FEATURE:

A poor DA statement that misrepresents the facts

By: Gareth van Onselen
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16 May 2013

The DA today released the following statement, based on this reply to a parliamentary question, from the Minister of Sport and Recreation.

The question was no doubt prompted by last year’s outrage, when it was revealed the Annual South African Sports Awards ceremony would cost some R45 million. That was a difficult pill to swallow, a grossly excessive amount made to appear all the more exorbitant by the fact that so many smaller sporting codes were struggling to survive.

According to the reply from the Minister, the total amount for this year’s ceremony was to increase – to R65 million – but the amount budgeted for the Department’s own cost (i.e. the amount of public money spent) would decrease, down to R21 million. The rest, some R44 million, would be covered by sponsorships and associated partners.

R21 million still seems excessive. And it speaks badly of those private sponsors too, who are willing to throw such huge amounts behind any event in which television is involved but are reluctant to sponsor anything with less exposure. By way of contrast, Telkom recently terminated its R11 million annual sponsorship of Swimming SA – an organization that already operates on a well-worn shoestring budget.

Here, then, the DA was presented with two options: It could welcome the decrease in public spending (indeed, it could justifiably claim some credit for it, as it was largely responsible for highlighting the problem last year) and say more needs to be cut and allocated elsewhere in the future, but that the general intention was good. Or, it could focus on the total amount, and suggest it represents an increase in spending and that this is outrageous.

The latter option is the more devious of the two and, whether or not the R21 million is still excessive, punishes the Department for cutting rather than increasing the amount it spent. It speaks poorly of the DA that it chose to pursue it.

Likewise, whatever the ethics of the sponsors, it speaks well of the Department that it sought out their financial support. Whatever your position, the Department of Sport now presumably has some R25 million in additional funds to allocate elsewhere and which were unavailable last year, which is something. That fact too, however, was overlooked by the DA’s response. A more interesting question might be what that additional money is being spent on.

Although the DA did not pretend the sponsorship component did not exist it essentially ignored it and the moral thrust of its argument is captured by this sentiment from the statement:

“It is simply unacceptable that Minister Mbalula chooses to spend a R65 million on amplifying ‘razzmatazz’ instead of service delivery.”

As if to magnify this disingenuous claim, it then provided a list of comparative spending possibilities, on which the R65 million could be spent (“3 250 swimming pools at R20 000 each”, for example). Of course, if one was to do that, you would have to use the R21 million figure, not the R65 million – sponsors don’t give money generically, it is event specific and the big draw card here would be potential television coverage of the ceremony. All of this the DA repeated on Twitter in a series of tweets, to fuel any potential outrage.

As an action step, the DA said it would be writing to the Auditor-General “requesting that this expenditure be classified as fruitless and wasteful, and that Minister Mbalula be disciplined accordingly”. This point will probably be overlooked, but that request is both wrong (in terms of the AG’s mandate) and politically at odds with various concerns the DA has with the AG’s ever-growing ambit.

The AG can assess whether money is properly spent in terms of procedure. In other words, that something is properly budgeted for, that money is properly allocated, that proper procedures are followed and that it is, in fact, spent in the final instance. It is not the AG’s job to determine policy. This is something the DA has expressed concerned about, particularly in the Western Cape, where it governs – that as the AG’s influence grows it is beginning to make judgement calls about policy decisions, as opposed to good financial practice. The electorate determines the policy it wants, not the AG.

But here, in this statement, the DA has basically given the AG an open mandate to prescribe policy. No doubt the R21 million was properly allocated and will be spent in terms of the rules, whether or not it is bad judgement to have such an awards ceremony, however, is a policy decision. Certainly it is not the AG’s job to “discipline” poor policy choices. That is why we have an election.

This confusion is evident in other recent DA calls. For instance, its first action step on the Gupta debacle was to ask the AG to investigate. What did they expect the AG to find? That Waterkloof Airbase got a qualified audit? The decision to land the Gupta’s plane at a military airstrip had nothing to do with financial management and everything to do with political decision-making.

So why did the DA chose to go the route it did? Instead of welcoming the reduction in spending, even if that welcoming was qualified, it felt obliged to misrepresent the whole affair.

One reason, the obvious one, is that bad news sells and in an environment where executive extravagance is so prevalent, at first glance this must have seemed to tick all the right boxes. But one could have quite credibly made the case R21 million was still excessive, without using the R65 million total.

A second, more depressing option, is that it failed to identify the good news – that some R25 million extra was now available to the Department, compared to 2012, to spend on more worthy things. However limited the Department’s decrease in expenditure, it is a step in the right direction; in turn, a response to public sentiment and opposition pressure – both achievements the DA had, ironically, helped bring about. Given how tone deaf the ANC government generally is on such things, perhaps this was thus an opportunity missed.

Either way, it was a poor statement.

