We must be lions, not vultures

When all is said and done, the midterm budget is a fine effort by the minister of finance and his team at National Treasury.

It also proves that whatever the naysayers and Jeremiahs may claim, there is some considerable coherence in government.

Given the shenanigans of the national director of public prosecutions, the SA Revenue Service, the Hawks, the presidency and other poorly run state structures, it is a testimony to the resilience of Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan and his deputy, Mcebisi Jonas, that they have not let the dangerous – albeit clumsy and clownish – antics distract them.

The mini budget was a balancing act performed to meet the demands of students and other constituencies, while at the same time showing the markets that there will be discipline in terms of spending.

The fact that government is functioning in spite of all the nonsense and reactionary agendas of some elements is also a testimony to the resilience of our economy and, whether one is a supporter or not, to the ANC.

Coming hot on the heels of a disastrous election result, the delivery of this disciplined and focused effort by government as a whole shows that whatever its problems, the ANC still has some bite in it.

But this resilience is both a strength and a weakness.

It allows the ANC leadership and those in government to rest on their laurels.

Because the punishment metered out by the electorate and the market is tempered by a strong loyalty to the ANC, this generosity is misread by complacent rulers as a signal to carry on regardless.

The social unrest we see occurring daily, the student demonstrations, the fatigued electorate and other similar social ills, are all signs of the breakdown of the social compact from 1994 to 1996 that led to the Constitution we all rightly celebrate.

Yet, as Gordhan pointed out himself, the levels of poverty, inequality and unemployment we are faced with as a nation are simply unacceptable and unsustainable.

As a recent analysis on the attempt to agree on a minimum wage by Cosatu’s Neil Coleman shows, capital/business/enterprise/the wealthy – however one chooses to define who controls the economy – are just not prepared to share the wealth, or even to agree on sharing the future wealth.

Real wages have declined, the gap between workers’ and executives’ pay has widened from 30 times to almost 50 times and our executives earn more than double that of executives in similar developing countries such as Brasil.

Simply put, the structure of the apartheid economy, of the political economy of apartheid, has not changed much and in many ways is worse today than it was under that iniquitous system.

This is a recipe for social unrest, violence and the destruction of our country.

Capital and the wealthy elite are by definition greedy, selfish and conservative.

This is not to say that they won’t invest in our economy. But they will only do so when they can make a return on that investment that they can’t make elsewhere.

The question that we have to answer then is: What must we do to attract investment from these sources of capital? We must also consider what government must invest its limited resources in.

All the indicators are that the government is getting it wrong in this regard.

A good example is the proposed nuclear build programme.

It is clear that our country cannot afford this expensive option.

It may be government policy, but as examples from all over the world show, the private sector will rush to invest in renewable energy.

But the current conditions for these investors are onerous and, frankly speaking, appear to be designed to discourage them.

If government made it simpler, fairer and reduced the red tape for such investors, almost all our entire future energy needs could be paid for by private capital.

The same is true for SAA, PetroSA and other public enterprises.

So, why is government pouring money into these enterprises when it could be encouraging private capital into them, even without privatising them?

Some of it is clearly a continued adherence to a mechanistic and crude interpretation of the developmental state and possibly some hankering for a failed and outdated notion of statist socialism.

But it is also clear that the class and personal interest of some in the leadership of the ANC are making it impossible for government to take rational and sensible decisions.

The desire to utilise the state as a mechanism for personal accumulation, often in the most primitive form, means that the working class and the poor are being led to the alter for slaughter.

If we continue to take such bad decisions as propping up a useless SAA, for example, when BA Comair, Safair and even its own subsidiary, Mango, do this better, then we cannot expect anything to change for the better.

The goodwill that the finance minister has created, the loyalty of the vast majority of the people of this country to the ANC and the respect our country has earned across the globe mean that the members of the ANC must take bold action.

The failure of leadership, the lack of vision, the creation of divisions where there should be unity – and cohesion and the resultant contradictions that are exacerbated by such poor leadership – must be dealt with.

We can only create a spirit of unity, cohesion, of solidarity and of purpose that will shape our polity, our economy and our nation in a way that benefits all when we are honest about our strengths and weaknesses and when we work to “bring down the buffalo” together.

This means we must be lions and not vultures.

Dexter is an ANC member and independent writer