Percy Ngonyama
South African President Thabo Mbeki's "State of the Nation" address, delivered on February 3 in Cape Town at the highly militarised opening of parliament, was a further blow for the country's poor masses.
While recommitting to market-friendly economic policies, Mbeki failed to outline specific programs to meaningfully deal with South Africa's worsening poverty and underdevelopment. South Africa's have-nots, who have suffered severely in the last 12 years as a result of the African National Congress (ANC) government's conservative economic policies, must brace themselves for more hardship.
It is very hypocritical for the ANC-controlled parliament to have chosen the theme "All shall have equal rights" — derived from the historic Freedom Charter. The annual opening of parliament provides a very graphic reflection of the growing inequalities between the rich and the poor. The event has become a Hollywood-style extravaganza for a few rich. The South African Broadcasting Corporation's fashion commentator skilfully scrutinised the numerous trendy outfits worn by the elite on the ANC's "black economic empowerment" gravy train and the country's fat-cat parliamentarians — whose function in Mbeki's technocracy has been reduced to merely rubber-stamping unpopular policies.
Despite South Africa's worsening levels of poverty and inequalities, Mbeki, pointing to recent surveys, is optimistic that his economic policies are taking the country in the right direction. Unfortunately, reality on the ground paints a very gloomy picture.
As expected, economic growth and the government's Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative (ASGISA) featured prominently in Mbeki's speech. This, along with the other neoliberal initiatives, has seen South Africa's ruling politicians prostituting themselves to the financially well-endowed corporations and the financial markets that they control in an attempt to attract much-craved foreign investment, with dire consequences for the masses.
ASGISA sees increased exports as fundamental for the projected 6% annual economic growth rate in the next few years. In recent years, the country has managed to drastically increase exports, but this has come at a heavy price for the working class. While output growth has increased, employment growth has declined in major sectors, such as manufacturing, business services, agriculture and mining.
As the Cape Town-based Alternative Information and Development Centre (AIDC) points out, export-oriented growth also means increased competition, which in many instances has meant local bosses seek production cost reductions that lead to unsafe working conditions, retrenchments and wage cuts.
A large proportion of the public, even after 12 years of so-called democracy, cannot meet their basic needs that are guaranteed by South Africa's internationally acclaimed constitution, which celebrates its 10th anniversary this year. While Mbeki may have managed to fool many with phrases such as "people-centred" delivery, his government's anti-poor economic policies speak volumes.
Indeed, as Mbeki himself conceded in yet another one of the government's desperate pleas to the private sector for increased investment, the years of post-apartheid "freedom" have been very good for business. Life has never been this good for local and international capitalists. Among other things, they have benefited handsomely from the government's annual tax cuts.
At the expense of the poor, the ANC government has placed too much reliance on the private sector. The problem with this is that the private sector's primary aim is to increase profitability. Private companies are accountable to no-one but their shareholders. South Africa, with its heavy apartheid-induced services backlog cannot afford this situation.
The expanded public works program (EPWP), which the government sees as the solution to the worsening unemployment crisis, relies heavily on small, medium and large corporations for infrastructure development. It is being touted as a brilliant strategy, which, we are told, will result in 1 million job opportunities in the next five years.
The EPWP, however, has proved to be a major fiasco in many parts of the country. It has been characterised by widespread corruption and cronyism. Also, the jobs are only temporary and pay next to slave wages. Moreover, given South Africa's 41% unemployment rate, the EPWP is just a drop in the ocean. Only a fool or a liar can claim the program will significantly improve the lives of the poor.
Upcoming official celebrations on June 16 marking the 30th anniversary of the Soweto youth uprising and August 9 marking the 50th anniversary of the women's march to the Union buildings mean very little for the majority of youth and women, who, as a result of government policies, are confronted with extreme poverty on a daily basis.
It is estimated that 70% of the unemployed are young people. Most have never worked. Only about 14% of those graduating from tertiary institutions each year find secure employment in the formal economy. Yet, none of our so-called experts see the connection between this hopeless situation and young people's resort to crime, survival sex and substance abuse.
Instead, in true South African-style, the government plans to deal with the symptoms and not the causes. In his speech, Mbeki mentioned a plan to improve resource allocation within the justice system to ensure that crime does not pay. The fact that a large majority of those overcrowding our prisons are arrested for what most sociologists view as poverty-related crimes is immaterial to the ruling party.
The majority of our women live under conditions most would consider unsuitable for pets.
Should the success of the ANC government's so-called empowerment programs for women and youth not be measured by the number of women and youth who have been lifted out of a life of poverty? Phumzile Mlambo Ngcuka's appointment as deputy president and the increasing number of women members of cabinet has not translated into a better life for all women. The empowerment of young ANC-aligned people has also not changed the lives of the vast majority of young people.
Because of the government's strict "fiscal discipline", and Mbeki and health minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang's AIDS denial, life-saving anti-retroviral drugs are only available to a fraction of infected patients at government hospitals. Only about a 100,000 of the six million HIV-AIDS patients are on anti-retroviral medicine at public institutions.
Is it therefore not an insult for Mbeki to suggest that we should be proud of this horrific situation? Mbeki is optimistic that, with increased private sector investment, poverty will be halved by 2014. Yet his government's pro-rich developmental agenda can only exacerbate the current situation.
South Africa's opposition parties, which in electioneering for the March 1 local government election have portrayed themselves as an alternative to the ANC, have raised few misgivings about Mbeki's speech. They are in full agreement with the ANC's overall anti-poor capitalist agenda.
The failure to acknowledge that it is the top-down capitalist policies of the ruling party that breed corruption and poverty, give the lie to their claims.
The complacent Mbeki boasts that 7 million children and 12 million other South Africans are on social welfare grants. That the government's meagre grants are hardly sufficient to pay for outsourced and privatised basic services, let alone put food on the table and send kids to school, is not, for Mbeki, a matter of serious concern.
Mbeki's assertion that South Africa can play a positive contribution towards global peace is undermined by the fact that the state-owned arms manufacturer Denel continues to export arms to dictators and countries at war. On its website, the company describes corporate globalisation as a wonderful opportunity to increase its markets and profit margins.
Furthermore, South Africa cannot claim to be committed to the resolution of the Palestine-Israel conflict. To the detriment of the oppressed Palestinians, the growth-obsessed ANC government has helped legitimise the oppressive Zionist regime by signing trade deals with it.
There is an urgent need to conduct an intensive nationwide debate about the ANC government's economic policies that have rendered freedom and democracy enigmatic for many South Africans.
Is it not the right time then to demand an end to privatisation and outsourcing? Wasn't the struggle against apartheid also about decent and secure jobs for the majority? With more than 8 million of the economically active population unemployed, should we not be demanding urgent steps to curb the unemployment virus? Isn't equal redistribution of wealth the genuine solution to poverty and underdevelopment?
The suffering masses of South Africa demand a genuine people-centred developmental approach that does not prioritise profits over people's basic needs.
[Percy Ngonyama is a social-movement activist based in Durban. From the Centre for Civil Society, University of KwaZulu-Natal. Visit <http://www.ukzn.ac.za/ccs/>.]
From Green Left Weekly, February 15, 2006.
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