• Gareth van Onselen (@GvanOnselen) is the Editor of Inside Politics (@insidepols), Winner: Best Political Blog 2012.

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SERIES:

On nature

By: Gareth van Onselen
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14 May 2013

‘Nature’ is big business in the modern world. There is no end to the number of lobby groups that advocate for its protection or appreciation, and which speak out against man’s encroachment on it. However, in doing so, they have appropriated the word to serve a very particular moral agenda, their narrative being: nature is a glorious thing, and we must do what we can to respect, conserve and nurture it.

That is disingenuous, if not misleading.

The truth is that nature is not a benevolent force for good; it is capricious, often brutal and entirely unmoved by humankind’s various concerns. It is just as capable of eradicating life as it is of torturing it to death, whether by some dread disease or a random act of massive destruction. In short, it is responsible as much for pain as it is pleasure.

Yet, for many environmentalists, the word ‘nature’ has come to represent some universal good. Thanks to so much moralising, ‘nature’ – this ostensibly virtuous wonder – has been detached in the public mind from its true, amoral and arbitrary meaning.

Such people are perfectly happy for scientists to work day and night to eliminate those natural things that pose a threat or risk to our collective well being but, where something is deemed beautiful or unique, to savage any assault on them.

Ironically, nature itself cares not a bit. The world could be reduced to a pile of concrete rubble, and nature would carry on its business regardless.

That is not to say there is no value in conservation, or the appreciation of wonderful things, indeed there is, only that one must understand that both good and bad, the majestic and malevolent, are part of parcel of nature’s offering. To pretend the one exists at the expense of the other is to misunderstand man’s relationship with nature and those forces that define it.

An abbreviated version of this column first appeared in the Business Day. For more columns from The Thing About series, click here.

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SERIES:

On propaganda

By: Gareth van Onselen
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9 May 2013

Propaganda at its most devious successfully smuggles a falsehood betwixt and between truths. In this way it creates the illusion that some ostensible ‘fact’ enjoys the same veracity as the proven context in which it is presented, fooling the gullible and apathetic alike. And so it escapes interrogation and is accepted as part and parcel of history.

At its most brazen, however, propaganda will make no attempt at such subtle manipulation. When this happens – when outright lies are declared incontestable truths – you can be sure the propagandist enjoys an unfettered influence. After all, why twist history when you can rewrite it absolutely?

So the nature of propaganda is a good litmus test for power: the more extreme it is, the cruder the lies it generates, the less threatened the propagandist by the consequences that normally accompany such deceit.

Likewise, an omission constitutes propaganda when its purpose is to give a false impression of something’s nature. In other words, by excluding that fact, an idea is rendered incomplete and the effect of that is a distortion of the truth.

Just like the reworking of ideas, the omission of information can vary in scale and significance. The insecure propagandist might polish off some small annoyance without too badly damaging a general narrative or, more comfortable in their role, the seasoned propagandist might exclude an entire chapter, altering a story fundamentally.

Whether by omission or manipulation the purpose is to change the lesson an audience might learn from a given event, always to the benefit of the propagandist – for the propagandist the means always justify the end and the end is always theirs to justify.

But the real test propaganda constitutes is for the audience itself to pass. If their critical faculties are lulled into a false sense of security, they will fail to identify or correct propaganda. In the other direction, if their minds are independent, informed and interrogating, the propagandist will never gain the foothold necessary to entrench their particular worldview.

An abbreviated version of this column first appeared in the Business Day. For more columns from The Thing About series, click here.

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ARTICLE:

The ANC’s dubious donors

By: Gareth van Onselen
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8 May 2013

The primary reason the ANC was forced to start looking to local business for financial support was that its overseas funding started to dry up after the party came to power in 1994.

Although obviously not the full confidential report presented to the ANC’s National Executive Committee, there is an abridged version of the financial report presented by ANC treasurer-general Makhenkesi Stofile to the 1997 national conference on the ANC’s website. Among other things, that report states:

“The ANC had largely depended on friendly countries and institutions for it’s funds. Most of these donors were in foreign lands. The 1994 elections created the perception or expectation that a ruling Party had access to the country’s resources. Also, the purpose for which we were funded, to defeat apartheid, had been accomplished. So our erstwhile donors were reluctant or unable to continue funding us. Our members’ contributions were and are negligible. In many ways we had become dependent on the President’s initiatives and those of some officials for income”.

Prior to the advent of South Africa’s new democracy, the ANC used to receive massive sums of money from foreign donors – a significant number of which were foreign governments – eager to help support the liberation struggle. Obviously, once the party came to power, it became increasingly difficult for foreign donors – and almost impossible for foreign governments – to justify huge donations to a governing party. (Nelson Mandela’s retirement from politics also dealt a blow to the party’s ability to solicit donations from abroad). But there was a period of transition, from around 1993 to 1999 where, despite being in power, the ANC still received substantial donations from abroad, a number of which came from highly dubious sources.

