphosa, Julius Malema, the pair's relationship in the ANC disciplinary committee, problems with Malema potentially ending the crisis, and nationalisation of the mines. Asked about the political nature of the discussion and whether it is legal for the SAPS to use policing operations to influence party politics, Phiyega responded, “What's political about this?”
“They could have used different words, but what I hear is people who are interested in ending a protest.”
Let us say it once more: It is impossible to look at Phiyega's cross-examination on Wednesday and believe she's being honest. DM
Source: Daily Maverick
Riah Phiyega listened to chairman Ian Farlam. “You swear that the further evidence you give to this Commission will be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?” In a floral skirt, teal blouse and blazer, with matching pearl earrings and necklace, Phiyega agreed.
The national police commissioner appeared in front of the Marikana Commission again on Wednesday for the last time before the inquiry wraps up. As the top cop in August 2012, when 34 mineworkers were killed in a single day and 10 people were killed in the preceding week, Phiyega's testimony is crucial to the Commission's goal of pursuing truth and restorative justice. She is ultimately responsible for the police operations. She's also the link between alleged political influence and SAPS actions.
On Wednesday, however, Phiyega stonewalled Farlam who for most of her appearance quizzed her on issues that either hadn't been resolved or had come to light since Phiyega's previous lengthy appearance. To most questions, she simply said she doesn't remember what happened over two years ago. In her silence, she painted a picture of a leader unwilling to cooperate with the inquiry, senior police officers who failed to perform their duties, and an SAPS that has tried to mislead the Commission.
Farlam wanted to talk about the extraordinary meeting of the police management forum on 15 August when top provincial and national officers discussed Marikana. It was in this meeting when the decision was taken to implement the disperse, disarm and arrest plan the next day, which ultimately led to the massacre. Incredibly, the police didn't hand over any evidence of the meeting nor mention it when they made their submissions to the Commission. It only came out later.
“You're now seriously stating we would be in error if we find SAPS didn't cooperate [with the Commission]?” Farlam put to Phiyega. Only after a third party pointed them towards the meeting did the Commission find out about it. There was nothing untoward, she claimed, and when requested, they admitted the meeting took place. “It certainly appeared to us to be a secret when it came out at a later stage,” said Farlam.
Phiyega agreed the Marikana strike was the most challenging public policing situation during the democratic era, but she could not remember details of the meeting which approved the plan to tackle it. In the hour-long session on 15 August 2012, North West Provincial Commissioner Zukiswa Mbombo made a presentation for 10 to 15 minutes and the SAPS from different provinces also discussed sharing the necessary resources for the operation. Beyond that, Phiyega said she didn’t have a “photographic memory” and could not remember “pedantic details” about what happened in the meeting.
“It's very important for us to know why the decision was taken to proceed on Thursday morning,” said Farlam. “It's important for us to find out was exactly was said.” Phiyega didn't help, but she was clear about what didn't happen in the meeting. While most of the country's provincial police commissioners were present, some of whom come from policing backgrounds, Phiyega said no specific details of the plan to confront the mineworkers were discussed before it was approved.
“Are you seriously suggesting that the meeting endorsed the proposal without knowing what the details of the response were?” asked Farlam. Phiyega's response was that police know how to conduct disarming operations and they're are essentially the same. She said this despite two officers being hacked to death when a disarming operation went wrong on 13 August. Incredibly, reflecting on the meeting on 15 August, Phiyega could not recall any of the country's top police officers raising the fear of further bloodshed while they decided to approve the plan.
While shocking, it also seems extremely unlikely given the volatile situation in Marikana at the time and widely publicised problems with policing protests. Yet if Phiyega acknowledged they knew and spoke about the dangers, the next question is, so why did they implement the plan, or why this plan, and why wasn't greater precaution taken?
Farlam, however, seemed shocked. “The fact that the proposal was endorsed by the meeting, the fact that the people there all agreed to make resources available as required, surely means that they cannot evade responsibility and say, 'We knew about the plan. Sure go ahead. We'll make resources available. And if it goes wrong because it's managed badly or defective planning, that's nothing to do with us.' Surely there comes a time when responsibility must rest with those people in that meeting as well.”
He was equally surprised that Phiyega had no recollection of a conversation with SAPS expert witness Cees de Rover about political influence on police decisions at Marikana. “My questions have been straightforward on the issue; the answers have not been,” De Rover said last week, claiming Phiyega was evasive. Farlam said surely she would remember being asked if political pressure played a part in the death of 34 people in a day. Phiyega said she couldn't remember and refused to engage the chairman's questions.
Already evasive and difficult, the national police commissioner's credibility was shot when Farlam brought up the review panel. When Phiyega had appeared at the Commission before, she was asked whether the SAPS had established a review on certain issues related broadly to Marikana and Phiyega said she had not. But when a police hard drive was analysed, it emerged a review panel had been established and Phiyega's signature was on the call up instructions. No evidence the panel existed was voluntary handed to the Commission by the police despite their commitment to do so with all relevant information at the start of the inquiry.
It is impossible to look at Phiyega's cross-examination on Wednesday and believe she's being honest.
While she plays the amnesia card and tries to distance the country's top officers from the details of the plan to confront the miners, she opens up herself and other officers to allegations of incompetence and dereliction of duty. But by doing so she shifts the greater responsibility to the commanders on the ground who she says the SAPS relied on.
Phiyega is also putting a wall between the police and the politicians who got involved in Marikana. Last week, De Rover, a policing expert who has worked in over 60 countries, said he couldn't fathom a situation where politicians were not involved.
If there was any doubt that Phiyega was untruthful, Advocate Dali Mpofu showed her the transcript between the SAPS's Mbombo and Lonmin's Bernard Mokoena on 14 August 2012. In relation to the police ending the strike, the two speak of Cyril Ramaphosa, Julius Malema, the pair's relationship in the ANC disciplinary committee, problems with Malema potentially ending the crisis, and nationalisation of the mines. Asked about the political nature of the discussion and whether it is legal for the SAPS to use policing operations to influence party politics, Phiyega responded, “What's political about this?”
“They could have used different words, but what I hear is people who are interested in ending a protest.”
Let us say it once more: It is impossible to look at Phiyega's cross-examination on Wednesday and believe she's being honest. DM
Source: Daily Maverick
Tuesday, May 6, 2014
Abahlali baseMjondolo Press Statement: The ANC Must be removed from Office
For nine years our movement has boycotted elections. We have been clear that no political party represents the interests of the poor and that it was necessary for us to build our own power in order to present our own needs and demands to society. In these nine years we have won many victories but most of us remain in shacks. Twenty years of shack life is a disgrace in a democracy.
Corruption is also a disgrace. In Durban you get nothing without a membership card for the ANC. All development goes through the councillors and their ward committees and ANC branch executive committees. Development is there to make ANC leaders rich and to control the rest of us by only making it available to ANC members. Development is not for the people. This kind of corruption is a disgrace in a democracy.
But an even bigger disgrace is the repression that we have faced from the ANC, its members, its leaders and its assassins. They have banned our marches; attacked our marches; arrested us on trumped up charges; assaulted us in detention; used armed men to drive us from our homes with police support; used death threats, attacks in our homes and torture in police stations to intimidate people to manufacture evidence against us; detained us for months and months while we wait for a trial that gets thrown out of court because there is no evidence against us; used their anti-land invasion unit to evict us for political reasons and beaten and shot us in our communities. Senior members of the ANC and the Municipality have made public death threats against us. Two activists were assassinated in Cato Crest last year and another, an unarmed teenage girl, was executed by the police.
We cannot go on with this level of repression. As everyone knows we are not the only people who face this kind of repression. We all know about Andries Tatane and all the others murdered by the police on protests. We all know about the Marikana Massacre.
In Durban court orders are just ignored by the Municipality and so the courts cannot protect us. Mostly the media and civil society tend to agree that because we are poor and black we are automatically violent and criminal and too stupid to think our own politics and so we do not get that much protection from the media and civil society either. We have some valued comrades on the left among the middle classes but mostly this left just wants to bus us into its meetings so that it can look credible without having any interest at all in our struggles, our ideas or our safety. NUMSA asked us to support their march in Durban but they have not shown any concern to support us when we face repression. The EFF also asked us to support their march in Durban but, like NUMSA, they have not supported us when we face repression. So far our experience of both these organisations is that they are operating like the left NGOs – we are treated as if our only role is to provide the large numbers of people that they need to be bussed in to justify their politics.
Because we cannot carry on like this we took a decision to vote against the ANC. We did not want to split our vote. We decided to collectivise our vote in order to make it stronger. Our main priority was that the ANC must be removed from office. We knew that this will not happen in this election but we were still clear that if we can weaken the ANC then we must do that. Also we knew that if we collectivise our vote all the political parties will know that there is a large bloc of votes that will be available at the next election for the party that does the best job in opposing repression and takes the best position on shack settlements.
We decided that all political parties except the ANC would be invited to make a presentation to the movement. Some of our members did not want to invite the DA to make a presentation as they are known to represent the rich and, in Cape Town, they are no different to the ANC when it comes to illegal and violent evictions. However we debated this at length and decided to invite them to make a presentation on the grounds that the removal of the ANC was our first priority and the weakening of the ANC was our second priority.
The DA, EFF, NFP and WASP all accepted the invitation to make a presentation to our members at the Diakonia Centre on 25 April and they all came and made their presentations.
The delegates to that meeting then returned to their branches to discuss the presentations there. We met again on 2 May and held a general meeting. At this meeting the general leadership did not vote as their role was to facilitate the meeting. The rest of the delegates voted and the results were as follows:
2 - undecided
2 - WASP
16 - EFF
26 - NFP
146 – DA
The DA and the EFF returned to witness the voting. WASP did not return. The NFP arrived three hours late with lots of car, bodyguards and their senior people. But by that time we were already dispersing.
The whole meeting was recorded on video and this video can be made available. Even those who were very disappointed with the results agree that it was a highly democratic process. The collective discipline of a democratic organisation requires that we all accept this outcome. Of course this decision is only for this election and it does not bind our members in Cape Town. When the next election comes we will again decide whether or not to vote and, if so, which party to vote for.
The main reason why the majority of the delegates supported the DA was because they wanted to have the strongest possible opposition to the ANC to put the maximum pressure on the ANC and to prevent it from doing what it pleases – which includes murdering us. We negotiated a legal agreement with DA which commits them to support some of our more basic demands. We hope that they will stand up for these issues and that they, and all other parties, will realise that if they want the support of the shack dwellers they will have to support us rather than see us as a problem to be eradicated or forcibly removed from the cities and taken to the human dumping grounds.
We will vote, as one bloc, for the DA tomorrow. We will not take membership of the party, we do not endorse its policies and we will continue to insist that no one can hold a position as an elected leader in our movement if they join a political party. We do not love or trust the DA. Already they are telling lies about our choice and we are not surprised. We have made a purely tactical choice. We will certainly continue to organise against all and any attacks on the poor in Cape Town by the DA government there.
One of the lies that is being told is that the DA are saying that we have endorsed them for this election in the Western Cape. This is not true. Our Western Cape branch has endorsed our decision to make a tactical vote for the DA in KwaZulu-Natal. Our Western Cape branch has not decided to make any collective vote for any party in this election.
Over the last nine years we have protected our autonomy from NGOs very carefully even though we do work with some NGOs. Now that we feel that it is necessary for our safety and our ability to continue to organise to use our numbers to make deals with political parties we will protect our autonomy from political parties in the same way.
Our politics puts people first. We cannot do nothing but wait for socialism to come one day in the far distant future. Our children are dying from diarrhoea right now, our old people and disabled people are dying in shack fires right now, we are being evicted and disconnected right now and we are being beaten and shot during evictions and disconnections right now. We been repressed, and even murdered, right now. We have to act to do what we can to make our members’ lives better right now. We have to act to protect our ability to organise and to sustain our living politics right now. This does not mean that we have given up on our vision of a world where land, cities, wealth and power are shared fairly. We call this a living communism and we remain committed to it. But we also remain committed to the human beings that we are now and to our families, neighbours and comrades. We will make what deals we have to make to protect our politics and improve our members’ lives right now but we will not give up on our political vision. We represent thousands of people who live in shack settlements. Those people who sit in university offices and NGO offices only represent themselves. Their children are safe. Their lives are not at risk. They are free to put ideology before people because they are not accountable to oppressed people and because they are not themselves oppressed people. But the fact that we do not enjoy that freedom does not mean that we have given up our politics. It means that we are searching for a practical way forward in a difficult and dangerous struggle.
The new Abahlali electoral position has offered us a lot to learn about. There is a lot to learn about party politics and its dirty campaigning tactics. There is a lot to learn about the deeper politics of our time. And, yes, there is a lot to learn about who cares and doesn't care about the struggles of the poor and the working class.
Ideology and principle are vital but if they both fail to house the homeless and rescue the repressed and recognise the humanity of the inhumanized then the oppressed are not doing any harm to anyone in trying to emancipate ourselves by taking practical action now to keep people safe and to make their lives better while always keeping a bigger vision of freedom and justice in mind.
We share a sadness that we have had to make this decision. Very few people outside the movement have been witness to what we’ve been going through in the hands of the ANC. We do not have words to explain the pain many of us have gone through. We do not have words to explain our pain of twenty years of shack life and all the state repression that has come to us when we stood up for our humanity. Last year we came to the ceiling of hopelessness. It was clear that we are people that can be freely killed. The stress that this created led to some intense internal conflicts. We knew that we could not carry on with our old politics. Our new position has enabled us to rethink our struggle. It may not be the perfect way but it brought a robust discussion about us that was seriously trying to find ways of creating a new hope from no hope.
We are not surprised at the way some people on the so called left have reacted on our position. We are not surprised at the usual lies from the usual people on the internet. Many people and organisations on the left do not accept that we have the right to think our own struggle and to make our own decisions. They think that because they are on the left they have the right to tell us what to do. We do not accept this. These people see our decision as stupid and as a sell-out while they are nowhere to be seen in our times of great difficulty. It makes us to think that such people enjoy our suffering or even benefit from it. Why will people who claim to be in our support judge us instead of contacting us to first understand our decision? It may be a wrong decision but the reality is that we cannot deceive ourselves purposefully on our pain. Why should we be made to struggle in a way that is only designed to try and impress other people simple because they say that they are on the left? We will never do this. Our members must live in shacks and they must try and survive repression. Their organisation is theirs and it will be directed by their decisions. We have never compromised on this and for this we have always been attacked by the regressive left that only want us to take their money so that in exchange we can arrange for people to be bussed into their meetings. This is not emancipation. It is another kind of oppression.
Is the left doing enough to care about our struggle? Or do they see our struggles as projects from which they can prove and debate their findings and analysis rather than as a struggle to genuinely confront the forces of darkness? Our decision aims at trying to keep the space open for us to liberate ourselves by making a tactical move. We do not love the DA or agree with its policies. Why do people who failed to condemn the ANC attacks on us get so angry with us when we try to punish the ANC by making a tactical vote for its enemy? Maybe for these people it is better for us to be oppressed by the ANC than the DA. For us it is better not to be oppressed. Some of the left is just like some of the development NGOs and some of the state. They want to experiment on us, to use us for their own projects. We say no. On this there is no compromise. We continue to say ‘talk to us, not for us’ and ‘think with us not for us’.
Our position remains honouring those who have supported and who continue to support us. Since we all don't know the answers in this struggle to humanise the world we will keep hunting and trying. Sometimes we will make wrong decisions but at least we offer debate and learning for ourselves and all our friends and comrades.
The ANC are a serious threat to society and to right of the poor to organise freely in this society. They must be removed from office and until we can remove them we must do all that we can to weaken them.
For further information and comment please contact:
Mnikelo Ndabankulu on 081 263 3462
Zodwa Nsibande on 082 902 2960
Thembani Ngongoma on 084 613 9772
Nono Majola on 074 803 1986
Source: Abahlali baseMjondolo
Corruption is also a disgrace. In Durban you get nothing without a membership card for the ANC. All development goes through the councillors and their ward committees and ANC branch executive committees. Development is there to make ANC leaders rich and to control the rest of us by only making it available to ANC members. Development is not for the people. This kind of corruption is a disgrace in a democracy.
But an even bigger disgrace is the repression that we have faced from the ANC, its members, its leaders and its assassins. They have banned our marches; attacked our marches; arrested us on trumped up charges; assaulted us in detention; used armed men to drive us from our homes with police support; used death threats, attacks in our homes and torture in police stations to intimidate people to manufacture evidence against us; detained us for months and months while we wait for a trial that gets thrown out of court because there is no evidence against us; used their anti-land invasion unit to evict us for political reasons and beaten and shot us in our communities. Senior members of the ANC and the Municipality have made public death threats against us. Two activists were assassinated in Cato Crest last year and another, an unarmed teenage girl, was executed by the police.
We cannot go on with this level of repression. As everyone knows we are not the only people who face this kind of repression. We all know about Andries Tatane and all the others murdered by the police on protests. We all know about the Marikana Massacre.
In Durban court orders are just ignored by the Municipality and so the courts cannot protect us. Mostly the media and civil society tend to agree that because we are poor and black we are automatically violent and criminal and too stupid to think our own politics and so we do not get that much protection from the media and civil society either. We have some valued comrades on the left among the middle classes but mostly this left just wants to bus us into its meetings so that it can look credible without having any interest at all in our struggles, our ideas or our safety. NUMSA asked us to support their march in Durban but they have not shown any concern to support us when we face repression. The EFF also asked us to support their march in Durban but, like NUMSA, they have not supported us when we face repression. So far our experience of both these organisations is that they are operating like the left NGOs – we are treated as if our only role is to provide the large numbers of people that they need to be bussed in to justify their politics.