The sums themselves ranged anywhere from 2.6 million Pounds all the way up to as much as 50 million Dollars. In fact, if one just sets out the amounts of those key foreign donations to the ANC over this period, it is quite staggering that the ANC managed to be in the dire financial situation in which it found itself, in 1997. So which foreign donors gave money to the ANC over this period and how much did they give?

The following donations were reported in the media:

• King Fahd of Suadi Arabia (1990): 50 million Dollars: Business Day reported that the donation was made “at Mandela’s request”;
• Taiwanese Government (July 1993): 6 million Pounds Sterling;
• Taiwanese Government (June 1994): 10 million US Dollars: According to the Washington Post, the donation was made “to help the African National Congress repay a 20 million Dollar campaign debt”. The paper wrote that among those ANC officials involved in soliciting the donation were Thomas Nkobi (the ANC’s treasurer-general) and Thabo Mbeki. At the time, ANC secretary-general Cyril Ramaphosa denied any knowledge of the deal to the Mail & Guardian. A Taiwanese official said the payment helped delay South Africa’s recognition of China by at least two years;
• General Sani Abacha of Nigeria (1994): 2.6 million Pounds Sterling: writing for the Guardian, David Beresford claimed that the donation was made in cash. Beresford also wrote, “The ANC is known to have received substantial cash donations from the Moroccan government, which could explain the South African government’s recent reluctance to honour promises to recognise the Polisario Front’s Saharawi Republic”;
• General Sani Abacha of Nigeria (1995): 50 million US Dollars: According to the Lagos newspaper The News, the donation was made to “prepare the ground for an eventual rapport with a Mandela-led government”. The money was allegedly withdrawn from the security vote – “that nebulous fund that has become the veritable channel for both national and state leaders to misappropriate monies, or even embezzle them outright”.
• King Fahd of Saudi Arabia (1999): 10 million US Dollars;
• Colonel Muammar Gaddafi of Libya (1999): Unknown: The Sunday Telegraph wrote, “South African Foreign Ministry officials last week confirmed that Col Gaddafi has given Mr Mandela a significant donation – several million pounds – to be used in the ANC’s election campaign”. The story later claimed, “Mr Mandela is also believed to have received party funding from Beijing during a visit in which he notably failed to comment on China’s human rights record”;
• Sheik Zaid bin Sultan al-Nahayan of United Arab Emirates (1999): 10 million US Dollars;
• President Mahathir Mohammed of Malaysia (Unknown): 50 million US Dollars; and
• General Mohammed Suharto of Indonesia (Unknown): 60 million US Dollars: Business Day described the donations from Al-Nahayan, President Mohammed and King Fahd as follows: “President Mandela disclosed last night that Saudi Arabia’s King Fahd had donated 10 million US Dollars to the ANC. Another 10 million US Dollars was received from Shaikh Zaid bin Sultan al-Nahayan of the UAE… Al-Nahayan gave the money ‘on the spot’, he said… The 10 million donated by Fahd was in addition to 50 million US Dollars he donated to the ANC in 1990, Mandela said… He had asked Malaysian prime minister Mahatir Mohammed for 10 million US Dollars, but he gave 50 million”.

That’s a total of around 260 million US Dollars. If one took a very conservative ratio, of one Dollar for every four Rands, that works out to just over a billion Rand – and that’s just the donations outlined above – which found their way into the public domain. Seen in that light, quite how the ruling party has managed to find itself in the state of financial distress it is currently in really boggles the mind.

There are some notorious people in that collection of names. King Fahd, Sani Abacha and Mohammed Suharto all have dubious human rights track records. Colonel Gaddafi is hardly a shining example of democratic leadership. Indeed, the ruling party’s approach to fundraising is yet further evidence of the ANC’s drift away from a commitment to promoting human rights – not only has the ANC solicited money from people such as Mohammed Suharto, but often it has actually celebrated them.

The Sunday Times reported in May 1999, for example, that on his arrival in South Africa in 1998, president Suharto was greeted at the airport by then Deputy President Thabo Mbeki, 14 Cabinet Ministers, a guard of honour and a 21 gun salute. He was subsequently awarded the Order of the Cape of Good Hope, Gold Class – the highest honour available to foreigners – by President Nelson Mandela.

Wikipedia has the following to say about Suharto:

“In May 1999, Time Asia estimated Suharto’s family fortune at US$15 billion in cash, shares, corporate assets, real estate, jewelery and fine art. Of this, US$9 billion is reported to have been deposited in an Austrian bank. The family is said to control about 36,000 km² of real estate in Indonesia, including 100,000 m² of prime office space in Jakarta and nearly 40 percent of the land in East Timor. Over US$73 billion is said to have passed through the family’s hands during Suharto’s 32-year rule. On May 29, 2000, Suharto was placed under house arrest when Indonesian authorities began to investigate the corruption during his regime. In July, it was announced that he was to be accused of embezzling US$571 million of government donations to one of a number of foundations under his control and then using the money to finance family investments. But in September court-appointed doctors announced that he could not stand trial because of his declining health. State prosecutors tried again in 2002 but then doctors cited an unspecified brain disease. According to Transparency International, Suharto embezzled more money than any other world leader in history with the estimated US $15–35 billion embezzlement during his 32 years rule.”

(Click here for Wikipedia’s entry on King Fahd; here for its entry on Sani Abacha and here for its entry on Colonel Gaddafi.)

This article was first published on 29 January 2007.

• Gareth van Onselen (@GvanOnselen) is the Editor of Inside Politics (@insidepols), Winner: Best Political Blog 2012.

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FEATURE:

An erosion of the DA’s liberal values: A response

By: Gareth van Onselen
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17 April 2013

“No rational argument will have a rational effect on a man who does not want to adopt a rational attitude.” [Karl Popper, Oracular Philosophy and the Revolt against Reason.]

Introduction

There have been several responses to my initial piece on the Democratic Alliance, Ubuntu and ‘Africaness’ (see here and here). The party itself, however, has provided no formal reply. This is perhaps a concession of sorts. Significantly, I notice it has not used the word since. Nevertheless, I felt it necessary to respond to those various rebuttals that were put forward, as the majority misunderstood the nature of the problem.

Those responses I am aware of follow below, in no particular order. I apologise if I have overlooked any. These are published argument; I have not included Facebook responses or Twitter opinion (‘opinion’ being a generous description).

• For Liberalism to Succeed we must Dispense with Dogma
• We Should Not Dodge the Tough Questions, We Must Give Tough Answers
• The unAfrican liberal
• Liberalism, the Democratic Alliance and Identity
• The Liberal Project and DA Discontent
• Why Ubuntu is a Liberal Value
• Ideology and its Relevance – The Trade Off
• Liberalism and Ubuntu: Better Together
• What’s Behind Liberalism’s Unseemly Attack On Ubuntu?
• Meer as Blote Pietersielie

The three schools

Essentially all the various replies can be divided into three schools of thought:

• Those that believe Ubuntu is accompanied by a full and comprehensive explanation of its meaning and purpose; that it is a liberal idea in nature; and that it is an important and necessary addition to democracy and liberal thought, constituting a valid political philosophy and universally applicable moral code.

• Those that are hesitant about Ubuntu; who believe it is ill-defined and potentially problematic, but who think it can be interpreted or re-interpreted in a liberal fashion and, in this way, constitutes a good and necessary thing in the manner described above. If not, then it represents no threat, merely a harmless anecdote.

• Those who believe Ubuntu suffers no coherent definition, which renders it meaningless or all-meaning, both equally problematic; that what general understanding can be discerned about the idea, especially in a nationalistic environment, represents a threat to freedom and, thus, that it cannot be reconciled with liberal thought.

The problems inherent to each school

The first two groups suggested the DA’s liberalism can and should accommodate the idea of Ubuntu, the third argues otherwise.

The first group is generally the weakest, and offered no real defense at all, merely a reconstitution of the problem. As a definition, they simply rehashed the vague – ‘you are you are through other people’ – sentiment, and made no attempt to apply the idea to any philosophical test (in other words, how and why it might constitute a moral code). In turn, they failed to examine in detail anything more than the platitude itself, or to interrogate its practical implications.

They could not, for example, tell you what Ubuntu’s position on abortion or freedom of speech is (no doubt because it is simply not possible), rather they pretended it enjoys the same veracity as any other philosophy by citing generalities about its good intentions. Significantly, they ignored the prevalent nationalist culture that defines the South African context, as if the idea is entirely unrelated to it. Read any piece by this group and, sure enough, you shall not encounter the word nationalism anywhere.

The second group is the most politically correct. They desperately want to reconcile Ubuntu and liberalism for fear of causing offence if they cannot and a desire to seem open to and accepting of African culture by doing so. The biggest threat to such people is being labeled ‘Eurocentric’ and so they diluted the integrity of their analysis to an acceptable middle way in response, thereby compromising its veracity. They used the vagueness of the idea to their advantage and confused liberal thought with the nature of a liberal society.

In short, they argued: liberalism allows for many contrasting ideas to flourish, so if you speak out against Ubuntu you are being illiberal. Instead, it should be respected and accommodated as an idea.

Of course a liberal society does indeed allows space for different ideas to coexist, that is its great virtue; liberal thought, however, does not. If it did, it would simply be a mish-mash of all worldviews from socialism through fascism. In truth, liberal ideas and principles are well defined and you can quite rightly argue what is a liberal idea and what is not.