Because we cannot carry on like this we took a decision to vote against the ANC. We did not want to split our vote. We decided to collectivise our vote in order to make it stronger. Our main priority was that the ANC must be removed from office. We knew that this will not happen in this election but we were still clear that if we can weaken the ANC then we must do that. Also we knew that if we collectivise our vote all the political parties will know that there is a large bloc of votes that will be available at the next election for the party that does the best job in opposing repression and takes the best position on shack settlements.
We decided that all political parties except the ANC would be invited to make a presentation to the movement. Some of our members did not want to invite the DA to make a presentation as they are known to represent the rich and, in Cape Town, they are no different to the ANC when it comes to illegal and violent evictions. However we debated this at length and decided to invite them to make a presentation on the grounds that the removal of the ANC was our first priority and the weakening of the ANC was our second priority.
The DA, EFF, NFP and WASP all accepted the invitation to make a presentation to our members at the Diakonia Centre on 25 April and they all came and made their presentations.
The delegates to that meeting then returned to their branches to discuss the presentations there. We met again on 2 May and held a general meeting. At this meeting the general leadership did not vote as their role was to facilitate the meeting. The rest of the delegates voted and the results were as follows:
2 - undecided
2 - WASP
16 - EFF
26 - NFP
146 – DA
The DA and the EFF returned to witness the voting. WASP did not return. The NFP arrived three hours late with lots of car, bodyguards and their senior people. But by that time we were already dispersing.
The whole meeting was recorded on video and this video can be made available. Even those who were very disappointed with the results agree that it was a highly democratic process. The collective discipline of a democratic organisation requires that we all accept this outcome. Of course this decision is only for this election and it does not bind our members in Cape Town. When the next election comes we will again decide whether or not to vote and, if so, which party to vote for.
The main reason why the majority of the delegates supported the DA was because they wanted to have the strongest possible opposition to the ANC to put the maximum pressure on the ANC and to prevent it from doing what it pleases – which includes murdering us. We negotiated a legal agreement with DA which commits them to support some of our more basic demands. We hope that they will stand up for these issues and that they, and all other parties, will realise that if they want the support of the shack dwellers they will have to support us rather than see us as a problem to be eradicated or forcibly removed from the cities and taken to the human dumping grounds.
We will vote, as one bloc, for the DA tomorrow. We will not take membership of the party, we do not endorse its policies and we will continue to insist that no one can hold a position as an elected leader in our movement if they join a political party. We do not love or trust the DA. Already they are telling lies about our choice and we are not surprised. We have made a purely tactical choice. We will certainly continue to organise against all and any attacks on the poor in Cape Town by the DA government there.
One of the lies that is being told is that the DA are saying that we have endorsed them for this election in the Western Cape. This is not true. Our Western Cape branch has endorsed our decision to make a tactical vote for the DA in KwaZulu-Natal. Our Western Cape branch has not decided to make any collective vote for any party in this election.
Over the last nine years we have protected our autonomy from NGOs very carefully even though we do work with some NGOs. Now that we feel that it is necessary for our safety and our ability to continue to organise to use our numbers to make deals with political parties we will protect our autonomy from political parties in the same way.
Our politics puts people first. We cannot do nothing but wait for socialism to come one day in the far distant future. Our children are dying from diarrhoea right now, our old people and disabled people are dying in shack fires right now, we are being evicted and disconnected right now and we are being beaten and shot during evictions and disconnections right now. We been repressed, and even murdered, right now. We have to act to do what we can to make our members’ lives better right now. We have to act to protect our ability to organise and to sustain our living politics right now. This does not mean that we have given up on our vision of a world where land, cities, wealth and power are shared fairly. We call this a living communism and we remain committed to it. But we also remain committed to the human beings that we are now and to our families, neighbours and comrades. We will make what deals we have to make to protect our politics and improve our members’ lives right now but we will not give up on our political vision. We represent thousands of people who live in shack settlements. Those people who sit in university offices and NGO offices only represent themselves. Their children are safe. Their lives are not at risk. They are free to put ideology before people because they are not accountable to oppressed people and because they are not themselves oppressed people. But the fact that we do not enjoy that freedom does not mean that we have given up our politics. It means that we are searching for a practical way forward in a difficult and dangerous struggle.
The new Abahlali electoral position has offered us a lot to learn about. There is a lot to learn about party politics and its dirty campaigning tactics. There is a lot to learn about the deeper politics of our time. And, yes, there is a lot to learn about who cares and doesn't care about the struggles of the poor and the working class.
Ideology and principle are vital but if they both fail to house the homeless and rescue the repressed and recognise the humanity of the inhumanized then the oppressed are not doing any harm to anyone in trying to emancipate ourselves by taking practical action now to keep people safe and to make their lives better while always keeping a bigger vision of freedom and justice in mind.
We share a sadness that we have had to make this decision. Very few people outside the movement have been witness to what we’ve been going through in the hands of the ANC. We do not have words to explain the pain many of us have gone through. We do not have words to explain our pain of twenty years of shack life and all the state repression that has come to us when we stood up for our humanity. Last year we came to the ceiling of hopelessness. It was clear that we are people that can be freely killed. The stress that this created led to some intense internal conflicts. We knew that we could not carry on with our old politics. Our new position has enabled us to rethink our struggle. It may not be the perfect way but it brought a robust discussion about us that was seriously trying to find ways of creating a new hope from no hope.
We are not surprised at the way some people on the so called left have reacted on our position. We are not surprised at the usual lies from the usual people on the internet. Many people and organisations on the left do not accept that we have the right to think our own struggle and to make our own decisions. They think that because they are on the left they have the right to tell us what to do. We do not accept this. These people see our decision as stupid and as a sell-out while they are nowhere to be seen in our times of great difficulty. It makes us to think that such people enjoy our suffering or even benefit from it. Why will people who claim to be in our support judge us instead of contacting us to first understand our decision? It may be a wrong decision but the reality is that we cannot deceive ourselves purposefully on our pain. Why should we be made to struggle in a way that is only designed to try and impress other people simple because they say that they are on the left? We will never do this. Our members must live in shacks and they must try and survive repression. Their organisation is theirs and it will be directed by their decisions. We have never compromised on this and for this we have always been attacked by the regressive left that only want us to take their money so that in exchange we can arrange for people to be bussed into their meetings. This is not emancipation. It is another kind of oppression.
Is the left doing enough to care about our struggle? Or do they see our struggles as projects from which they can prove and debate their findings and analysis rather than as a struggle to genuinely confront the forces of darkness? Our decision aims at trying to keep the space open for us to liberate ourselves by making a tactical move. We do not love the DA or agree with its policies. Why do people who failed to condemn the ANC attacks on us get so angry with us when we try to punish the ANC by making a tactical vote for its enemy? Maybe for these people it is better for us to be oppressed by the ANC than the DA. For us it is better not to be oppressed. Some of the left is just like some of the development NGOs and some of the state. They want to experiment on us, to use us for their own projects. We say no. On this there is no compromise. We continue to say ‘talk to us, not for us’ and ‘think with us not for us’.
Our position remains honouring those who have supported and who continue to support us. Since we all don't know the answers in this struggle to humanise the world we will keep hunting and trying. Sometimes we will make wrong decisions but at least we offer debate and learning for ourselves and all our friends and comrades.
The ANC are a serious threat to society and to right of the poor to organise freely in this society. They must be removed from office and until we can remove them we must do all that we can to weaken them.
For further information and comment please contact:
Mnikelo Ndabankulu on 081 263 3462
Zodwa Nsibande on 082 902 2960
Thembani Ngongoma on 084 613 9772
Nono Majola on 074 803 1986
Source: Abahlali baseMjondolo
Wednesday, January 8, 2014
ANC at 102: when the revolution eats its own children
There are few people who can talk about the state of the ANC without sighing and shaking their heads. The transition from a liberation movement to a political party in government has not been kind – the organisation appears to be on a mission of self-destruction with lure of power and wealth tattering its fibre, and factionalism and patronage constantly diminishing its stature. The ANC has been able to reach the grand age of 102 because of the strength of its leadership and its popularity throughout its lifespan. But now it is difficult to hold up the ANC in 2014 against the organisation with a progression of heroic leaders which took power in 1994. Most bizarre is the way it has turned on itself. By RANJENI MUNUSAMY.
Lieutenant General Sean Tshabalala died of a broken heart. His body was found in his locked office at the police headquarters in Pretoria on Christmas Eve. Tributes at his memorial service and funeral tell the story of a once proud Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK) soldier and one of the first line of VIP protectors when the ANC returned from exile, withering in a state of depression after being marginalised by the police management.
A furore erupted after Tshabalala’s funeral where former national police commissioner Bheki Cele revealed a list of 18 names of former MK combatants serving or formerly in the South African Police Service who were allegedly on a target list, presumably of the current national commissioner Riah Phiyega and her political bosses. Tshabalala’s name allegedly topped the list. His friends and former colleagues had earlier told of Tshabalala’s heartbreak at being shifted sideways from Protection and Security Services division of the police to the information technology division and later to a non-job at the police inspectorate.
Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa acted swiftly to meet with some of the people on the list and dismiss the claims as rubbish. Phiyega denied knowledge of the list. However, the perception exists that experienced ANC and MK members were being steadily hounded out of the security services since President Jacob Zuma won power at the ANC’s Polokwane conference.
There has been a deluge of early retirements and resignations from the Department of State Security, the military and the SAPS in recent years, most of which involved people who served in MK or ANC intelligence structures during the liberation struggle. Some of these people went into exile in their teenage years, some were involved in dangerous intelligence missions at great personal cost, some were trained in the camps under the ANC’s most iconic leaders.
Their departure from the security services has been a curious phenomenon. Zuma, formerly head of intelligence in the ANC, has always seen security and intelligence as high priority. But after the recall of Thabo Mbeki, it would seem that paranoia set in and people perceived to be loyal to the former president were systematically weeded out, irrespective of their skills, service to their country with distinction or role in the liberation struggle.
Cele is well aware of the purge because he was instrumental in implementing it while he was national commissioner. In one case, he called a high-ranking officer who was on a mission abroad immediately back to the country and informed him he was being transferred to another job. It did not take long for the officer to resign from the police service. Cele was also the one who transferred Tshabalala out of the Protection and Security Services division.
Tshabalala, unlike most of his comrades, stuck it out in the police despite being sidelined – a decision which probably eventually cost him his life. Shortly before his death, Tshabalala had received a letter transferring him to the Northern Cape province (viewed as the Siberia of deployments), and this is possibly the reason his depression became too much to bear.
Tshabalala is just one of many of people whose lives have been destroyed by the organisation they dedicated their lives to. Others have been able to move on with their lives but their disillusionment with the ANC is profound. For many of them, the ANC was not just a political organisation but a way of life, a reason for being. To see the organisation self-destruct is worse than a family feud or divorce because they had chosen the ANC over their families and their own safety when they joined the struggle.
There are various explanations for the purge. The first is that ANC people in the security services would refuse to use state institutions to fight power battles in the party. There is always the risk that loyalty to the ANC would outweigh loyalty to the individual in power, which could lead to instructions being ignored, undermined or disclosed. The theory goes that this is why Zuma and Mthethwa saw use in Richard Mdluli – as a person who worked for the apartheid era police, he has no affiliation to the ANC and is loyal only to those who pay his salary.
The second theory is that the security ministers felt threatened by the seniority, knowledge and experience of the commanders serving under them. In terms of ANC hierarchy, many of the officials were senior to the current batch of ministers and this was a source of tension, particularly when there were differences of opinion on operational issues. But while there might have been underlying resentment, it would be strange if Zuma allowed the security services to be depleted of loyal and experienced officials on the basis of his ministers' inferiority complexes.
The third theory is more complex. A former senior member of the security services says the success of South Africa’s transition was partly due to the fact that security of the country was in the hands of the “doves”.
“This ensured that national security was based on human security. Now the focus is on state security. For the first time, security is now in the hands of the ‘hawks’, just like during the Apartheid era when the hawks saw a red (communists) under every bed. So we have come full circle with the hawks again in charge,” he said.
He said the current crop of hawks are fixated on external threats to the country, such as from foreign governments, imperialist forces and lobby groups, and they trade on conspiracy theories. “The real threats to the country are unemployment, inequality and poverty, and our failure to deliver. But anyone who puts forward that view is hounded out, marginalised or made redundant.
“They do not want to hear about our own failures; they prefer nonsensical stories about plots against the president, like what was in the Mdluli report. The plot is the failure of delivery. That is the biggest threat to national security,” the retired member said.
The theory is consistent with how the state and ANC views the personal security of the president and the state as interchangeable – as exemplified by the handling of the issue of the security upgrades at Zuma’s Nkandla estate. But the retired security official says people often overlook how the Constitution defines the governing principles around national security: “National security must reflect the resolve of South Africans, as individuals and as a nation, to live as equals, to live in peace and harmony, to be free from fear and want and to seek a better life”.
The Constitution says nothing about the President and his Cabinet receiving special protection in their homes and cars as a principle of national security but dictates that ordinary people should be “free from fear”. It would appear that the organisation which drafted this Constitution has these days lost sight of these principles.
To the ANC at 102, it would seem, people, even their most experienced and dedicated comrades, are expendable. It has become a pattern that factional battles need to be fought till one group is hounded out and the organisation belongs only to the victors. From branch to national level, battles are fought for dominance of leadership positions, and those who lose are treated as pariahs and purged from positions in the state.
At the ANC national conferences, voting for the top six positions and the national executive committee takes place according to slates, dependent only according to loyalty to those who control the faction. As a result, the organisation is controlled by the winning faction and those outside the faction are marginalised, irrespective of their seniority, credentials or what they have to offer the party or the country.
Both Mbeki and Zuma appear to believe that the best way to protect their presidencies is to surround themselves with loyalists who tell them what they want to hear and fight off dissent on their behalf. It is this very tendency which builds resentment in the ANC and leads bad decision-making.
As the ANC celebrates its 102nd anniversary, it is also in the process of compiling its lists of representatives to serve in Parliament and the provincial legislatures. The list process is also likely to be defined by factional politics, with loyalists able to get higher on the lists and stand a better chance of becoming a member of Parliament. Those who refrain from factional battles or who campaigned against Zuma’s second term at the ANC’s Mangaung conference are less likely to be elected.
But there are also a number of people who are declining nomination because they cannot in good conscience agree to serve the ANC in its current state. “It is a bloody nightmare for us,” said one high-ranking member who has declined nomination.
He said if the party was serious about its future and that of the country, they would ask the president and other ANC leaders steeped in scandal to step aside. “But in the NEC, few can stand up and impose their integrity. The rest will be found wanting themselves,” he said.
Others, however, believe that they should remain in the fold and the ANC will self correct at its next conference in 2017. But what is the likelihood of it and how much damage would have been done by then? With the organisation a shadow of its former self now, what will it look like with four years still to go under the current leadership?
Despite the many problems in the ANC, there are only few people who are able to speak up and confront the issues besetting the organisation. The leadership seems to believe that the organisation is resilient and can withstand the scandals and strife. And those who do speak out are treated as disgruntled elements that should be disregarded. ANC and South African Communist Party veteran Ronnie Kasrils wrote in The Guardian last year: “The ANC's soul needs to be restored; its traditional values and culture of service reinstated. The pact with the devil needs to be broken”.
The ANC simply ignored him.
And so, Africa’s oldest liberation movement turns 102 on Wednesday. It is a momentous occasion for the organisation with a proud history and iconic leaders to still be going strong and enjoying the support of the majority of South Africans. While the current leaders mark the occasion with celebratory rallies, doubling as campaign events, many people will be looking on from the outside, mourning for days gone by when the ANC was a home for all.
Perhaps it is normal for any political organisation to find itself unable to keep its soul once it gets touched by the spoils of uninterrupted power. It has happened many times before, and it will happen many times in the future. What is surprising, though, is how history always fails to teach the ones at the top. At 102, the ANC is drifting into the darkness, increasingly disconnected from the lives and reality of those they are sworn to protect: the masses that continue to exist in the tough reality and fearing a hopeless future. DM
Source: Daily Maverick
Lieutenant General Sean Tshabalala died of a broken heart. His body was found in his locked office at the police headquarters in Pretoria on Christmas Eve. Tributes at his memorial service and funeral tell the story of a once proud Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK) soldier and one of the first line of VIP protectors when the ANC returned from exile, withering in a state of depression after being marginalised by the police management.
A furore erupted after Tshabalala’s funeral where former national police commissioner Bheki Cele revealed a list of 18 names of former MK combatants serving or formerly in the South African Police Service who were allegedly on a target list, presumably of the current national commissioner Riah Phiyega and her political bosses. Tshabalala’s name allegedly topped the list. His friends and former colleagues had earlier told of Tshabalala’s heartbreak at being shifted sideways from Protection and Security Services division of the police to the information technology division and later to a non-job at the police inspectorate.
Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa acted swiftly to meet with some of the people on the list and dismiss the claims as rubbish. Phiyega denied knowledge of the list. However, the perception exists that experienced ANC and MK members were being steadily hounded out of the security services since President Jacob Zuma won power at the ANC’s Polokwane conference.