Some people in this group went further still and argued that the DA’s liberalism is itself liberal. In other words, they suggested the party’s ideology is a fluid, heady mix of all-encompassing romantic idealism (even nationalism). No doubt that is a comforting thought for the fragile soul. It’s not true though. The DA’s liberalism has clear, principled boundaries that define its nature. Anyone in doubt should attend a DA Young Leaders’ course, or perhaps get the reading pack. One can debate no-end how those principles are best applied in practice, in theory though they are well set.

This group also ignored the nationalist context responsible for the idea’s prominence and assumed everyone’s first inclination was to interpret it from a liberal perspective, as opposed to from a collectivist view; the latter being the dominant ideological and culture impulse in South Africa. In doing so they failed to see how patronising their assumption: that African culture has invented a great liberal tradition, only us African liberals need to explain to them how it works, so it doesn’t become a messy, nationalist threat. Mbeki, for one, would tell them to take their condescension elsewhere.

Noticeably, many people from this group are not originally from the DA and so are threatened by any definition of liberalism that is too prescriptive. They wish to believe its parameters far more porous, thereby legitimating Ubuntu and their own ideological uncertainty.

The third group represents my view and, as I have set it out in some detail elsewhere, I shall not repeat it here.

By way of introspection, I will say this: this position does suffer the problem of the idea not being well defined. Interpreted merely as an observation, with no philosophical consequences, it is axiomatic that we are indeed social creatures that live in and are influenced by society. That is an entirely inoffensive position. However, if one argues this influence defining and inescapable or the idea represents a moral code of some sort and should thus be applied to policy and practice, indeed that it constitutes a component of ‘African’ identity, it immediately transforms into a threat to individual liberty, which is where my concern lies.

Some general concerns

Many of the responses, unable to muster a strong intellectual argument, resorted to ad hominem attack, which ranged from the bizarre to the desperate. One such attack went so far as to suggest I was threatening physical violence and bloodshed by defining the DA’s liberalism. This is lamentable, a petty attempt at pettifoggery.

There are some traits particular to all responses.

For one, the suggestion that the DA’s brand of liberalism was somehow ill-defined and open to interpretation. It is telling that not a single response made reference to the DA’s constitution, which actually sets out very clearly its general philosophical approach. This suggests to me either those people who responded had not read the DA’s constitution or simply assumed the party’s fundamentals were there to be reinterpreted as they saw fit, a rather egotistical attitude.

Indeed, the DA’s own constitution is very helpful on this subject. It contains the following “founding political principle”:

That the party will defend and promote the “…rights of individuals and the communities they create through free association”.

For the DA the individual is primary and the communities “they create”, as a consequence of their associations, secondary.

The DA’s constitution does not mention Ubuntu, nor does it suggest communities and groups are primary – in other words, that we each are a product of some communal force that precedes us. For the DA the agent is the individual, not the community. Ubuntu, of course, suggests an equal relationship; if not, that the group is elevated above the individual.

The DA’s position is in contrast to other political parties. The IFP’s constitution, for example, opens with the following:

“EMBRACING the principles of African humanism otherwise known as Ubuntu…”

One should always be careful of any description that qualifies a principle with a geographic tag. What, you might ask, is the difference between ‘African’ humanism and humanism itself? Just as one might ask, what is the difference between Ubuntu and compassion? (Another question no one addressed: interpreted ‘liberally’, what value or principle does Ubuntu encapsulate that our Bill of Human Rights does not?) But I digress. The point is: the DA’s constitution contains no such commitment. No one seemed to ask why that is. It’s because the DA is not the IFP.

Now, it is common cause that there exist other variations of liberalism throughout the world and one can pontificate about them to one’s heart’s content but the DA’s particular, liberal philosophical framework is well defined. And it is that framework one must engage with if you want to determine whether the idea is compatible with its liberalism or not – for the DA was the subject of my criticism.

A second general oversight was the failure to acknowledge or engage with the document I cited at the end of my critique: a piece by Ryan Coetzee in which he sets out in some detail a powerful liberal response, from a DA perspective, to the problem at hand. That article speaks to the need for compassion for one’s fellow man, acknowledges that communities are a powerful way through which people self-identify – South Africans in particular – and that the dignity of self-worth is an idea well grounded and expounded upon by liberal thought and not the soul vestige of collectivists.

In short, it appears to me a solution to the problem – a description of the relationship between the group and the individual and where the boundaries between the two lie, without any reference to Ubuntu but warning against the problems inherent to this kind of group think.

Indeed, Coetzee’s piece deals with another non-point made by a few: the suggestion that Ubuntu is a form of social liberalism and I was representing some kind of dogmatic classical, economic liberalism from the 1900s. This view, not to put too fine a point on it, is pretentious nonsense. First, if it is your view that Ubuntu is responsible for uncovering some great, as yet unknown truth – that we are not atomised individuals but social beings – well, the Greeks had that covered. Liberalism today, in almost all of its mainstream forms (bar perhaps the cold work of Ayn Rand) takes that for granted. So well done for stating the obvious. Even at its most ‘liberal’, Ubuntu offers nothing new there. Second, and more to the point, you cannot conveniently detach Ubuntu from African nationalism: Ubuntu  is an expression of African nationalism, not social liberalism. To argue otherwise is ignorant.

Coetzee’s piece, which dealt with all of this, seemed to most people to be an annoyance, best ignored rather than engaged with for fear it might interfere with their posturing.

So, why the need for any debate on Ubuntu at all when the answer is so well defined?

I am under the impression, and based on most of those responses received, that for many this was an exercise in political correctness and reputation management: a chance to demonstrate their patriotism and the degree to which they truly are ‘African’ liberals, non-judgmental and blindly accepting of whatever ‘African’ cultural practice enjoys hegemonic legitimacy. That is a rather sad state of affairs and suggests dependent rather than independent minds.

The test of a political philosophy

What are the tests a political philosophy must pass, to register as a coherent ideology? I believe the following applies:

• First, it must serve as a moral code. It must be able to tell one how best to lead the good life; not in abstract, but in particular. In other words, based on its principles, it must be able to provide you with a moral position on practical circumstance. Ubuntu fails fundamentally this test. Liberalism passes. Should we allow pornography? I can give you a liberal response. What is the Ubuntu response, I wonder?

• Second, and following on from the above, it must necessitate a set of accompanying principles that reflect its core belief. Liberalism has such principles: freedom of speech, curtailed by the harm principle; a small state, defined by a free market economy; maximum choice and opportunity; the protection of civil liberties, a separation of powers, and so on. Again, Ubuntu fails this test. Indeed, its vague, general nature means even its primary belief is difficult to define precisely. But you can be sure, the community, not the individual, would be at its centre.

• Third, it must stand up to scrutiny – conjecture and refutation. Ubuntu falls at this hurdle too. The very fact that its core premise is so ill-defined means it cannot actually be scrutinized, and so it can never fail. That it generates so many disparate definitions, legal, social, political, cultural, even spiritual proves not disproves my point.

No doubt there are other tests, these represent some of the more fundamental ones and Ubuntu fails each one fundamentally.

Nationalism: the core problem

So, what of the Ubuntu we can define?

For one, we know it exists in a certain context. African culture in general and South African culture in particular is a nationalist one – it has at its heart group identity, in various different guises (race through ethnicity). The suggestion that the idea of Ubuntu was born of some hidden liberal impulse, divorced from this reality is absurd; and to ignore it is shortsighted. Were those who argued this way simply hoping to wish nationalism away? To pretend it didn’t exist, that this might free them of some harsh judgement? It is real, its influence pervasive and its effect illiberal. It is the bedrock on which Ubuntu rests.

Here is the key point: Ubuntu, whatever its true nature, serves a racial nationalist agenda, not a social liberal or social democratic one. To suggest otherwise is, ironically, to see the African context through a ‘European’ lens. True, this is a pragmatic point but it cannot be separated from an understanding of the idea. If anything, it should constitute the first principles basis from which any attempt at understanding is made.

Did it not occur to anyone as odd that Ubuntu is inevitably and almost always accompanied by the idea of ‘Africaness’ and what it is to be ‘African’? (Another point almost no one addressed.) The two concepts are joined at the hip – to be African is to embrace Ubuntu. But what is an ‘African’? It is circular logic at its best – a fixed identity determines a fixed attitude, which determines a fixed identity. But that is clearly another, politically incorrect dilemma any full retort must address thus best ignored for the sake of expediency. And so few interrogated what it is to be an ‘African’, its relationship to Ubuntu, and the consequences for liberalism.

Ubuntu: an illiberal and collectivist idea

On a principled level, from what one is able to determine about the idea, it has inherent to it a majoritarian impulse, regardless of its context: that individuals are inextricably dependent on and shaped by the community in which they reside. There is some truth to this. But it is not a defining truth. It is case specific: Some people rebel against a community and its norms and standards; others start new communities; others change the norms and standards of the community; others still seek out solitude. Group identity is a choice, as the DA’s constitution makes clear.

Put simply, there are many people who are who they are in spite of other people, not because of them.

Liberalism caters for that, Ubuntu does not.