There has been a deluge of early retirements and resignations from the Department of State Security, the military and the SAPS in recent years, most of which involved people who served in MK or ANC intelligence structures during the liberation struggle. Some of these people went into exile in their teenage years, some were involved in dangerous intelligence missions at great personal cost, some were trained in the camps under the ANC’s most iconic leaders.
Their departure from the security services has been a curious phenomenon. Zuma, formerly head of intelligence in the ANC, has always seen security and intelligence as high priority. But after the recall of Thabo Mbeki, it would seem that paranoia set in and people perceived to be loyal to the former president were systematically weeded out, irrespective of their skills, service to their country with distinction or role in the liberation struggle.
Cele is well aware of the purge because he was instrumental in implementing it while he was national commissioner. In one case, he called a high-ranking officer who was on a mission abroad immediately back to the country and informed him he was being transferred to another job. It did not take long for the officer to resign from the police service. Cele was also the one who transferred Tshabalala out of the Protection and Security Services division.
Tshabalala, unlike most of his comrades, stuck it out in the police despite being sidelined – a decision which probably eventually cost him his life. Shortly before his death, Tshabalala had received a letter transferring him to the Northern Cape province (viewed as the Siberia of deployments), and this is possibly the reason his depression became too much to bear.
Tshabalala is just one of many of people whose lives have been destroyed by the organisation they dedicated their lives to. Others have been able to move on with their lives but their disillusionment with the ANC is profound. For many of them, the ANC was not just a political organisation but a way of life, a reason for being. To see the organisation self-destruct is worse than a family feud or divorce because they had chosen the ANC over their families and their own safety when they joined the struggle.
There are various explanations for the purge. The first is that ANC people in the security services would refuse to use state institutions to fight power battles in the party. There is always the risk that loyalty to the ANC would outweigh loyalty to the individual in power, which could lead to instructions being ignored, undermined or disclosed. The theory goes that this is why Zuma and Mthethwa saw use in Richard Mdluli – as a person who worked for the apartheid era police, he has no affiliation to the ANC and is loyal only to those who pay his salary.
The second theory is that the security ministers felt threatened by the seniority, knowledge and experience of the commanders serving under them. In terms of ANC hierarchy, many of the officials were senior to the current batch of ministers and this was a source of tension, particularly when there were differences of opinion on operational issues. But while there might have been underlying resentment, it would be strange if Zuma allowed the security services to be depleted of loyal and experienced officials on the basis of his ministers' inferiority complexes.
The third theory is more complex. A former senior member of the security services says the success of South Africa’s transition was partly due to the fact that security of the country was in the hands of the “doves”.
“This ensured that national security was based on human security. Now the focus is on state security. For the first time, security is now in the hands of the ‘hawks’, just like during the Apartheid era when the hawks saw a red (communists) under every bed. So we have come full circle with the hawks again in charge,” he said.
He said the current crop of hawks are fixated on external threats to the country, such as from foreign governments, imperialist forces and lobby groups, and they trade on conspiracy theories. “The real threats to the country are unemployment, inequality and poverty, and our failure to deliver. But anyone who puts forward that view is hounded out, marginalised or made redundant.
“They do not want to hear about our own failures; they prefer nonsensical stories about plots against the president, like what was in the Mdluli report. The plot is the failure of delivery. That is the biggest threat to national security,” the retired member said.
The theory is consistent with how the state and ANC views the personal security of the president and the state as interchangeable – as exemplified by the handling of the issue of the security upgrades at Zuma’s Nkandla estate. But the retired security official says people often overlook how the Constitution defines the governing principles around national security: “National security must reflect the resolve of South Africans, as individuals and as a nation, to live as equals, to live in peace and harmony, to be free from fear and want and to seek a better life”.
The Constitution says nothing about the President and his Cabinet receiving special protection in their homes and cars as a principle of national security but dictates that ordinary people should be “free from fear”. It would appear that the organisation which drafted this Constitution has these days lost sight of these principles.
To the ANC at 102, it would seem, people, even their most experienced and dedicated comrades, are expendable. It has become a pattern that factional battles need to be fought till one group is hounded out and the organisation belongs only to the victors. From branch to national level, battles are fought for dominance of leadership positions, and those who lose are treated as pariahs and purged from positions in the state.
At the ANC national conferences, voting for the top six positions and the national executive committee takes place according to slates, dependent only according to loyalty to those who control the faction. As a result, the organisation is controlled by the winning faction and those outside the faction are marginalised, irrespective of their seniority, credentials or what they have to offer the party or the country.
Both Mbeki and Zuma appear to believe that the best way to protect their presidencies is to surround themselves with loyalists who tell them what they want to hear and fight off dissent on their behalf. It is this very tendency which builds resentment in the ANC and leads bad decision-making.
As the ANC celebrates its 102nd anniversary, it is also in the process of compiling its lists of representatives to serve in Parliament and the provincial legislatures. The list process is also likely to be defined by factional politics, with loyalists able to get higher on the lists and stand a better chance of becoming a member of Parliament. Those who refrain from factional battles or who campaigned against Zuma’s second term at the ANC’s Mangaung conference are less likely to be elected.
But there are also a number of people who are declining nomination because they cannot in good conscience agree to serve the ANC in its current state. “It is a bloody nightmare for us,” said one high-ranking member who has declined nomination.
He said if the party was serious about its future and that of the country, they would ask the president and other ANC leaders steeped in scandal to step aside. “But in the NEC, few can stand up and impose their integrity. The rest will be found wanting themselves,” he said.
Others, however, believe that they should remain in the fold and the ANC will self correct at its next conference in 2017. But what is the likelihood of it and how much damage would have been done by then? With the organisation a shadow of its former self now, what will it look like with four years still to go under the current leadership?
Despite the many problems in the ANC, there are only few people who are able to speak up and confront the issues besetting the organisation. The leadership seems to believe that the organisation is resilient and can withstand the scandals and strife. And those who do speak out are treated as disgruntled elements that should be disregarded. ANC and South African Communist Party veteran Ronnie Kasrils wrote in The Guardian last year: “The ANC's soul needs to be restored; its traditional values and culture of service reinstated. The pact with the devil needs to be broken”.
The ANC simply ignored him.
And so, Africa’s oldest liberation movement turns 102 on Wednesday. It is a momentous occasion for the organisation with a proud history and iconic leaders to still be going strong and enjoying the support of the majority of South Africans. While the current leaders mark the occasion with celebratory rallies, doubling as campaign events, many people will be looking on from the outside, mourning for days gone by when the ANC was a home for all.
Perhaps it is normal for any political organisation to find itself unable to keep its soul once it gets touched by the spoils of uninterrupted power. It has happened many times before, and it will happen many times in the future. What is surprising, though, is how history always fails to teach the ones at the top. At 102, the ANC is drifting into the darkness, increasingly disconnected from the lives and reality of those they are sworn to protect: the masses that continue to exist in the tough reality and fearing a hopeless future. DM
Source: Daily Maverick
Wednesday, November 13, 2013
Parliament should reject Robert McBride's nomination as head of the Independent Police Investigative Directorate
Dr Mamphela Ramphele, the leader of Agang SA, calls on Parliament to reject the appointment of disgraced former Ekurhuleni metro police chief Robert McBride as head of the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (Ipid).
"McBride has tarnished his copybook with too many criminal charges that he has managed to escape in the past, making his potential appointment to such an important public institution highly questionable," she said. "South African citizens deserve better - they deserve clean government that looks after the interests of every citizen, not the political elite," she said.
Dr Ramphele, who addressed a meeting in the Strand district of Cape Town last evening, called on South Africans to vote for a clean and professional police force - one of the key issues Agang SA is championing in the run up to the 2014 elections.
At the meeting, she praised the Strand Broadlands community for the way in which they had managed to root out a scourge of drug dealers by working together with the police in a peaceful and effective campaign over a period of seven months.
Her message follows the alarming event last week in Khutsong, west of Johannesburg, where residents took the law into their own hands against gangsters, and killed six people.
"This country desperately needs to respect its public institutions, including the police, so that we can have law and order. We need a country that is free of corruption and crime - a country that trains and pays its police force well and expects the best of them," Ramphele said.
"Imagine we could have a country where everybody feels safe on the streets. It is possible, if we all insist on the best services our nation can deliver to us all."
Statement issued by Dr Mamphela Ramphele, the leader of Agang SA, November 13 2013
Source: Politicsweb
"McBride has tarnished his copybook with too many criminal charges that he has managed to escape in the past, making his potential appointment to such an important public institution highly questionable," she said. "South African citizens deserve better - they deserve clean government that looks after the interests of every citizen, not the political elite," she said.
Dr Ramphele, who addressed a meeting in the Strand district of Cape Town last evening, called on South Africans to vote for a clean and professional police force - one of the key issues Agang SA is championing in the run up to the 2014 elections.
At the meeting, she praised the Strand Broadlands community for the way in which they had managed to root out a scourge of drug dealers by working together with the police in a peaceful and effective campaign over a period of seven months.
Her message follows the alarming event last week in Khutsong, west of Johannesburg, where residents took the law into their own hands against gangsters, and killed six people.
"This country desperately needs to respect its public institutions, including the police, so that we can have law and order. We need a country that is free of corruption and crime - a country that trains and pays its police force well and expects the best of them," Ramphele said.
"Imagine we could have a country where everybody feels safe on the streets. It is possible, if we all insist on the best services our nation can deliver to us all."
Statement issued by Dr Mamphela Ramphele, the leader of Agang SA, November 13 2013
Source: Politicsweb
Tuesday, November 12, 2013
Protecting our public protector: We need to defend the space for Thuli Madonsela to work without fear or favour
Durban - The public protector is under siege from many quarters and has had little vocal support from citizens whose interests she is tasked to protect. We need to play our role in defending the space for her to work without fear or favour.
Our political environment reminds me of Machiavelli’s words that: “There is nothing more difficult, nothing more doubtful of success than to initiate new ways of things. For the reformer has enemies in all those who profit from the old ways, and only lukewarm support from those who would profit from the new way. This lukewarmness arising partly from fear of their adversaries, and partly from the incredulity of mankind, who do not actually believe in anything until they have had experience of it.”
Change agents like our public protector are up against a political culture that has still to grow into the promise of freedom embedded in our constitution. Holding those in public office accountable is only possible if citizens demand it and support organs of state responsible for protecting the public interest.
The biggest challenge facing chapter nine institutions such as the public protector is the tolerance by citizens of the confusion deliberately created by the ANC between the state, the government, the governing party and the president. When ministers in the security cluster invoke the risks to “state security”, that the release of the public protector’s report on the upgrades of President Jacob Zuma’s Nkandla residence would entail, are they focusing on the “state” or the person of the “president”?
The state represents the “commonwealth” that belongs to all citizens. How can this commonwealth’s security be put at risk by the exposure of improprieties in the procurement processes regarding the expenditure of a significant amount of taxpayers’ money in excess of R200 million? How does exposure of the suggested presence of a cattle kraal worth an estimated R1.2m jeopardise the security of our commonwealth as citizens?
It is the concealment of wrongdoing in public procurement processes that is putting our commonwealth at risk. In my travels across the country in villages, townships, universities, workplaces and corporate offices, my fellow citizens point to corruption as the biggest threat to our future as a society.
They identify corruption as the reason we have not come far enough and fast enough in living out our aspirations as a society in the past 20 years. Disclosure is like sunshine that disinfects hidden wrongdoing and eradicates corruption.
Young people who comprise the largest segment of our population can shape the country’s future in next year’s elections. Yet many are not sure that registering and voting will have any impact on their future. A big part of their misgiving comes from their perception that the state, government, ANC and president are an unmovable corrupt monolith that is destroying the country. This misgiving represents the biggest risk to our democracy.
The fearless work of the public protector’s office is essential to restoring the hope in young people that no one is above the law and that citizens’ rights matter and will be protected.
Moreover, there was a worrying phenomenon among poor communities this past weekend. In some areas, people refused to register or to allow registration to take place in their areas until their demands are met. They, too, do not distinguish between the IEC, a chapter nine institution, and the government.
We must stand up and defend the space for the key institutions of our democracy to operate without fear or favour. It is a question of “for whom the bell tolls” – it tolls for all of us. Today it is the public protector, tomorrow it is the judiciary, then it will be citizens without the protection of those key institutions. By then, it will be too late to stand up.
We have been through similar moments in our history and must not return there. When I was banned and banished to Tzaneen, my lawyer was told it was not in the state’s interests to disclose why I had been banished to that area.
Are we again ready to tolerate threats to our democracy in the name of “state security” as defined by those determined to secure their positions in power? Are we willing to protect abuse of power and resources in order to protect those in public office?
We can stop abuse of power by those who should be serving us who instead focus on serving themselves. We must not shy away from raising our voices in protection of the public protector so she can do her work to secure the public interest. We have seen how her report on the IEC chairwoman’s impropriety in procuring the lease of property for IEC offices has been attacked on procedural grounds. Are we to condone wrongdoing in this and many other matters through political procedural stonewalling? Where will these stonewalling tactics end?
We have seen enough signs of the president’s lack of capacity to take responsibility for executive action at too many levels: the Schabir Shaik case, his rape trial, Guptagate etc.
His performance in Parliament where he trivialised accountability for Guptagate into a joke about it not being realistic for him to know who is landing at our airports was an embarrassment. Waterkloof is an airforce base that we have afforded him and authorised other officials to use – to serve us. It is not to be used to curry favour with his friends.
We need a strong public protector to keep the executive branch of the state accountable to citizens. We have to protect the public protector so she can continue to protect the “commonwealth” from those invoking “state security” to put our democracy at risk. We dare not fail.
Mamphela Ramphele
Source: The Mercury
Our political environment reminds me of Machiavelli’s words that: “There is nothing more difficult, nothing more doubtful of success than to initiate new ways of things. For the reformer has enemies in all those who profit from the old ways, and only lukewarm support from those who would profit from the new way. This lukewarmness arising partly from fear of their adversaries, and partly from the incredulity of mankind, who do not actually believe in anything until they have had experience of it.”
Change agents like our public protector are up against a political culture that has still to grow into the promise of freedom embedded in our constitution. Holding those in public office accountable is only possible if citizens demand it and support organs of state responsible for protecting the public interest.
The biggest challenge facing chapter nine institutions such as the public protector is the tolerance by citizens of the confusion deliberately created by the ANC between the state, the government, the governing party and the president. When ministers in the security cluster invoke the risks to “state security”, that the release of the public protector’s report on the upgrades of President Jacob Zuma’s Nkandla residence would entail, are they focusing on the “state” or the person of the “president”?
The state represents the “commonwealth” that belongs to all citizens. How can this commonwealth’s security be put at risk by the exposure of improprieties in the procurement processes regarding the expenditure of a significant amount of taxpayers’ money in excess of R200 million? How does exposure of the suggested presence of a cattle kraal worth an estimated R1.2m jeopardise the security of our commonwealth as citizens?
It is the concealment of wrongdoing in public procurement processes that is putting our commonwealth at risk. In my travels across the country in villages, townships, universities, workplaces and corporate offices, my fellow citizens point to corruption as the biggest threat to our future as a society.
They identify corruption as the reason we have not come far enough and fast enough in living out our aspirations as a society in the past 20 years. Disclosure is like sunshine that disinfects hidden wrongdoing and eradicates corruption.
Young people who comprise the largest segment of our population can shape the country’s future in next year’s elections. Yet many are not sure that registering and voting will have any impact on their future. A big part of their misgiving comes from their perception that the state, government, ANC and president are an unmovable corrupt monolith that is destroying the country. This misgiving represents the biggest risk to our democracy.
The fearless work of the public protector’s office is essential to restoring the hope in young people that no one is above the law and that citizens’ rights matter and will be protected.
Moreover, there was a worrying phenomenon among poor communities this past weekend. In some areas, people refused to register or to allow registration to take place in their areas until their demands are met. They, too, do not distinguish between the IEC, a chapter nine institution, and the government.
We must stand up and defend the space for the key institutions of our democracy to operate without fear or favour. It is a question of “for whom the bell tolls” – it tolls for all of us. Today it is the public protector, tomorrow it is the judiciary, then it will be citizens without the protection of those key institutions. By then, it will be too late to stand up.
We have been through similar moments in our history and must not return there. When I was banned and banished to Tzaneen, my lawyer was told it was not in the state’s interests to disclose why I had been banished to that area.
Are we again ready to tolerate threats to our democracy in the name of “state security” as defined by those determined to secure their positions in power? Are we willing to protect abuse of power and resources in order to protect those in public office?
We can stop abuse of power by those who should be serving us who instead focus on serving themselves. We must not shy away from raising our voices in protection of the public protector so she can do her work to secure the public interest. We have seen how her report on the IEC chairwoman’s impropriety in procuring the lease of property for IEC offices has been attacked on procedural grounds. Are we to condone wrongdoing in this and many other matters through political procedural stonewalling? Where will these stonewalling tactics end?
We have seen enough signs of the president’s lack of capacity to take responsibility for executive action at too many levels: the Schabir Shaik case, his rape trial, Guptagate etc.
His performance in Parliament where he trivialised accountability for Guptagate into a joke about it not being realistic for him to know who is landing at our airports was an embarrassment. Waterkloof is an airforce base that we have afforded him and authorised other officials to use – to serve us. It is not to be used to curry favour with his friends.
We need a strong public protector to keep the executive branch of the state accountable to citizens. We have to protect the public protector so she can continue to protect the “commonwealth” from those invoking “state security” to put our democracy at risk. We dare not fail.
Mamphela Ramphele
Source: The Mercury
Parties denounce McBride's nomination for IPID head
Opposition parties have criticised a decision to recommend former Ekurhuleni metro police chief Robert McBride as head of the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (IPID).
The Democratic Alliance would "vehemently" oppose the appointment in Parliament, MP Dianne Kohler Barnard said on Tuesday. "IPID is responsible for investigating police officials in positions of authority and deals with sensitive information on a daily basis, thus the executive director must be a person free of scandal."
Lobby group AfriForum said Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa should resign for nominating McBride. "Minister Mthethwa, with this step, clearly indicated that the efficacy and integrity of the police is not a priority for him," said spokesperson Ian Cameron.
The Freedom Front Plus said the recommendation made a "farce and mockery" of Mthethwa's comments that he would eradicate corruption in the police. "IPID investigates corruption in the police and the head of this institution should not be a controversial person and should have an irreproachable character," spokesperson Pieter Groenewald said.
Christian Democratic Party leader Theunis Botha said the recommendation was "a serious challenge for being the sickest joke of the millennium".
"This makes a mockery of all the ANC promises that the policy of cadre deployment will be based on merit."
Shortlisted
Mthethwa said earlier that Cabinet decided at a meeting on Wednesday to recommend McBride as IPID executive director. "We believe Mr McBride's appointment as head of IPID will help this important institution to achieve [its] ... mandate," Mthethwa said.
He said McBride was the successful candidate following shortlisting, an interview process, and Cabinet's endorsement. "However, in line with the IPID Act, the appointment can only be finalised once Parliament has concurred."
Kohler Barnard said Mthethwa had requested that the portfolio committee on police consider McBride's nomination in a letter published in Parliament's announcements, tablings and committees on Tuesday morning. According to the IPID Act, the nomination must be considered within 30 parliamentary days.
She said the IPID should not be led by "such a controversial figure".
"The executive director must be suitably qualified for the position, not have previous convictions, and be a person of integrity."
Cameron said Mthethwa's decision had jeopardised the integrity of the police. "McBride had been previously arrested for arms smuggling, drunk driving and defeating the ends of justice. Now he must investigate and control corruption and malpractice in the police ...," he said.
Groenewald said Mthethwa was violating the public's trust with the recommendation. "McBride is extremely controversial and definitely not suitable for the position. The public should be able to trust the head of the IPID because a lot of complaints are against the [South African Police Service]."
Fired
Botha said Mthethwa should be fired. "Surely, no other minister is as determined to destroy his or her department," he said.
"If President [Jacob] Zuma does not now fire this bungling minister, the ANC should not be surprised when the world likens the Cabinet to a bunch of clowns."
McBride, who is a former MP and government official, won an appeal in March against a conviction of drunken driving and attempting to obstruct justice.
He was arrested in 2006 after crashing his official car on the R511 following a Christmas party. In September 2011, a Pretoria magistrate sentenced McBride to two years imprisonment for driving under the influence of alcohol and in effect three years' imprisonment for attempting to obstruct the course of justice.
In 1998, McBride was arrested in Mozambique on charges of gun-running. He spent seven months in a Maputo prison and was later cleared of all charges. He claimed he was investigating illegal gun-running with the National Intelligence Agency.
In 1999, McBride faced an assault charge after he, underworld boss Cyril Beeka, and another man visited an escort agency and allegedly assaulted an employee.
McBride was part of an Umkhonto we Sizwe group that bombed the Why Not Restaurant and Magoo's Bar in Durban on June 14 1986. Three people were killed and 69 were injured in the explosion. He was captured and convicted, and sentenced to death.
In 1992, he was released after his actions were classified as politically motivated. He was later granted amnesty at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. – Sapa
Source: Mail & Guardian
The Democratic Alliance would "vehemently" oppose the appointment in Parliament, MP Dianne Kohler Barnard said on Tuesday. "IPID is responsible for investigating police officials in positions of authority and deals with sensitive information on a daily basis, thus the executive director must be a person free of scandal."
Lobby group AfriForum said Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa should resign for nominating McBride. "Minister Mthethwa, with this step, clearly indicated that the efficacy and integrity of the police is not a priority for him," said spokesperson Ian Cameron.
The Freedom Front Plus said the recommendation made a "farce and mockery" of Mthethwa's comments that he would eradicate corruption in the police. "IPID investigates corruption in the police and the head of this institution should not be a controversial person and should have an irreproachable character," spokesperson Pieter Groenewald said.
Christian Democratic Party leader Theunis Botha said the recommendation was "a serious challenge for being the sickest joke of the millennium".
"This makes a mockery of all the ANC promises that the policy of cadre deployment will be based on merit."
Shortlisted
Mthethwa said earlier that Cabinet decided at a meeting on Wednesday to recommend McBride as IPID executive director. "We believe Mr McBride's appointment as head of IPID will help this important institution to achieve [its] ... mandate," Mthethwa said.
He said McBride was the successful candidate following shortlisting, an interview process, and Cabinet's endorsement. "However, in line with the IPID Act, the appointment can only be finalised once Parliament has concurred."
Kohler Barnard said Mthethwa had requested that the portfolio committee on police consider McBride's nomination in a letter published in Parliament's announcements, tablings and committees on Tuesday morning. According to the IPID Act, the nomination must be considered within 30 parliamentary days.
She said the IPID should not be led by "such a controversial figure".
"The executive director must be suitably qualified for the position, not have previous convictions, and be a person of integrity."
Cameron said Mthethwa's decision had jeopardised the integrity of the police. "McBride had been previously arrested for arms smuggling, drunk driving and defeating the ends of justice. Now he must investigate and control corruption and malpractice in the police ...," he said.
Groenewald said Mthethwa was violating the public's trust with the recommendation. "McBride is extremely controversial and definitely not suitable for the position. The public should be able to trust the head of the IPID because a lot of complaints are against the [South African Police Service]."
Fired
Botha said Mthethwa should be fired. "Surely, no other minister is as determined to destroy his or her department," he said.
"If President [Jacob] Zuma does not now fire this bungling minister, the ANC should not be surprised when the world likens the Cabinet to a bunch of clowns."
McBride, who is a former MP and government official, won an appeal in March against a conviction of drunken driving and attempting to obstruct justice.
He was arrested in 2006 after crashing his official car on the R511 following a Christmas party. In September 2011, a Pretoria magistrate sentenced McBride to two years imprisonment for driving under the influence of alcohol and in effect three years' imprisonment for attempting to obstruct the course of justice.
In 1998, McBride was arrested in Mozambique on charges of gun-running. He spent seven months in a Maputo prison and was later cleared of all charges. He claimed he was investigating illegal gun-running with the National Intelligence Agency.
In 1999, McBride faced an assault charge after he, underworld boss Cyril Beeka, and another man visited an escort agency and allegedly assaulted an employee.
McBride was part of an Umkhonto we Sizwe group that bombed the Why Not Restaurant and Magoo's Bar in Durban on June 14 1986. Three people were killed and 69 were injured in the explosion. He was captured and convicted, and sentenced to death.
In 1992, he was released after his actions were classified as politically motivated. He was later granted amnesty at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. – Sapa
Source: Mail & Guardian
Saturday, June 22, 2013
Agang launch: Nkandla, Guptas, Arms Deal - Ramphele criticises government
"The leaders of this current government set an appalling example that others follow ... They seem to think they are beyond the reach of the law," Agang SA leader Mamphela Ramphele said on Saturday at the Tshwane Events Centre.
"One by one they have systematically attacked the very foundations of our constitutional democracy, the judicial system, the freedom of the press, accountability of government and the human rights of all citizens."
She said the arrogance of the current government was "breathtaking". It was acting with impunity and abusing "the resources of the state for the enrichment of a party, themselves and their friends".
"The arms deal, Nkandla, the Guptas, the list of these abuses goes on and on," she said to a cheering crowd.
The former activist and businessperson was welcomed by cheers from the crowd who arrived to support her new party.
More than a thousand people, mostly dressed in white T-shirts with Agang SA printed on them, listened intently and cheered as Ramphele spoke about problems facing South Africa.
For the past five months Ramphele visited communities around the country listening to people's concerns.
"We are here to begin the restoration of the promise of our great nation and to offer the hope of a better future for South Africa," she told the crowd.
"There is a desperate need for change."
Leaders failed to deliver
After nearly 20 years, the country's leaders failed to deliver on the promise of freedom, she said. Adding that it was too long to wait for jobs, education and healthcare.
Ramphele said the country had reached a crossroads.
"I for one do not want to think about where we will be in five years time unless we change course. Imagine five more years of corruption," she said as the crowd shouted "no".
"Imagine five more years of young people being lost from the education system and the economy. Five more years of millions of people entering the workforce but not having jobs. Five more years of non-functioning hospitals and clinics."
However, the country had potential and it was this, according to Ramphele, which inspired her at the age of 65 to enter South African politics and start Agang SA.
During Ramphele's speech the mostly youthful crowd, started shouting "enough is enough".
She introduced her campaign team calling them world-class.
Nkosinathi Solomon, who joined Agang from Absa, was the campaign director.
Also on the team were Dr Mills Soko, director of policy, from the University of Cape Town's graduate school of business, Thabo Leshilo, a former Sowetan editor as director of communications, Zohra Dawood as director of fundraising and Rorisang Tshabalala as deputy director of field management.
Elective conference
Ramphele also announced that Vanessa Hani, former South African Communist Party leader Chris Hani's daughter, would join her team to focus on mobilising women as part of the field management team.
Moeketsi Mosola joined as political director and would lead the creation of the party's political leadership.
Ramphele said Agang would hold an elective conference towards the end of the year.
"There are many experienced parliamentarians and battle hardened activists who will join our national and provincial leadership in the coming months," she said.
"We will strike a balance between old hands and many new faces." – Sapa
Source: Mail & Guardian
"One by one they have systematically attacked the very foundations of our constitutional democracy, the judicial system, the freedom of the press, accountability of government and the human rights of all citizens."
She said the arrogance of the current government was "breathtaking". It was acting with impunity and abusing "the resources of the state for the enrichment of a party, themselves and their friends".
"The arms deal, Nkandla, the Guptas, the list of these abuses goes on and on," she said to a cheering crowd.
The former activist and businessperson was welcomed by cheers from the crowd who arrived to support her new party.
More than a thousand people, mostly dressed in white T-shirts with Agang SA printed on them, listened intently and cheered as Ramphele spoke about problems facing South Africa.
For the past five months Ramphele visited communities around the country listening to people's concerns.
"We are here to begin the restoration of the promise of our great nation and to offer the hope of a better future for South Africa," she told the crowd.
"There is a desperate need for change."
Leaders failed to deliver
After nearly 20 years, the country's leaders failed to deliver on the promise of freedom, she said. Adding that it was too long to wait for jobs, education and healthcare.
Ramphele said the country had reached a crossroads.
"I for one do not want to think about where we will be in five years time unless we change course. Imagine five more years of corruption," she said as the crowd shouted "no".
"Imagine five more years of young people being lost from the education system and the economy. Five more years of millions of people entering the workforce but not having jobs. Five more years of non-functioning hospitals and clinics."
However, the country had potential and it was this, according to Ramphele, which inspired her at the age of 65 to enter South African politics and start Agang SA.
During Ramphele's speech the mostly youthful crowd, started shouting "enough is enough".
She introduced her campaign team calling them world-class.
Nkosinathi Solomon, who joined Agang from Absa, was the campaign director.
Also on the team were Dr Mills Soko, director of policy, from the University of Cape Town's graduate school of business, Thabo Leshilo, a former Sowetan editor as director of communications, Zohra Dawood as director of fundraising and Rorisang Tshabalala as deputy director of field management.
Elective conference
Ramphele also announced that Vanessa Hani, former South African Communist Party leader Chris Hani's daughter, would join her team to focus on mobilising women as part of the field management team.
Moeketsi Mosola joined as political director and would lead the creation of the party's political leadership.
Ramphele said Agang would hold an elective conference towards the end of the year.
"There are many experienced parliamentarians and battle hardened activists who will join our national and provincial leadership in the coming months," she said.
"We will strike a balance between old hands and many new faces." – Sapa
Source: Mail & Guardian
Friday, January 25, 2013
FNB: You Can Help campaign is regrettable
FNB met with the leadership of the ANC, led by its secretary general Gwede Mantashe on Thursday. The bank apologised to the ANC on Friday.
"The CEO of FirstRand, Mr Sizwe Nxasana, agreed that the research clippings that were posted online were regrettable; he apologised for the posting of the research clippings online," the ANC said in a statement.
"He then assured the meeting that this regrettable incident will not be repeated."
The FNB campaign features a number of videos of children in school uniform reading their hopes for the country. Opposition parties and activist groups said the ANC's criticism of the campaign showed its intolerance.
During the meeting, the ANC pointed out that the video clips were a deliberate attack on the ANC.
The clips fed into the opposition narrative that sought to project the ANC and government in a negative manner, it said.
The ANC said the clips had a negative impact on business confidence and could undermine the promotion of investment into the country.
"The ANC indicated that its leadership and membership were strongly raising a question why the organisation should continue to bank with a bank that has adopted an oppositional (sic) stance to it."
Nxasa explained to the ruling party the objectives of their youth campaign and stressed that it was meant to inspire all South Africans to work together by helping one another.
FNB expressed its commitment to the National Development Plan in addressing the areas of poverty, inequality and unemployment, the ANC said on Friday.
Source: Mail & Guardian
"The CEO of FirstRand, Mr Sizwe Nxasana, agreed that the research clippings that were posted online were regrettable; he apologised for the posting of the research clippings online," the ANC said in a statement.
"He then assured the meeting that this regrettable incident will not be repeated."
The FNB campaign features a number of videos of children in school uniform reading their hopes for the country. Opposition parties and activist groups said the ANC's criticism of the campaign showed its intolerance.
During the meeting, the ANC pointed out that the video clips were a deliberate attack on the ANC.
The clips fed into the opposition narrative that sought to project the ANC and government in a negative manner, it said.
The ANC said the clips had a negative impact on business confidence and could undermine the promotion of investment into the country.
"The ANC indicated that its leadership and membership were strongly raising a question why the organisation should continue to bank with a bank that has adopted an oppositional (sic) stance to it."
Nxasa explained to the ruling party the objectives of their youth campaign and stressed that it was meant to inspire all South Africans to work together by helping one another.
FNB expressed its commitment to the National Development Plan in addressing the areas of poverty, inequality and unemployment, the ANC said on Friday.
Source: Mail & Guardian
Wednesday, January 23, 2013
Reaction to FNB advert like Lady Macbeth’s guilty rants
It is never a good sign when an organisation or individual completely overreacts to perceived criticism. As the simmering discontent of South Africa’s underclass boils over into open revolt and violence and as corrupt shoot-to-kill cops are increasingly deployed in places as far flung as Marikana, De Doorns and Sasolburg to protect the old and new elites from the wrath of the dispossessed, some politicians are increasingly resembling Lady Macbeth, driven by their guilt and shame to commit ever more heinous misdeeds. The hysterical and often undemocratic response of various ANC and SACP structures to the silly First National Bank (FNB) advertising campaign is a case in point.
In Shakespeare’s “Macbeth”, Lady Macbeth urges her husband to kill Duncan, the king, to allow Macbeth to satisfy his ambitions of becoming king. She overrides all of her husband’s objections by challenging his manhood and he relents and kills Duncan. Later Lady Macbeth becomes racked with guilt and sleepwalks through the palace, haunted by the murder of the former king. In this trance she tries to wash off imaginary bloodstains from her hands, shouting: “Out, damned spot! Out, I say!—One, two. Why, then, ’tis time to do ’t. Hell is murky!—Fie, my lord, fie! A soldier, and afeard? What need we fear who knows it, when none can call our power to account?—Yet who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him.”
The response of the ANC, the ANC Youth League and the SACP to the FNB campaign resembles the attempts of Lady Macbeth to clean imaginary bloodstains from her hands.
“What need we fear who knows it, when none can call our power to account?”
The FNB campaign includes videos of young South Africans apparently speaking their minds. In one of the videos a participant says: “Stop voting for the same government in hopes for change – instead, change your hopes to a government that has the same hopes as us.”
The ANC Youth League and SACP joined the ANC in slamming the campaign, with the league saying it was “deeply angered and disappointed” by the bank’s “treacherous” campaign. On Sunday, Youth League spokeswoman Khusela Sangoni-Khawe said FNB had failed in trying to “recreate an Arab Spring of some sort in South Africa” and said it “uses children to make unproven claims of a government rife with corruption. We call upon South Africans to close ranks against what is a treacherous attack on our country.”
ANC spokesperson Jackson Mthembu said the ANC (who is never directly mentioned in any of the videos) was “appalled” by the campaign in which the ANC, its leadership and government were “under attack” the campaign was an “undisguised political statement that makes random and untested accusations against our government in the name of discourse. While we believe that people are entitled to their views, we don’t accept that young kids should be used as proxies to articulate political views espoused, as in the case of the FNB advertisement.”
“Out, damned spot! Out, I say!”