I have recently finished reading ‘Man’s Search for Meaning’, a quite excellent if not harrowing account of Holocaust survivor Viktor E. Frankl’s experience in Nazi Germany’s various concentration camps. In it, Frankl writes:

“…do the prisoner’s reactions to the singular world of the concentration camp prove that man cannot escape the influences of surroundings? Does man have no choice of action in such circumstances? We can answer these questions from experience as well as on principle. The experiences of camp life show us that man does have a choice of action. There were enough examples, often of heroic nature, which proved that apathy could be overcome, irritability suppressed. Man can preserve a vestige of spiritual freedom, of independence of mind, even in such terrible conditions of physic and physical stress.”

Central to his defense of man’s inner freedom is that, always, we have choice:

“…there are always choices to make. Every day, every hour, offered the opportunity to make a decision, a decision which determined whether you would or would not submit to those powers that threaten to rob you of your very self, your inner freedom; which determined whether or not you would become the play thing of circumstance…”

We can make always decisions, however limited; always we can choose.

Choice: the final test

A final test worth applying to Ubuntu, then, is its effect on choice – does it maximize choice, as liberalism demands, or does it constrain it, as nationalism seeks to do? How does the sentiment ‘you are who you are through other people’ maximize choice? And the idea that you are ‘unAfrican’ if you reject it? It appears determining to me: a description of the definitive effect of a certain set of communal values.

And here one must distinguish influence from prescription. Ubuntu does not suggest that communities have an influence on you, which you can choose to accept or reject; it suggests communities are defining, that your environment determines your character. That sentiment is anathema to choice.

Individuals create communities. Communities influence individuals, but the agent is the individual, not the community. And the minute you subvert that, or raise both factors to an equal footing, you subvert liberal thought and, I would argue, the truth.

To those that might argue that I am an individual because of others, well, you can’t have your cake and eat it. Either you are an agent, with free will, able to determine your own identity, or you are a victim of circumstance. And saying my choices are informed by my context is only to elevate the same dichotomy one level up. Either they are your choices or they are not. Informing a choice is merely to influence it, it is not to determine it.

So take solace all you fragile ideological souls, you needn’t damn communities and communal values as irrelevant. Ubuntu and liberalism are not mutually exclusive in that way. Your politically correct status can remain in tact. Only they are ours to control, not to be controlled by.

Conclusion

Ubuntu holds powerful emotional sway over those eager to legitimate all cultural practices but rationally it is supported by little more than hot air. It might be politically palatable and unthreatening to cower in the face of a nationalist culture that says otherwise, the fact of the matter is that the DA in particular and liberal thought in general advocates otherwise or, at least, it should.

If the DA wants to change its “fundamental liberal ideals”, as one response suggested, go right ahead but then it must discard any pretense it is liberal and be open and upfront about its intentions. Recently it has started wooing nationalism’s affections by flattering its ideas – sometimes out of ignorance, sometimes purposefully; without some introspection and honesty soon enough it will be in love.

• Gareth van Onselen (@GvanOnselen) is the Editor of Inside Politics (@insidepols), Winner: Best Political Blog 2012.

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SERIES:

On originality

By: Gareth van Onselen
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16 April 2013

Few gifts are greater than originality. To conceive of something new is to add to human knowledge and what could be more wonderous? Whatever the quality of that contribution, there is something marvelous about the discovery: that, out of nothing, now there is something; hence the euphemism, ‘creativity’.

That characteristic alone necessitates further curiosity; for a new idea must be assessed, its strengths and weaknesses interrogated and, should it suggest some further consequence, an enquiring mind will seek to explore that possibility too.

This – the possibility inherent to discovery – is responsible for the excitement originality generates. That is both enlivening and captivating for anyone interested in ideas. So originality is a catalyst, self-replicating and thus the spark capable of igniting a powerful intellectual current. It is the result of curiosity, the force behind creativity and impulse that drives discovery.

Originality has a penetrating affect on conventional wisdom, breaking it up as a jackhammer might crack open a pavement and reconstituting it in some new fashion. Other times, it can reveal an entirely different universe, wholly unrelated to accepted thought. This is perhaps originality at its most powerful, rare and exceptional; in turn, at its most majestic. It is one thing to offer a new insight into an existing paradigm, quite another to provide the world with an original frame of reference. The greatest thinkers have done this and for that reason their works stands out like beacon in the dark.

There exists a platitude: genius is 1% inspiration, 99% perspiration. It misrepresents originality. Remove originality from that equation and all you are left with is hard work, and that is easily replicated. Remove hard work, however, and you are left with originality – even if only a drop in the ocean, the unique difference, capable of transforming dedication into invention, and so a different unit of measurement should apply.

Originality is a rare talent indeed, and a more precious commodity you will struggle to find.

An abbreviated version of this column first appeared in the Business Day. For more columns from The Thing About series, click here.