These vehement reactions to what appear to be rather mild criticisms of the government and platitudes about one’s right to vote for the party of one’s choice (widely accepted in any functioning democracy) are curious for several reasons.
First, whatever one might think of FNB and its advertising campaign (and I am not a fan of the campaign or of the lily-livered manner in which the bank caved in to political thugs), the manner in which several ANC and SACP spokespersons conflated the ANC with the state and with the country is worrying. The ANC is not the state. Neither is it the sole representative of the South African people. South Africa, in the words of the Freedom Charter, belongs to all who live in it – it does not belong to the ANC. Like any political party, the ANC deserves to be praised when it does something well and deserves to be criticised when it abandons the poor that it professes to love and serve.
Second, the statement that the FNB campaign is treacherous and tries to recreate the Arab Spring, is anti-democratic and – I am sorry to have to use such an emotive term – proto-fascist. There is nothing wrong with telling people that they should refrain from voting for the governing party. Voting for whomever one pleases is at the heart of political freedom in a democratic state. Every democratic election is based on a fair and free contestation between political parties in which we are all allowed to express our preferences.
We are also all free to try and convince others to vote for the ANC, to vote for the DA, or to vote for the TP (Tender Party), for that matter. It is probably not a great business model for a Bank to get involved in an advertising campaign that might alienate the majority of voters, but if it does, there is nothing treacherous about it. If FNB had not pulled the adverts I might even have lauded the bank for putting its principles (which one may agree or disagree with) before naked profits.
The Arab Spring refers to various uprisings organised by oppressed populations in countries where citizens did not enjoy political rights and where democratic contestation and free and fair elections could not be held. To refer to an advertising campaign in which a teenager urges people in South Africa to vote for the party of their choice as an attempt to recreate an Arab Spring, suggests the ANC Youth league believes that South Africa is not a democracy, that its citizens are oppressed and do not enjoy political rights and that they will never be allowed to change the government by using their vote. Like Lady Macbeth wandering in a trance and trying to wash off imaginary bloodstains from her hands, the ANC Youth League is revealing rather more than it intended about its own undemocratic tendencies. Pity Jackson Mthembu will not display the same sense of outrage about this full-frontal attack on our democracy.
Whether one is a staunch ANC supporter or a supporter of the right wing Freedom Front Plus, if one supports democracy one will not be appalled by the fact that an institution has dared to criticise a political party. Only proto-fascists would be appalled by the fact that a bank has dared to broadcast statements criticising the government.
One might, of course, disagree with the sentiments expressed by the youngsters in the FNB produced videos, and the ANC has every right to express its disagreement with some of the statments made by the youngsters. But claiming that the sentiments are treacherous or that it is not legitimate to criticise the party displays the kind of undemocratic intolerance that cannot be associated with a party who supports democracy.
Personally I find that it is better to ignore attacks that are far-fetched or motivated by racism, hatred or a complete lack of information. That is what I do when I am criticised for something I have written. “Don’t feed the trolls,” I tell myself every time I read the unhinged invective of faceless loonies on my Blog. If the criticism is serious, one either responds to it by pointing out why and how it is wrong, or one takes it on board and changes one’s behaviour. Just a thought: use it, don’t use it.
One does not tell those who criticise that they are committing treason or that they are attacking the state merely because one happens (for the time being) to be the party of government.
I was reluctant even to enter this discussion, not because I am fearful of repercussions, but because what I have written here is so obvious and because all this fuss about a bank’s advertising campaign detracts attention from the far more important social and economic issues facing the country.
Maybe that is why the campaign has attracted such hysterical responses from the ANC and its partners. Like Lady Macbeth, whose paranoid dreams symbolises the fact that she is haunted by her guilt, the ANC reaction is perhaps a symptom of the fear and guilt that stalks the political class in South Africa. As Marikana, De Doorns and Sasolburg have shown, the poor, economically excluded and marginalised members of society have not benefited as handsomely from the end of apartheid as the members of the old (mostly white) and emerging (mostly black) middle classes.
While those in the chattering classes squabble about silly adverts made to promote the commercial interests of a big bank and argue whether these adds exploit children, many of those same children are dropping out of school or receiving a third rate education because of the cowardice of politicians who are too scared to take on a powerful union. While I write about the nature of democracy, members of social movement are harassed and tortured by the police. While Helen Zille spends her days on twitter, blaming the poor for the lack of services in their communities in Cape Town, millions of South Africans go to bed hungry, wondering whether this wonderful democracy will ever guarantee them a full stomach.
Source: Constitutionally Speaking
In Shakespeare’s “Macbeth”, Lady Macbeth urges her husband to kill Duncan, the king, to allow Macbeth to satisfy his ambitions of becoming king. She overrides all of her husband’s objections by challenging his manhood and he relents and kills Duncan. Later Lady Macbeth becomes racked with guilt and sleepwalks through the palace, haunted by the murder of the former king. In this trance she tries to wash off imaginary bloodstains from her hands, shouting: “Out, damned spot! Out, I say!—One, two. Why, then, ’tis time to do ’t. Hell is murky!—Fie, my lord, fie! A soldier, and afeard? What need we fear who knows it, when none can call our power to account?—Yet who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him.”
The response of the ANC, the ANC Youth League and the SACP to the FNB campaign resembles the attempts of Lady Macbeth to clean imaginary bloodstains from her hands.
“What need we fear who knows it, when none can call our power to account?”
The FNB campaign includes videos of young South Africans apparently speaking their minds. In one of the videos a participant says: “Stop voting for the same government in hopes for change – instead, change your hopes to a government that has the same hopes as us.”
The ANC Youth League and SACP joined the ANC in slamming the campaign, with the league saying it was “deeply angered and disappointed” by the bank’s “treacherous” campaign. On Sunday, Youth League spokeswoman Khusela Sangoni-Khawe said FNB had failed in trying to “recreate an Arab Spring of some sort in South Africa” and said it “uses children to make unproven claims of a government rife with corruption. We call upon South Africans to close ranks against what is a treacherous attack on our country.”
ANC spokesperson Jackson Mthembu said the ANC (who is never directly mentioned in any of the videos) was “appalled” by the campaign in which the ANC, its leadership and government were “under attack” the campaign was an “undisguised political statement that makes random and untested accusations against our government in the name of discourse. While we believe that people are entitled to their views, we don’t accept that young kids should be used as proxies to articulate political views espoused, as in the case of the FNB advertisement.”
“Out, damned spot! Out, I say!”
These vehement reactions to what appear to be rather mild criticisms of the government and platitudes about one’s right to vote for the party of one’s choice (widely accepted in any functioning democracy) are curious for several reasons.
First, whatever one might think of FNB and its advertising campaign (and I am not a fan of the campaign or of the lily-livered manner in which the bank caved in to political thugs), the manner in which several ANC and SACP spokespersons conflated the ANC with the state and with the country is worrying. The ANC is not the state. Neither is it the sole representative of the South African people. South Africa, in the words of the Freedom Charter, belongs to all who live in it – it does not belong to the ANC. Like any political party, the ANC deserves to be praised when it does something well and deserves to be criticised when it abandons the poor that it professes to love and serve.
Second, the statement that the FNB campaign is treacherous and tries to recreate the Arab Spring, is anti-democratic and – I am sorry to have to use such an emotive term – proto-fascist. There is nothing wrong with telling people that they should refrain from voting for the governing party. Voting for whomever one pleases is at the heart of political freedom in a democratic state. Every democratic election is based on a fair and free contestation between political parties in which we are all allowed to express our preferences.
We are also all free to try and convince others to vote for the ANC, to vote for the DA, or to vote for the TP (Tender Party), for that matter. It is probably not a great business model for a Bank to get involved in an advertising campaign that might alienate the majority of voters, but if it does, there is nothing treacherous about it. If FNB had not pulled the adverts I might even have lauded the bank for putting its principles (which one may agree or disagree with) before naked profits.
The Arab Spring refers to various uprisings organised by oppressed populations in countries where citizens did not enjoy political rights and where democratic contestation and free and fair elections could not be held. To refer to an advertising campaign in which a teenager urges people in South Africa to vote for the party of their choice as an attempt to recreate an Arab Spring, suggests the ANC Youth league believes that South Africa is not a democracy, that its citizens are oppressed and do not enjoy political rights and that they will never be allowed to change the government by using their vote. Like Lady Macbeth wandering in a trance and trying to wash off imaginary bloodstains from her hands, the ANC Youth League is revealing rather more than it intended about its own undemocratic tendencies. Pity Jackson Mthembu will not display the same sense of outrage about this full-frontal attack on our democracy.
Whether one is a staunch ANC supporter or a supporter of the right wing Freedom Front Plus, if one supports democracy one will not be appalled by the fact that an institution has dared to criticise a political party. Only proto-fascists would be appalled by the fact that a bank has dared to broadcast statements criticising the government.
One might, of course, disagree with the sentiments expressed by the youngsters in the FNB produced videos, and the ANC has every right to express its disagreement with some of the statments made by the youngsters. But claiming that the sentiments are treacherous or that it is not legitimate to criticise the party displays the kind of undemocratic intolerance that cannot be associated with a party who supports democracy.
Personally I find that it is better to ignore attacks that are far-fetched or motivated by racism, hatred or a complete lack of information. That is what I do when I am criticised for something I have written. “Don’t feed the trolls,” I tell myself every time I read the unhinged invective of faceless loonies on my Blog. If the criticism is serious, one either responds to it by pointing out why and how it is wrong, or one takes it on board and changes one’s behaviour. Just a thought: use it, don’t use it.
One does not tell those who criticise that they are committing treason or that they are attacking the state merely because one happens (for the time being) to be the party of government.
I was reluctant even to enter this discussion, not because I am fearful of repercussions, but because what I have written here is so obvious and because all this fuss about a bank’s advertising campaign detracts attention from the far more important social and economic issues facing the country.
Maybe that is why the campaign has attracted such hysterical responses from the ANC and its partners. Like Lady Macbeth, whose paranoid dreams symbolises the fact that she is haunted by her guilt, the ANC reaction is perhaps a symptom of the fear and guilt that stalks the political class in South Africa. As Marikana, De Doorns and Sasolburg have shown, the poor, economically excluded and marginalised members of society have not benefited as handsomely from the end of apartheid as the members of the old (mostly white) and emerging (mostly black) middle classes.
While those in the chattering classes squabble about silly adverts made to promote the commercial interests of a big bank and argue whether these adds exploit children, many of those same children are dropping out of school or receiving a third rate education because of the cowardice of politicians who are too scared to take on a powerful union. While I write about the nature of democracy, members of social movement are harassed and tortured by the police. While Helen Zille spends her days on twitter, blaming the poor for the lack of services in their communities in Cape Town, millions of South Africans go to bed hungry, wondering whether this wonderful democracy will ever guarantee them a full stomach.
Source: Constitutionally Speaking
Friday, December 7, 2012
Zuma on nationalisation and working with Ramaphosa
PRESIDENT Jacob Zuma has welcomed the prospect of working with businessman Cyril Ramaphosa as his deputy, saying "it would not be the first time" that he has worked with the man who was once tipped to take over from Nelson Mandela as president of the African National Congress (ANC).
Mr Zuma is set to be re-elected to lead the ANC at the party’s elective congress in Mangaung later this month. However, his current deputy, Kgalema Motlanthe — who has been nominated by three provinces and the youth league for the position of party president — is likely to lose out to Mr Ramaphosa.
Mr Ramaphosa has garnered more than 1,800 nominations for the position of deputy president, while Mr Motlanthe has received about 160 nominations to retain his current position in the party.
In an interview with the UK’s Daily Telegraph published on Thursday, Mr Zuma praised Mr Ramaphosa when asked about the prospect of working with the business tycoon.
"It would not be the first time I worked with Cyril Ramaphosa. When he was the secretary-general, I was his deputy. So it would not be the first time, if he is elected," Mr Zuma told the paper.
He said that he was ready for a second term as president of the ANC.
The party’s elective conference in Mangaung will also be keenly watched by business — with the hope that economic policy will be clarified.
One of the burning issues up for possible debate is that of nationalisation of South Africa’s mines. Mr Zuma told the paper that the party would increase the pace of economic reform but would not "break" existing businesses to do so.
"Nationalisation is not the ANC policy," he said. "There are fundamental issues that need to be dealt with. It would be useful to do it quickly but we’ve got to balance things because we don’t want to break things in order to move forward."
Source: Business Day
Mr Zuma is set to be re-elected to lead the ANC at the party’s elective congress in Mangaung later this month. However, his current deputy, Kgalema Motlanthe — who has been nominated by three provinces and the youth league for the position of party president — is likely to lose out to Mr Ramaphosa.
Mr Ramaphosa has garnered more than 1,800 nominations for the position of deputy president, while Mr Motlanthe has received about 160 nominations to retain his current position in the party.
In an interview with the UK’s Daily Telegraph published on Thursday, Mr Zuma praised Mr Ramaphosa when asked about the prospect of working with the business tycoon.
"It would not be the first time I worked with Cyril Ramaphosa. When he was the secretary-general, I was his deputy. So it would not be the first time, if he is elected," Mr Zuma told the paper.
He said that he was ready for a second term as president of the ANC.
The party’s elective conference in Mangaung will also be keenly watched by business — with the hope that economic policy will be clarified.
One of the burning issues up for possible debate is that of nationalisation of South Africa’s mines. Mr Zuma told the paper that the party would increase the pace of economic reform but would not "break" existing businesses to do so.
"Nationalisation is not the ANC policy," he said. "There are fundamental issues that need to be dealt with. It would be useful to do it quickly but we’ve got to balance things because we don’t want to break things in order to move forward."
Source: Business Day
Friday, November 30, 2012
In South Africa, Lethal Battles for Even Smallest of Political Posts
OSHABENI, South Africa — It was, by all accounts, an ordinary small-town political meeting. The leaders of the local branch of the African National Congress gathered in September at a convent here to discuss candidates for a newly vacated seat on the ward council, the lowest-level elected position in South Africa.
When it was over, Dumisani Malunga, the local party chairman and the front-runner for the seat, stopped at a friend’s house for a late meal of chicken curry. As he and another party official, Bheko Chiliza, drove home at 9:30 p.m., a gunman fired into their car. Their bloody, bullet-riddled bodies were later found sprawled on the ground beside the white Toyota hatchback.
Mr. Malunga and Mr. Chiliza were the latest casualties in an increasingly bloody battle for local political posts in South Africa. Dozens of officials, including ward councilors, party leaders and mayors, have been killed in what has become a desperate, deadly struggle for power and its spoils.
The killings threaten to tarnish the image of the so-called rainbow nation, whose largely bloodless transition from white minority rule to nonracial democracy has made it a beacon of peace, tolerance and forgiveness.
Amid rising corruption and waning economic opportunities, political killings are on the rise. Here in KwaZulu-Natal Province, nearly 40 politicians have been killed since 2010 in battles over political posts, more than triple the number in the previous three years, according to government figures. Over the past few years, dozens more have been killed in provinces like Mpumalanga, North West and Limpopo.
The A.N.C., once a banned liberation movement engaged in one of the 20th century’s most important struggles for justice and human rights, is now in power, and it has come under harsh scrutiny for the rampant poverty, deep inequality and widespread unemployment plaguing the country. A wave of wildcat strikes that began in August, and the lethal crackdown against them, has fueled anger at a party seen as increasingly out of touch and whose leaders appear only to seek to fill their pockets.
That is a stark change from the A.N.C.’s early days, when people risked their lives and freedom to join the party and its fight to end apartheid. But in recent years, the party has sharply increased recruitment of new members, with little consideration for who joins and why.
Many new members come in search of wealth and power. Fewer than half of South African’s young black adults have jobs, and many lack the basic skills to find work after years of attending substandard schools in townships and rural areas. For these youths, politics is a seemingly certain route out of poverty. The rise in corruption has fed the belief that political posts mean kickbacks and contracts.
In the ranks of public servants, the post of rural ward council member in a speck of a town like this one would seem no great prize. The job pays about $150 a month, and its occupant must digest a steady diet of complaints from residents about the most fundamental ailments afflicting South Africa: schools that do not teach, taps that do not deliver water, crime that the police seem helpless to stop, jobs that are impossible to find.
But ward councilors are also a conduit for development projects in their areas, and they can influence the awarding of government contracts. The potential upside — earnings from bribes or surreptitious deals — is high.
“Due to the high rate of unemployment, people look for any opportunity to create an income and capitalize on it,” said Mzwandile Mkhwanazi, the regional chairman of the A.N.C. in the area that includes Oshabeni. “They are influenced by levels of poverty. They come up with any ways and means of getting money.”
Such changes in fortune explain why the post of ward councilor in Oshabeni, an impoverished town nestled in rolling hills about 15 miles inland from the Indian Ocean, was so hotly contested. When the woman who held the post died of illness in August, many local politicians were eager to throw their hats into the ring.
One of them was a young taxi driver named Sfiso Khumalo, the leader of the local branch of the A.N.C.’s Youth League. But Mr. Khumalo did not have a very good reputation, fellow Youth League members said. He was hotheaded, they said, and had spent nine years in prison for theft.
“We knew him as a stealer,” said Gcinile Duma, the secretary of the Youth League. “He had been in jail and was with the wrong kind of people.”
Other members of the local A.N.C. branch’s executive committee said they were worried that Mr. Khumalo was not a suitable candidate.
“Some people get into politics for the wrong reason, only for money,” said one local party leader who did not want to be named discussing party business. “Sfiso Khumalo was not looking to help people, only to help himself.”
Standing in his way was Mr. Malunga, 42, the party chairman and a popular local figure.
“People liked Dumisani and saw him as a good leader,” Ms. Duma said.
On Sept. 9, Mr. Khumalo attended the meeting at the Daughters of St. Francis of Assisi Convent to declare his candidacy. There was no open confrontation between Mr. Malunga and Mr. Khumalo, people who attended the meeting said. But when Mr. Malunga was found shot to death near his house, few doubted who was the prime suspect.
“We told the police, ‘We know who did this. It was Sfiso Khumalo,’ ” Ms. Duma said.
After two days of investigations, the police arrested Mr. Khumalo, who promptly confessed that he had conspired with a local businessman to have Mr. Malunga killed. On Sept. 18, Mr. Khumalo was sentenced to 22 years in prison. The person accused of being his co-conspirator is still in court.
In a statement, the leader of the A.N.C. in KwaZulu-Natal condemned the violence and the culture it springs from.
“The A.N.C. can ill afford the development of the culture of the underworld, criminality and violent elimination of opponents,” said the provincial chairman, Zweli Mkhize. “Neither can the A.N.C. afford the association of political appointment to self-enrichment where ascendancy to office is not linked with capacity, competence and dedicated service to our people.”
Party officials paid for Mr. Malunga’s burial, and his brick and stucco grave looks lavish next to the unadorned earthen mounds in the family graveyard that hold his father, brother and nephew.
Mr. Malunga’s mother, Sizakele Malunga, has already buried 5 of her 11 children, but losing her youngest son was a special blow, she said. Mr. Malunga lived with her and kept her company in her widowhood.
“I am lonely, but nothing will bring him back,” Mrs. Malunga said. “I just try to make the time pass without him.”
Mukelwa Hlatshwayo contributed reporting.
Source: New York Times
When it was over, Dumisani Malunga, the local party chairman and the front-runner for the seat, stopped at a friend’s house for a late meal of chicken curry. As he and another party official, Bheko Chiliza, drove home at 9:30 p.m., a gunman fired into their car. Their bloody, bullet-riddled bodies were later found sprawled on the ground beside the white Toyota hatchback.
Mr. Malunga and Mr. Chiliza were the latest casualties in an increasingly bloody battle for local political posts in South Africa. Dozens of officials, including ward councilors, party leaders and mayors, have been killed in what has become a desperate, deadly struggle for power and its spoils.
The killings threaten to tarnish the image of the so-called rainbow nation, whose largely bloodless transition from white minority rule to nonracial democracy has made it a beacon of peace, tolerance and forgiveness.
Amid rising corruption and waning economic opportunities, political killings are on the rise. Here in KwaZulu-Natal Province, nearly 40 politicians have been killed since 2010 in battles over political posts, more than triple the number in the previous three years, according to government figures. Over the past few years, dozens more have been killed in provinces like Mpumalanga, North West and Limpopo.
The A.N.C., once a banned liberation movement engaged in one of the 20th century’s most important struggles for justice and human rights, is now in power, and it has come under harsh scrutiny for the rampant poverty, deep inequality and widespread unemployment plaguing the country. A wave of wildcat strikes that began in August, and the lethal crackdown against them, has fueled anger at a party seen as increasingly out of touch and whose leaders appear only to seek to fill their pockets.
That is a stark change from the A.N.C.’s early days, when people risked their lives and freedom to join the party and its fight to end apartheid. But in recent years, the party has sharply increased recruitment of new members, with little consideration for who joins and why.
Many new members come in search of wealth and power. Fewer than half of South African’s young black adults have jobs, and many lack the basic skills to find work after years of attending substandard schools in townships and rural areas. For these youths, politics is a seemingly certain route out of poverty. The rise in corruption has fed the belief that political posts mean kickbacks and contracts.
In the ranks of public servants, the post of rural ward council member in a speck of a town like this one would seem no great prize. The job pays about $150 a month, and its occupant must digest a steady diet of complaints from residents about the most fundamental ailments afflicting South Africa: schools that do not teach, taps that do not deliver water, crime that the police seem helpless to stop, jobs that are impossible to find.
But ward councilors are also a conduit for development projects in their areas, and they can influence the awarding of government contracts. The potential upside — earnings from bribes or surreptitious deals — is high.
“Due to the high rate of unemployment, people look for any opportunity to create an income and capitalize on it,” said Mzwandile Mkhwanazi, the regional chairman of the A.N.C. in the area that includes Oshabeni. “They are influenced by levels of poverty. They come up with any ways and means of getting money.”
Such changes in fortune explain why the post of ward councilor in Oshabeni, an impoverished town nestled in rolling hills about 15 miles inland from the Indian Ocean, was so hotly contested. When the woman who held the post died of illness in August, many local politicians were eager to throw their hats into the ring.
One of them was a young taxi driver named Sfiso Khumalo, the leader of the local branch of the A.N.C.’s Youth League. But Mr. Khumalo did not have a very good reputation, fellow Youth League members said. He was hotheaded, they said, and had spent nine years in prison for theft.
“We knew him as a stealer,” said Gcinile Duma, the secretary of the Youth League. “He had been in jail and was with the wrong kind of people.”
Other members of the local A.N.C. branch’s executive committee said they were worried that Mr. Khumalo was not a suitable candidate.
“Some people get into politics for the wrong reason, only for money,” said one local party leader who did not want to be named discussing party business. “Sfiso Khumalo was not looking to help people, only to help himself.”
Standing in his way was Mr. Malunga, 42, the party chairman and a popular local figure.
“People liked Dumisani and saw him as a good leader,” Ms. Duma said.
On Sept. 9, Mr. Khumalo attended the meeting at the Daughters of St. Francis of Assisi Convent to declare his candidacy. There was no open confrontation between Mr. Malunga and Mr. Khumalo, people who attended the meeting said. But when Mr. Malunga was found shot to death near his house, few doubted who was the prime suspect.
“We told the police, ‘We know who did this. It was Sfiso Khumalo,’ ” Ms. Duma said.
After two days of investigations, the police arrested Mr. Khumalo, who promptly confessed that he had conspired with a local businessman to have Mr. Malunga killed. On Sept. 18, Mr. Khumalo was sentenced to 22 years in prison. The person accused of being his co-conspirator is still in court.
In a statement, the leader of the A.N.C. in KwaZulu-Natal condemned the violence and the culture it springs from.
“The A.N.C. can ill afford the development of the culture of the underworld, criminality and violent elimination of opponents,” said the provincial chairman, Zweli Mkhize. “Neither can the A.N.C. afford the association of political appointment to self-enrichment where ascendancy to office is not linked with capacity, competence and dedicated service to our people.”
Party officials paid for Mr. Malunga’s burial, and his brick and stucco grave looks lavish next to the unadorned earthen mounds in the family graveyard that hold his father, brother and nephew.
Mr. Malunga’s mother, Sizakele Malunga, has already buried 5 of her 11 children, but losing her youngest son was a special blow, she said. Mr. Malunga lived with her and kept her company in her widowhood.
“I am lonely, but nothing will bring him back,” Mrs. Malunga said. “I just try to make the time pass without him.”
Mukelwa Hlatshwayo contributed reporting.
Source: New York Times
Murder attempt signals ugly turn in North West
THE murder attempt on African National Congress (ANC) North West provincial secretary Kabelo Mataboge on Thursday night signalled an ugly turn of events in the embattled province, amid the possibility of a parallel provincial nominations conference on Friday, in preparation for the ANC’s national elective conference in Mangaung next month.
The SABC reported on Friday morning that unknown gunmen opened fire on Mr Mataboge when he arrived at his home in Mafikeng on Thursday night.
ANC North West spokesman Kenny Morolong said in a statement on Friday that police were "investigating a case of attempted murder".
The incident followed controversy on Thursday after the two opposing ANC factions in the province — one led by Mr Mataboge and another by provincial chairman Supra Mahumapelo — disagreed on the venue for Friday’s provincial nominations conference.
The group led by Mr Mahumapelo preferred a hall at Hartbeespoort Dam, while those supporting Mr Mataboge were pushing for the gathering to be held at the Civic Centre in Mafikeng.
Mr Mahumapelo has been the chief campaigner for President Jacob Zuma’s second-term bid in Mangaung, while Mr Mataboge has been associated with the group campaigning for Deputy President Kgalema Motlanthe to replace Mr Zuma.
Mr Morolong on Friday called on "members of the public with information to approach the law enforcement agencies", and for police to expedite their investigation "so that culprits of this hideous act are brought to book".
Source: Business Day
The SABC reported on Friday morning that unknown gunmen opened fire on Mr Mataboge when he arrived at his home in Mafikeng on Thursday night.
ANC North West spokesman Kenny Morolong said in a statement on Friday that police were "investigating a case of attempted murder".
The incident followed controversy on Thursday after the two opposing ANC factions in the province — one led by Mr Mataboge and another by provincial chairman Supra Mahumapelo — disagreed on the venue for Friday’s provincial nominations conference.
The group led by Mr Mahumapelo preferred a hall at Hartbeespoort Dam, while those supporting Mr Mataboge were pushing for the gathering to be held at the Civic Centre in Mafikeng.
Mr Mahumapelo has been the chief campaigner for President Jacob Zuma’s second-term bid in Mangaung, while Mr Mataboge has been associated with the group campaigning for Deputy President Kgalema Motlanthe to replace Mr Zuma.
Mr Morolong on Friday called on "members of the public with information to approach the law enforcement agencies", and for police to expedite their investigation "so that culprits of this hideous act are brought to book".
Source: Business Day
Secrecy Bill gets NCOP approval, marches towards becoming law
The African National Congress is using its majority might to bulldoze the Protection of State Information Bill through Parliament. It now goes to the National Assembly after being passed by the upper house, where MPs were given suspicious, unmarked propaganda documents promoting the Bill’s “benefits”. By MANDY DE WAAL.
South Africa’s Protection of State Information Bill (POIB) was pushed through Parliament's National Council of Provinces (NCOP) by the ANC’s majority muscle late on Thursday 29 November 2012. The vote was 34 in favour of the draft legislation, while 16 members of Parliament voted against the Bill.
As MPs filed into Parliament’s upper house, the Right2Know campaign, a coalition formed in August 2010 to oppose the Secrecy Bill, handed out letters spelling out its concerns. “One of our campaign supporters noticed that the MPs were carrying documents themselves, and did an exchange,” says Murray Hunter, Right2Know’s spokesperson and organiser. “What we got hold of was a spin sheet with sound bites spinning certain aspects of the Bill. It was a document called “Myths about the Protection of State Information Bill” asserting that the Bill did indeed contain a public interest defence and would make it impossible to hide corruption.”
Murray says that the information used in the document – which had no source or logo on it – was filled with flawed and confused arguments. The Right2Know campaign said it wanted to know who had drafted the document and how it was funded.
Parliamentary leader for the DA, Lindiwe Mazibuko, said her biggest issue was the source of the anonymous document, and possible interference by the ministry of State Security. “We know that Siyabonga Cwele’s department has been interfering in the legislative process quite publicly by saying what NCOP members should and shouldn’t do with the legislation, which is in itself a violation of the separation of powers. That is problematic because once the law is in Parliament, it must be dealt with by MPs, and an MP’s job is not to do the bidding of government,” said Mazibuko. She added that if the document did indeed come from the ministry of State Security, it would be a “huge problem”.
“It is well known that Parliament has a research unit in every single portfolio committee, and every select committee, which has a secretariat and a researcher, and often they provide committee members with information. But there is something very suspicious about parties and MPs being given a script on their way into a debate, whether or not that script came from Parliament or a government department. It is suspicious when this document comes late in the game, when the legislation is being debated upon,” she said, and added: “At the moment we are concerned with some of the procedural problems with the Information Bill, and it is certainly one of the things we will look into.”
Earlier in the week, the controversial Bill – subject of much civil society protest – was adopted by an NCOP ad hoc Parliamentary committee which had been working on changes to the Bill for the last year. Mail & Guardian reported that opposition parties were given just 10 minutes to study the 22-page report on the ad hoc committee’s deliberations, and amendments to the Secrecy Bill. The opposition walked out and ANC members voted to send the Bill to a plenary session of the NCOP.
“It is clear that the Bll’s final process through the NCOP has been rushed and botched very badly,” said Nic Dawes, editor-in-chief of the Mail & Guardian. “Despite the initial willingness of members of all parties in the NCOP to do this properly and to try and hear the concerns that were raised by civil society, by lawyers, by the media, by activists, this potential to do a good job has been replaced by a mad rush to meet a self-imposed deadline. Serious damage has been done to the process as a result.”
Dawes said people weren’t able to properly consider the committee report earlier in the week and added it was likely that the remainder of the NCOP, and plenary session, hadn’t had a proper chance to consider the amended legislation in its entirety, nor to make an informed decision on it.
“The remaining options are for the National Assembly to do what it ought to have done all along, and that is to say that this legislation needs major revisions. It needs a proper public interest defence and a public domain defence. It needs to have an appropriate balance between freedom of information and the need to protect very narrowly and carefully defined state secrets, and it needs to be subordinate to the main piece of Constitutional legislation in this area, and that is the Promotion of Information Act,” Dawes said, adding that the National Assembly had one last chance to do the right thing.
“If they don’t, I hope a draft of MPs will send this for Constitutional review; I have been advised that they will try. Or alternatively that President Zuma does that, and then ultimately we will end up in the Constitutional Court, testing the legislation vigorously, and it is a pity that it looks like we are going to get to that place, but if need be that is what we will do,” Dawes said.
As the NCOP session got underway, State Security minister Cwele worked hard to sell the “benefits” of the Bill. Cwele, who had long pushed for the more draconian aspects of the Bill to remain intact, said the draft legislation sought to “advance the public interest by protecting certain classified information held by the state that if it became known to adversaries, would prejudice state programmes and hinder its ability to perform its duties.”
Reaching for a snappy quotable quote, Cwele addressed those scared of the implementation of the Bill into law. “To those who fear that the Bill may be abused, we say: the only thing to fear is fear itself.” (We presume Mr Cwele is FDR's fan - Ed)
BDLive reported that there was fierce opposition debate in the NCOP, with DA MP Alf Lees accusing the ANC of misleading the public by claiming extensive amendments to the Bill had ruled out the possibility of a state official using it to conceal wrongdoing. "Given the levels of corruption we see in government today, it is inevitable that the Bill will be used to cover up crime and corruption by those who risk exposure," he said, to ANC jeers.
Lees said the Bill still lacked a proper public interest defence clause to protect the media and whistle blowers, while his colleague Albert Fritz added, "This Bill is Stasi-like in its content and design."
Anton Harber, who directs the Journalism and Media Studies Programme at Wits University, agrees that there is still much to fear about the Bill. “It affects people in two ways. If one comes across information that needs to be out there in the public interest, clearly it raises the risks of being a whistle blower enormously,” said Harber.
“I have no doubt it will have a chilling effect on certain kinds of investigative journalism. It means an impact on the flow of information in the public arena. The penalties for whistle blowing potentially jump enormously here,” he added.
To understand the practical impact of the Bill, should it become law, Daily Maverick spoke to an activist in Kwazulu-Natal, a province where the political body count has been rising during recent months.
“We have a lot of political killings in the province at the moment, and in some cases even within the same political party,” said Desmond D'sa, a veteran political activist who’s currently in an organisational role for Right2Know in Kwazulu-Natal. “We believe that this is because of all the corruption that’s happening in this province. We have been asking for information related to this for a long, long time; for instance, we’ve asked for the Manase report in Durban, which reveals a lot of the shenanigans that going on.”
But the city refused to let activists, who report and organise against corruption, to have a copy of the report. “The city cites that whistle-blowers will lose their jobs or get killed and all of that, but that’s exactly what’s going on here in the ruling party. We believe that the Manase report is linked to these killings and will reveal a lot about what’s going on in the ANC in Kwazulu-Natal. The killings are about who is in power, who controls the resources, and who gets access to resources,” he said.
D'sa said even less “sensitive” information, like finding out about funding of housing projects, is blocked by officials who are already using the Bill (which hasn’t been passed in to law) to stop activists, the media or concerned citizens from getting information.
“If, for instance, you want to know what housing projects are being done and what funds have been made available for this in the city, you won’t get to the bottom of it. This is because the information is classified and not released. It is classified by people right at the top. It is going to make it impossible for people to find out what is really going on here in the province,” said D’sa.
The activist explained that the control of information made it impossible for civic society to do its job as a watchdog of government, and stated that the Bill was particularly threatening for whistle blowers.
“The NGOs and the civic organisations depend on whistle blowers to uncover corruption, and whistle blowers are crucial to the functioning of a democratic society and to help us get to the truth. However, the situation with whistle-blowers will get even worse because of the mounting fear. People will be fearful of being arrested, and now will be scared to release any kind of information because of the consequences,” D’sa said.
In terms of the proposed law, whistle blowers who reveal “corruption, malfeasance or wrongdoing by the State” can look at jail terms of up to 15 years. Furthermore, the Right2Know campaign also fears that whistle blowers may be charged under espionage clauses of the law which would see penalties of up to 25 years imposed.
In Kwazulu-Natal, this might be the case for activists investigating chemical fires and explosions. “In Durban the chemical cluster operates under the military, and under this new law, the military and the ‘securocrats’ in government won’t release any information at all. Even when people are getting killed or people are being affected by chemical emissions, this will not be released because they will deem it confidential and they will classify it,” D'sa told Daily Maverick.
“We have had over thirty explosions in the past few years, and fires in Durban, and we asked the department of labour to release certain forensic reports and they won’t do it. Can you imagine now if the law comes out? The flow of information with come to a standstill,” he added.
In the past, activists have been able to eke out some information through whistle blowers, but this will either dry up, or both activists and whistle blowers could face jail stiff terms. But D’sa and the Right2Know campaign are unrelenting.
“I hope that everyone realises that the democracy that everyone fought for and yearned for will be curtailed by this new law, as it is being bulldozed through Parliament. We are worried that we have gone right back, right back to the dark days of the Apartheid government, in bringing about these laws to stifle civil society, and to stifle ordinary people from standing up and asking the right questions, and getting the answers.”
“We will up the tempo of our protests. We are going to fight, even to the extent of being imprisoned. We are not going to shy away from standing up for the truth – even to the extent of being imprisoned because we need to fight this,” he added. DM
Source: Daily Maverick
South Africa’s Protection of State Information Bill (POIB) was pushed through Parliament's National Council of Provinces (NCOP) by the ANC’s majority muscle late on Thursday 29 November 2012. The vote was 34 in favour of the draft legislation, while 16 members of Parliament voted against the Bill.
As MPs filed into Parliament’s upper house, the Right2Know campaign, a coalition formed in August 2010 to oppose the Secrecy Bill, handed out letters spelling out its concerns. “One of our campaign supporters noticed that the MPs were carrying documents themselves, and did an exchange,” says Murray Hunter, Right2Know’s spokesperson and organiser. “What we got hold of was a spin sheet with sound bites spinning certain aspects of the Bill. It was a document called “Myths about the Protection of State Information Bill” asserting that the Bill did indeed contain a public interest defence and would make it impossible to hide corruption.”
Murray says that the information used in the document – which had no source or logo on it – was filled with flawed and confused arguments. The Right2Know campaign said it wanted to know who had drafted the document and how it was funded.
Parliamentary leader for the DA, Lindiwe Mazibuko, said her biggest issue was the source of the anonymous document, and possible interference by the ministry of State Security. “We know that Siyabonga Cwele’s department has been interfering in the legislative process quite publicly by saying what NCOP members should and shouldn’t do with the legislation, which is in itself a violation of the separation of powers. That is problematic because once the law is in Parliament, it must be dealt with by MPs, and an MP’s job is not to do the bidding of government,” said Mazibuko. She added that if the document did indeed come from the ministry of State Security, it would be a “huge problem”.
“It is well known that Parliament has a research unit in every single portfolio committee, and every select committee, which has a secretariat and a researcher, and often they provide committee members with information. But there is something very suspicious about parties and MPs being given a script on their way into a debate, whether or not that script came from Parliament or a government department. It is suspicious when this document comes late in the game, when the legislation is being debated upon,” she said, and added: “At the moment we are concerned with some of the procedural problems with the Information Bill, and it is certainly one of the things we will look into.”
Earlier in the week, the controversial Bill – subject of much civil society protest – was adopted by an NCOP ad hoc Parliamentary committee which had been working on changes to the Bill for the last year. Mail & Guardian reported that opposition parties were given just 10 minutes to study the 22-page report on the ad hoc committee’s deliberations, and amendments to the Secrecy Bill. The opposition walked out and ANC members voted to send the Bill to a plenary session of the NCOP.
“It is clear that the Bll’s final process through the NCOP has been rushed and botched very badly,” said Nic Dawes, editor-in-chief of the Mail & Guardian. “Despite the initial willingness of members of all parties in the NCOP to do this properly and to try and hear the concerns that were raised by civil society, by lawyers, by the media, by activists, this potential to do a good job has been replaced by a mad rush to meet a self-imposed deadline. Serious damage has been done to the process as a result.”
Dawes said people weren’t able to properly consider the committee report earlier in the week and added it was likely that the remainder of the NCOP, and plenary session, hadn’t had a proper chance to consider the amended legislation in its entirety, nor to make an informed decision on it.
“The remaining options are for the National Assembly to do what it ought to have done all along, and that is to say that this legislation needs major revisions. It needs a proper public interest defence and a public domain defence. It needs to have an appropriate balance between freedom of information and the need to protect very narrowly and carefully defined state secrets, and it needs to be subordinate to the main piece of Constitutional legislation in this area, and that is the Promotion of Information Act,” Dawes said, adding that the National Assembly had one last chance to do the right thing.
“If they don’t, I hope a draft of MPs will send this for Constitutional review; I have been advised that they will try. Or alternatively that President Zuma does that, and then ultimately we will end up in the Constitutional Court, testing the legislation vigorously, and it is a pity that it looks like we are going to get to that place, but if need be that is what we will do,” Dawes said.
As the NCOP session got underway, State Security minister Cwele worked hard to sell the “benefits” of the Bill. Cwele, who had long pushed for the more draconian aspects of the Bill to remain intact, said the draft legislation sought to “advance the public interest by protecting certain classified information held by the state that if it became known to adversaries, would prejudice state programmes and hinder its ability to perform its duties.”
Reaching for a snappy quotable quote, Cwele addressed those scared of the implementation of the Bill into law. “To those who fear that the Bill may be abused, we say: the only thing to fear is fear itself.” (We presume Mr Cwele is FDR's fan - Ed)
BDLive reported that there was fierce opposition debate in the NCOP, with DA MP Alf Lees accusing the ANC of misleading the public by claiming extensive amendments to the Bill had ruled out the possibility of a state official using it to conceal wrongdoing. "Given the levels of corruption we see in government today, it is inevitable that the Bill will be used to cover up crime and corruption by those who risk exposure," he said, to ANC jeers.
Lees said the Bill still lacked a proper public interest defence clause to protect the media and whistle blowers, while his colleague Albert Fritz added, "This Bill is Stasi-like in its content and design."
Anton Harber, who directs the Journalism and Media Studies Programme at Wits University, agrees that there is still much to fear about the Bill. “It affects people in two ways. If one comes across information that needs to be out there in the public interest, clearly it raises the risks of being a whistle blower enormously,” said Harber.
“I have no doubt it will have a chilling effect on certain kinds of investigative journalism. It means an impact on the flow of information in the public arena. The penalties for whistle blowing potentially jump enormously here,” he added.
To understand the practical impact of the Bill, should it become law, Daily Maverick spoke to an activist in Kwazulu-Natal, a province where the political body count has been rising during recent months.
“We have a lot of political killings in the province at the moment, and in some cases even within the same political party,” said Desmond D'sa, a veteran political activist who’s currently in an organisational role for Right2Know in Kwazulu-Natal. “We believe that this is because of all the corruption that’s happening in this province. We have been asking for information related to this for a long, long time; for instance, we’ve asked for the Manase report in Durban, which reveals a lot of the shenanigans that going on.”
But the city refused to let activists, who report and organise against corruption, to have a copy of the report. “The city cites that whistle-blowers will lose their jobs or get killed and all of that, but that’s exactly what’s going on here in the ruling party. We believe that the Manase report is linked to these killings and will reveal a lot about what’s going on in the ANC in Kwazulu-Natal. The killings are about who is in power, who controls the resources, and who gets access to resources,” he said.
D'sa said even less “sensitive” information, like finding out about funding of housing projects, is blocked by officials who are already using the Bill (which hasn’t been passed in to law) to stop activists, the media or concerned citizens from getting information.
“If, for instance, you want to know what housing projects are being done and what funds have been made available for this in the city, you won’t get to the bottom of it. This is because the information is classified and not released. It is classified by people right at the top. It is going to make it impossible for people to find out what is really going on here in the province,” said D’sa.
The activist explained that the control of information made it impossible for civic society to do its job as a watchdog of government, and stated that the Bill was particularly threatening for whistle blowers.
“The NGOs and the civic organisations depend on whistle blowers to uncover corruption, and whistle blowers are crucial to the functioning of a democratic society and to help us get to the truth. However, the situation with whistle-blowers will get even worse because of the mounting fear. People will be fearful of being arrested, and now will be scared to release any kind of information because of the consequences,” D’sa said.
In terms of the proposed law, whistle blowers who reveal “corruption, malfeasance or wrongdoing by the State” can look at jail terms of up to 15 years. Furthermore, the Right2Know campaign also fears that whistle blowers may be charged under espionage clauses of the law which would see penalties of up to 25 years imposed.
In Kwazulu-Natal, this might be the case for activists investigating chemical fires and explosions. “In Durban the chemical cluster operates under the military, and under this new law, the military and the ‘securocrats’ in government won’t release any information at all. Even when people are getting killed or people are being affected by chemical emissions, this will not be released because they will deem it confidential and they will classify it,” D'sa told Daily Maverick.
“We have had over thirty explosions in the past few years, and fires in Durban, and we asked the department of labour to release certain forensic reports and they won’t do it. Can you imagine now if the law comes out? The flow of information with come to a standstill,” he added.
In the past, activists have been able to eke out some information through whistle blowers, but this will either dry up, or both activists and whistle blowers could face jail stiff terms. But D’sa and the Right2Know campaign are unrelenting.
“I hope that everyone realises that the democracy that everyone fought for and yearned for will be curtailed by this new law, as it is being bulldozed through Parliament. We are worried that we have gone right back, right back to the dark days of the Apartheid government, in bringing about these laws to stifle civil society, and to stifle ordinary people from standing up and asking the right questions, and getting the answers.”
“We will up the tempo of our protests. We are going to fight, even to the extent of being imprisoned. We are not going to shy away from standing up for the truth – even to the extent of being imprisoned because we need to fight this,” he added. DM
Source: Daily Maverick
Sunday, November 25, 2012
ANC KZN backs Jacob Zuma for ANC Presidency
ANC KZN NOMINATION CONFERENCE STATEMENT
25 November 2012
The African National Congress (ANC) in KwaZulu-Natal on Sunday concluded its successful two-day conference which was characterized by frankness, robustness and a comradely spirit that made all sessions to be enjoyable and enlightening.
The conference was convened to consolidate KwaZulu-Natal's policy positions and to combine the province's nominations for preferred leadership to be elected in the National Conference of the ANC to be held in Mangaung in December 2012.
The ANC in KwaZulu-Natal is happy that the conference was characterized by very productive debates on policy issues. Debates spanned from various and diverse views and individual expressions, scientific theory of our revolution to the experience gained through our daily involvement in our community struggles and serving within state institutions and platforms of service delivery.
Our province is once again leading the way by forsaking the foreign tendencies of coming to conferences for the sole purpose of voting for positions. The conference made history by dedicating more focus on policy matters in order to shape the transformation agenda and usher in a better life for all our people.
The ANC in KwaZulu-Natal strongly believes that the difference in the paths and direction the ANC will take post Mangaung depends on the thoroughness of the discussions and preparations to resolve issues that plague our country not on the face of the leadership cadres elected.
"Today (Sunday) we are concluding what has been a very democratic process. Our branches nominated their preferred candidates freely. The fact that more than one name per position were nominated was a clear indication ANC is a democratic organization," said ANC provincial Secretary, Sihle Zikalala.
After a very vigorous nomination process, ANC branches in KwaZulu-Natal nominated the following cadres:
President: Cde President Cde Jacob Zuma [unanimous]
Deputy President: Cde Cyril Ramaphosa [841 votes]
National Chairperson: Cde Baleka Mbethe [863 votes]
Secretary General: Cde Gwede Mantashe, [unanimous]
Deputy Secretary General: Cde Jessie Duarte [834 votes]
Treasure General: Cde Zweli Mkhize. [833 votes]
The conference emphasized the importance of discipline, unity and political maturity to ensure that the ANC will remain united after the Mangaung conference.
Statement issued by the ANC KwaZulu-Natal provincial secretary Sihle Zikalala November 26 2012
Source: Politicsweb
25 November 2012
The African National Congress (ANC) in KwaZulu-Natal on Sunday concluded its successful two-day conference which was characterized by frankness, robustness and a comradely spirit that made all sessions to be enjoyable and enlightening.
The conference was convened to consolidate KwaZulu-Natal's policy positions and to combine the province's nominations for preferred leadership to be elected in the National Conference of the ANC to be held in Mangaung in December 2012.
The ANC in KwaZulu-Natal is happy that the conference was characterized by very productive debates on policy issues. Debates spanned from various and diverse views and individual expressions, scientific theory of our revolution to the experience gained through our daily involvement in our community struggles and serving within state institutions and platforms of service delivery.
Our province is once again leading the way by forsaking the foreign tendencies of coming to conferences for the sole purpose of voting for positions. The conference made history by dedicating more focus on policy matters in order to shape the transformation agenda and usher in a better life for all our people.
The ANC in KwaZulu-Natal strongly believes that the difference in the paths and direction the ANC will take post Mangaung depends on the thoroughness of the discussions and preparations to resolve issues that plague our country not on the face of the leadership cadres elected.
"Today (Sunday) we are concluding what has been a very democratic process. Our branches nominated their preferred candidates freely. The fact that more than one name per position were nominated was a clear indication ANC is a democratic organization," said ANC provincial Secretary, Sihle Zikalala.
After a very vigorous nomination process, ANC branches in KwaZulu-Natal nominated the following cadres:
President: Cde President Cde Jacob Zuma [unanimous]
Deputy President: Cde Cyril Ramaphosa [841 votes]
National Chairperson: Cde Baleka Mbethe [863 votes]
Secretary General: Cde Gwede Mantashe, [unanimous]
Deputy Secretary General: Cde Jessie Duarte [834 votes]
Treasure General: Cde Zweli Mkhize. [833 votes]
The conference emphasized the importance of discipline, unity and political maturity to ensure that the ANC will remain united after the Mangaung conference.
Statement issued by the ANC KwaZulu-Natal provincial secretary Sihle Zikalala November 26 2012
Source: Politicsweb
Tuesday, October 23, 2012
Failing to Protect the Poor against Crime
South Africa continues to be a hazardous place for the Black poor. You don’t have to be a Marikana mineworker to die a death that is undignified, if not brutal and terrifying. The daily security concerns of the majority have never been further from the minds of politicians, who are either gripped with Mangaung mania, or – in the case of the DA - feverishly plotting the jingles and publicity stunts that they think will win them another metro city in the 2014 elections. COPE’s only recent claim to fame is its elderly MP who tried to open an aeroplane door in mid-flight, later escaping with a slap on the wrist after successfully arguing (with the support of the DA) that the combination of one alcoholic drink and one sleeping tablet made him lose his senses.
You know you are living in the most unequal country in the world when the mayor of a major metropolitan city can issue a self-congratulatory press statement – as the DA’s Patricia de Lille did recently – about the installation of less than 30 high-mast lights to be spread across numerous unlit informal settlements.
It is well known that in Cape Town’s townships and informal settlements, street lighting is almost non-existent, and as a result, that crime is rife. The complaint has been raised by residents at nearly every community meeting for years, no matter who organized the meeting or what else the meeting was supposed to be about. The DA likes to claim that communities vandalise every street light that ever gets installed but the truth is that street lighting has hardly been installed in the informal settlements and light bulbs are never replaced in the townships street lights. In Cape Town’s white suburbs, on the other hand, the DA city administration will send technicians out at 10pm to fix a streetlight bulb that died the same evening.
It emerged in a recent City of Cape Town press statement that poor, Black areas are not set to receive proper street lighting anytime soon. The DA city is instead going to rely on national government’s urban settlement development grant to install four lights here and there over the next two years. While the cost of keeping the streetlights on in white suburbs is part of the city’s normal budget, lighting the Black areas depends on donations.
The DA has already claimed that it is powerless to protect poor people on the Cape Flats from being caught in the crossfire between warring gangs, and that only the army would be able to do this. But with the re-emergence of necklacing in Khayelitsha as a community response to crime, the recent killings of four Cape Town metro police in the townships and the increase in the number of young people involved in violent gangs, it is clear that the DA is powerless on many more fronts and that things are unravelling fast in the “mother city”.
The concentration of public funds on white suburbs means the different races live totally different lives. White Capetonians can expect to wake up on the weekend and buy some beers for the night without incident. But for the past two Christmases, Khayelitsha residents have reported that police of all the different forces set up ad-hoc roadblocks on the pavements and ask residents returning from the bottle stores to show receipts for the beer they have purchased. If the residents have failed to keep their slips, or never got one, they are knocked around a bit and their alcohol confiscated. This is nothing to do with drinking in public but happens to ordinary people walking home after shopping.
More disturbingly, Black township residents are increasingly being subjected to the sight of public group killings, which increase the fear and insecurity in those areas. Several Khayelitsha residents vented their shock on Facebook just this past weekend at seeing groups of 14 year old youths killing each other in Makhaza Park.
"The park is full...it's blood everywhere. These boys are carrying weapons I have never seen in (my) life. This is too painful to see. We have been calling the police over and over but they haven't come," wrote one person. She later posted an update that two police had arrived, watched for a while and then left. "These kids are continuing", her desperate update read. Less than two hours later, another update read: "Sad to say, we have lost two young boys and others are injured...am numb".
Such horrific practices would be unthinkable in one of Cape Town’s white suburban parks. But in the townships, the government has allowed these incidents to become part of "normal" life.
It was only last week that Cape Town’s largest shack area, the Enkanini informal settlement, was provided with 452 electricity points – for 11 000 homes. How 24 families are going to share one power point is a mystery. The DA says another 2000 electricity connections will be turned on before May 2013 but that the rest of the electricity will be installed in phases. It is still not clear whether every home will eventually have its own electricity point or not. This informal settlement is situated in a highly urbanised city, which recently won the title of “World Design Capital”, yet its high school only got electricity last week!
Townships in the rest of the country are equally under-developed and crime plagued. Rural areas are also experiencing a spike in crime. The situation will continue to worsen rapidly until the DA and ANC abandon their practice of maintaining the living areas set up by apartheid’s Group Areas Act.
Unfortunately, this is unlikely to happen. The parties are two sides of the same coin. The ANC’s outdated neo-liberal economic policies were drawn up by the same international economists who wrote the policies of the DA. Successive ministers of Finance have focussed for 18 years now on pumping billions in public funds into tax breaks and incentives for overseas investors to set up factories that have never materialised.
Former president Thabo Mbeki said last week in a speech at Fort Hare university that South Africa was progressing “towards a costly disaster”, and was in a “dangerous and unacceptable situation of directionless and unguided national drift”.
This is rich coming from someone who, when he was in power, oversaw the arms deal; withheld anti-retroviral treatment from thousands of women living with HIV; set up the practice of wasting hundreds of millions of rands in public funds on hiring useless consultants for local and national government, and started the now defunct practice of paying retention bonuses to parastatal managers.
After 18 years, the DA and ANC have missed all opportunities to end apartheid in South Africa and improve the lives of the Black majority. The rapidly worsening situation, where more and more Black people are living without water, electricity, houses and schools as if in 17th century England, won’t be alleviated by either the DA or ANC. Their time has past.
Majavu is a writer concentrating on the rights of workers, oppressed people, the environment, anti-militarism and what makes a better world. She is currently studying for a Masters Degree in New Zealand.
Source: by Anna Majavu: SACSIS
You know you are living in the most unequal country in the world when the mayor of a major metropolitan city can issue a self-congratulatory press statement – as the DA’s Patricia de Lille did recently – about the installation of less than 30 high-mast lights to be spread across numerous unlit informal settlements.
It is well known that in Cape Town’s townships and informal settlements, street lighting is almost non-existent, and as a result, that crime is rife. The complaint has been raised by residents at nearly every community meeting for years, no matter who organized the meeting or what else the meeting was supposed to be about. The DA likes to claim that communities vandalise every street light that ever gets installed but the truth is that street lighting has hardly been installed in the informal settlements and light bulbs are never replaced in the townships street lights. In Cape Town’s white suburbs, on the other hand, the DA city administration will send technicians out at 10pm to fix a streetlight bulb that died the same evening.
It emerged in a recent City of Cape Town press statement that poor, Black areas are not set to receive proper street lighting anytime soon. The DA city is instead going to rely on national government’s urban settlement development grant to install four lights here and there over the next two years. While the cost of keeping the streetlights on in white suburbs is part of the city’s normal budget, lighting the Black areas depends on donations.
The DA has already claimed that it is powerless to protect poor people on the Cape Flats from being caught in the crossfire between warring gangs, and that only the army would be able to do this. But with the re-emergence of necklacing in Khayelitsha as a community response to crime, the recent killings of four Cape Town metro police in the townships and the increase in the number of young people involved in violent gangs, it is clear that the DA is powerless on many more fronts and that things are unravelling fast in the “mother city”.
The concentration of public funds on white suburbs means the different races live totally different lives. White Capetonians can expect to wake up on the weekend and buy some beers for the night without incident. But for the past two Christmases, Khayelitsha residents have reported that police of all the different forces set up ad-hoc roadblocks on the pavements and ask residents returning from the bottle stores to show receipts for the beer they have purchased. If the residents have failed to keep their slips, or never got one, they are knocked around a bit and their alcohol confiscated. This is nothing to do with drinking in public but happens to ordinary people walking home after shopping.
More disturbingly, Black township residents are increasingly being subjected to the sight of public group killings, which increase the fear and insecurity in those areas. Several Khayelitsha residents vented their shock on Facebook just this past weekend at seeing groups of 14 year old youths killing each other in Makhaza Park.
"The park is full...it's blood everywhere. These boys are carrying weapons I have never seen in (my) life. This is too painful to see. We have been calling the police over and over but they haven't come," wrote one person. She later posted an update that two police had arrived, watched for a while and then left. "These kids are continuing", her desperate update read. Less than two hours later, another update read: "Sad to say, we have lost two young boys and others are injured...am numb".
Such horrific practices would be unthinkable in one of Cape Town’s white suburban parks. But in the townships, the government has allowed these incidents to become part of "normal" life.
It was only last week that Cape Town’s largest shack area, the Enkanini informal settlement, was provided with 452 electricity points – for 11 000 homes. How 24 families are going to share one power point is a mystery. The DA says another 2000 electricity connections will be turned on before May 2013 but that the rest of the electricity will be installed in phases. It is still not clear whether every home will eventually have its own electricity point or not. This informal settlement is situated in a highly urbanised city, which recently won the title of “World Design Capital”, yet its high school only got electricity last week!
Townships in the rest of the country are equally under-developed and crime plagued. Rural areas are also experiencing a spike in crime. The situation will continue to worsen rapidly until the DA and ANC abandon their practice of maintaining the living areas set up by apartheid’s Group Areas Act.
Unfortunately, this is unlikely to happen. The parties are two sides of the same coin. The ANC’s outdated neo-liberal economic policies were drawn up by the same international economists who wrote the policies of the DA. Successive ministers of Finance have focussed for 18 years now on pumping billions in public funds into tax breaks and incentives for overseas investors to set up factories that have never materialised.
Former president Thabo Mbeki said last week in a speech at Fort Hare university that South Africa was progressing “towards a costly disaster”, and was in a “dangerous and unacceptable situation of directionless and unguided national drift”.
This is rich coming from someone who, when he was in power, oversaw the arms deal; withheld anti-retroviral treatment from thousands of women living with HIV; set up the practice of wasting hundreds of millions of rands in public funds on hiring useless consultants for local and national government, and started the now defunct practice of paying retention bonuses to parastatal managers.
After 18 years, the DA and ANC have missed all opportunities to end apartheid in South Africa and improve the lives of the Black majority. The rapidly worsening situation, where more and more Black people are living without water, electricity, houses and schools as if in 17th century England, won’t be alleviated by either the DA or ANC. Their time has past.
Majavu is a writer concentrating on the rights of workers, oppressed people, the environment, anti-militarism and what makes a better world. She is currently studying for a Masters Degree in New Zealand.
Source: by Anna Majavu: SACSIS
Tuesday, September 25, 2012
Sharp divisions on the Constitutional Court about the right to strike
In the aftermath of the Marikana massacre, the rights of striking workers and the unions they might belong to have once again come under the spotlight. Judging from the letters pages of middle brow newspapers, blog comments and callers to phone-in programmes, many middle class South Africans are about just as sympathetic to strikers and their constitutionally protected rights as they are to Julius Malema. Many middle class South Africans of whatever race seem to view striking workers as something of a menace, people who make unreasonable demands which – if agreed to – would threaten the comfortable existence of affluent members of society.
Luckily for striking workers, the majority of judges of the Constitutional Court do not seem to share this view. Last week, in the judgment of South African Transport and Allied Workers Union (SATAWU) and Others v Moloto N.O and Another the majority (in a judgment co-authored by Justice Yacoob, Froneman and Nkabinde, with Cameron and Van der Westhuizen concurring) rejected the argument of the minority (in a judgment authored by Acting Justice Maya, with Chief Justice Mogoeng, and Justice Jafta and Skweyiya concurring) that section 64(1)(b) of the Labour Relations Act obliged every employee who intends to embark on a strike to notify his or her employer of that intention personally or through a representative for the strike action to be protected.
In this case SATAWU members went on a strike and provided the employer with the requisite notice (as required by section 64(1)(b) of the Act) that its members would embark on a strike. Employees who were not SATAWU members joined the strike without individually giving notice to the employer that they would do so. These employees were subsequently dismissed because of their failure to notify the employer that they would join the strike.
Section 64(1)(b) states that striking employers are protected and cannot be fired if certain procedural requirements are met, including the requirement that “at least 48 hours’ notice of the commencement of the strike, in writing, has been given to the employer”.
For the majority the starting point of the inquiry was the Constitution, which protects the right to strike as a fundamental right without expressly limiting this right. The majority affirmed that constitutional rights conferred without express limitation should not be cut down by interpreting ambiguous legislative provisions as imposing implicit limitations on them.
As section 64(1)(b) contains no express requirement that every employee who intends to participate in a protected strike must personally or through a representative give notice of the commencement of the intended strike, nor that the notice must indicate who will take part in the strike, it was sufficient that SATAWU had given notice that it would strike. As the majority stated:
It is an accepted interpretative principle in our constitutional jurisprudence that if there is more than one interpretation of a statutory provision that is constitutionally compliant, the interpretation that best conforms with the spirit, purport and objects of the Bill of Rights should be preferred. In this case the interpretation not requiring every non-unionised member to give notice of their intention to take part in a strike organised by a union best conforms to the spirit, purport and object of the Bill of Rights.
This becomes even more evident if one recalls that the right to strike is protected in the Constitution at least partly in recognition of the fact that there are disparities in the social and economic power held by employers and employees. Employers have far more power than individual employees and in order to redress the inequality in social and economic power in employer/employee relations, employees are granted the right to strike to even out the playing field. To require individual employees to give detailed information of not only when they will strike but how many of them will strike, “would run counter to the underlying purpose of the right to strike in our Constitution – to level the playing fields of economic and social power already generally tilted in favour of employers”. As the majority pointed out:
The minority took a more restrictive view of the rights of strikers and is more closely aligned with the interests of employers than with those of employees. Focusing on the objects of the Labour Relations Act (instead of on the relevant section in the Bill of Rights which guarantees for employees the right to strike), the minority found that employers would be negatively affected if employees were not all required (either individually or through their representatives) to give notice to employers that would embark on a strike.
In contrast to the majority view, which focused on the imbalances in power between striking workers and their employers, the minority seemed to assume that employers were pretty powerless in the face of a strike. Accordingly, they claimed:
The minority would therefore have re-interpreted the relevant section of the Labour Relations Act so as to require that employees provide an employer with a notice “that makes it possible for the employer to reasonably identify the employees that may strike. And whilst this requirement may well place a burden on the exercise of the right to strike, the constitutionality of the provisions is not in the balance and it is therefore unnecessary to resolve the question.”
The two judgments therefore seem to reflect rather stark ideological differences between the judges on the Constitutional Court as well as differences in how to view the relationship between the provisions of the Bill of Rights, on the one hand, and provisions of legislation giving effect to those rights on the other.
The majority seem to be decidedly more progressive by assuming that the right to strike contained in the Bill of Rights should be limited as little as possible in order to ensure the levelling of the playing field between employers and employees. They would therefore oppose an interpretation of the legislation that would impose limitations on this right unless such limitations are expressly stated in the Labour Relations Act itself.
The minority seems to be rather more sympathetic to employers and big business and less enthusiastic about protecting the rights of striking workers. They are also more eager to interfere in the work of the democratically elected Parliament by re-interpreting legislation passed by that Parliament in such a manner that it would limit the rights of workers – even if that was perhaps not what the democratically elected Parliament intended to do.
Wonder whether the Cosatu representative on the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) is regretting his support for the appointment of some of the Constitutional Court justices who joined this minority decision. But I guess that is what you get when you remain loyal to an Alliance in which your own class interests will ultimately almost always be trumped by the class interests of those pro-business and pro-tender elites who currently dominate the leadership of the ANC.
Source: Constitutionally Speaking
Luckily for striking workers, the majority of judges of the Constitutional Court do not seem to share this view. Last week, in the judgment of South African Transport and Allied Workers Union (SATAWU) and Others v Moloto N.O and Another the majority (in a judgment co-authored by Justice Yacoob, Froneman and Nkabinde, with Cameron and Van der Westhuizen concurring) rejected the argument of the minority (in a judgment authored by Acting Justice Maya, with Chief Justice Mogoeng, and Justice Jafta and Skweyiya concurring) that section 64(1)(b) of the Labour Relations Act obliged every employee who intends to embark on a strike to notify his or her employer of that intention personally or through a representative for the strike action to be protected.
In this case SATAWU members went on a strike and provided the employer with the requisite notice (as required by section 64(1)(b) of the Act) that its members would embark on a strike. Employees who were not SATAWU members joined the strike without individually giving notice to the employer that they would do so. These employees were subsequently dismissed because of their failure to notify the employer that they would join the strike.
Section 64(1)(b) states that striking employers are protected and cannot be fired if certain procedural requirements are met, including the requirement that “at least 48 hours’ notice of the commencement of the strike, in writing, has been given to the employer”.
For the majority the starting point of the inquiry was the Constitution, which protects the right to strike as a fundamental right without expressly limiting this right. The majority affirmed that constitutional rights conferred without express limitation should not be cut down by interpreting ambiguous legislative provisions as imposing implicit limitations on them.
As section 64(1)(b) contains no express requirement that every employee who intends to participate in a protected strike must personally or through a representative give notice of the commencement of the intended strike, nor that the notice must indicate who will take part in the strike, it was sufficient that SATAWU had given notice that it would strike. As the majority stated:
The point of departure in interpreting section 64(1)(a) [and, one assumes, section 64(1)(b)] is that we should not restrict the right to strike more than is expressly required by the language of the provision, unless the purposes of the Act and the section on “a proper interpretation of the statute … imports them.” The relevance of a restrictive approach is to raise a cautionary flag against restricting the right more than is expressly provided for. Intrusion into the right should only be as much as is necessary to achieve the purpose of the provision and this requires sensitivity to the constraints of the language used.
It is an accepted interpretative principle in our constitutional jurisprudence that if there is more than one interpretation of a statutory provision that is constitutionally compliant, the interpretation that best conforms with the spirit, purport and objects of the Bill of Rights should be preferred. In this case the interpretation not requiring every non-unionised member to give notice of their intention to take part in a strike organised by a union best conforms to the spirit, purport and object of the Bill of Rights.
This becomes even more evident if one recalls that the right to strike is protected in the Constitution at least partly in recognition of the fact that there are disparities in the social and economic power held by employers and employees. Employers have far more power than individual employees and in order to redress the inequality in social and economic power in employer/employee relations, employees are granted the right to strike to even out the playing field. To require individual employees to give detailed information of not only when they will strike but how many of them will strike, “would run counter to the underlying purpose of the right to strike in our Constitution – to level the playing fields of economic and social power already generally tilted in favour of employers”. As the majority pointed out:
to hold otherwise would place a greater restriction on the right to strike of non-unionised employees and minority union employees than on majority union employees. It is these employees, much more than those who are unionised or represented by a majority union, who will feel the lash of a more onerous requirement. There is no warrant for that where they were already denied the right to bargain collectively on their own behalf in the preceding process.
The minority took a more restrictive view of the rights of strikers and is more closely aligned with the interests of employers than with those of employees. Focusing on the objects of the Labour Relations Act (instead of on the relevant section in the Bill of Rights which guarantees for employees the right to strike), the minority found that employers would be negatively affected if employees were not all required (either individually or through their representatives) to give notice to employers that would embark on a strike.
In contrast to the majority view, which focused on the imbalances in power between striking workers and their employers, the minority seemed to assume that employers were pretty powerless in the face of a strike. Accordingly, they claimed:
if a notice gives an employer no indication of which of its employees might strike, it is nigh impossible to conceive how the employer will prepare properly for the impending power play. How will it make an informed decision as to whether or not to yield to the employees’ demands? And, if it resists, how will it take proper steps to protect its business, the employees and the public and engage meaningfully in pre-strike regulatory discussions regarding issues such as picketing rules?
The minority would therefore have re-interpreted the relevant section of the Labour Relations Act so as to require that employees provide an employer with a notice “that makes it possible for the employer to reasonably identify the employees that may strike. And whilst this requirement may well place a burden on the exercise of the right to strike, the constitutionality of the provisions is not in the balance and it is therefore unnecessary to resolve the question.”
The two judgments therefore seem to reflect rather stark ideological differences between the judges on the Constitutional Court as well as differences in how to view the relationship between the provisions of the Bill of Rights, on the one hand, and provisions of legislation giving effect to those rights on the other.
The majority seem to be decidedly more progressive by assuming that the right to strike contained in the Bill of Rights should be limited as little as possible in order to ensure the levelling of the playing field between employers and employees. They would therefore oppose an interpretation of the legislation that would impose limitations on this right unless such limitations are expressly stated in the Labour Relations Act itself.
The minority seems to be rather more sympathetic to employers and big business and less enthusiastic about protecting the rights of striking workers. They are also more eager to interfere in the work of the democratically elected Parliament by re-interpreting legislation passed by that Parliament in such a manner that it would limit the rights of workers – even if that was perhaps not what the democratically elected Parliament intended to do.
Wonder whether the Cosatu representative on the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) is regretting his support for the appointment of some of the Constitutional Court justices who joined this minority decision. But I guess that is what you get when you remain loyal to an Alliance in which your own class interests will ultimately almost always be trumped by the class interests of those pro-business and pro-tender elites who currently dominate the leadership of the ANC.
Source: Constitutionally Speaking
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