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FEATURE:

Dealing with apartheid’s legacy: The Lee/Manuel correspondence

By: Gareth van Onselen
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14 April 2013

Apartheid and its effect on South Africa today is currently the subject of much debate after Minister in the Presidency, Trevor Manuel, suggested blaming it was no longer a valid excuse for poor delivery. In turn, he was rebuked by President Zuma, who said its legacy is still a legitimate hindrance to service delivery. As it so happens, it is a false choice: some things are legitimately still retarded by apartheid’s effect, others are not (attitudes for one). Nevertheless, one area where Manuel has been outspoken in the past about defending current practice to overcome past injustice is quotas in sport.

In 2005, Manuel entered into an exchange with Donald Lee (DA Member of Parliament and the party’s sports spokesperson). It started when Manuel took exception to a Lee speech in the house, suggesting quotas were unnecessary and, rather, that the ANC government should focus on development at a foundational level, to overcome disparities in opportunity. In the subsequent exchange, Manuel argued quotas necessary, Lee that they were not (and that they undermined the dignity of professional sportspeople – black and white – regardless).

So, perhaps one question worth putting to Manuel – who once declared his support for New Zealand’s rugby team as he could not relate to the demographics of the South African national squad – is whether or not he still believes quotas are necessary. It would be an interesting question. Rugby and cricket, so far as our national sports administrators are concerned, have not yet sufficiently ‘transformed’ but the ANC government has had 20 years to introduce a foundational development system which might overcome this (the DA’s sports policy is an example example of how this might be done).

Does Manuel no longer believe apartheid a valid excuse for quotas in sport? Is he satisfied with the make-up of our national teams? Does he believe the ANC should abandon quotas as it has failed to make them work and resort, rather, to grass-roots development as the DA suggests? I wonder what his position is?

What follows below is the correspondence, in chronological order.

In each case I have uploaded a PDF copy of the original speech/letters, click on the description to read it. Here they are:

• 1. Speech: Donald Lee MP – State of the Nation Debate – 15 February 2005
• 2. Letter: Trevor Manuel MP – 16 February 2005
• 3. Letter: Donald Lee MP – 18 February 2005
• 4. Letter: Trevor Manuel MP – 10 March 2005
• 5. Letter: Donald Lee MP – 18 March 2005

Related Posts:
• The selective moral outrage of Trevor Manuel
• Absolute South Africa

• Gareth van Onselen (@GvanOnselen) is the Editor of Inside Politics (@insidepols), Winner: Best Political Blog 2012.

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SERIES:

On wisdom

By: Gareth van Onselen
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14 April 2013

Wisdom, a relatively complex idea, enjoys an overly-simple reputation.

Often we are told there is much wisdom in a platitude or cliché, and it is eagerly promoted by those who believe its ostensible profundity says as much about them as it does the idea itself. That is: that such people are seemingly wise themselves because they recognise wise things – ‘wisdom’ by association.

But a cliché rarely contains inherent wisdom. Its great trick – that it appears universally applicable – masks its great weakness – that its worth is only ever particular to a specific circumstance. Thus, by advocating for one in an absolute fashion, as if it constitutes some fundamental and common truth, ironically, one often reveals little more than ignorance as to the ambiguity and difference that defines the human condition.

Wisdom is the product of three things: experience (and so it usually come with time and age); knowledge (understanding and insight); and, importantly, judgement (the sound application of experience and knowledge to circumstance).

Each element on its own, although valuable, does not constitute wisdom. It might be wise to cross the road today; tomorrow it might be equally unwise. And so, if anything, wisdom is a rational response to uncertainty: an ability to distinguish one moment from another and to use precedent and understanding to plot the best course of action in response to different conditions.

There is a risk, then, that wisdom lends itself to pragmatic, as opposed to principled decisions; for self-interest is often pursued as the ultimate good. And so what constitutes the collective wisdom of the day is well worth interrogating; and to what degree each of these three component parts are emphasised, worth some serious consideration.

Knowledge without experience engenders understanding devoid of compassion; experience without knowledge encourages conviction without principle; and experience and knowledge without judgement provokes expediency, at the expense of any noble vision or purpose.

The line between wisdom and moralising is a fine one indeed, beware those that walk it.

An abbreviated version of this column first appeared in the Business Day. For more columns from The Thing About series, click here.

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SERIES:

On vision

By: Gareth van Onselen
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12 April 2013

Any leader must have a vision. Ideally, it is on that basis they are elected to public office and by that standard their decisions and actions are gauged. Thus, being able to articulate their purpose, clearly and cogently, is an essential requirement of their profession.

If they are a great leader, as opposed to a good one, they will be able to convey their vision in an inspiring manner too; for it is one thing to set out and describe one’s goals, quite another to motivate and unite others behind them.

That is not to suggest that a vision itself cannot be inspiring. Any objective, the purpose of which is betterment, should be a source of encouragement. But such noble intent is often lost in the details; formal action is pragmatic and mundane, ideals and principles are what breathe life into rhetoric – the aspirational lifeblood of any visionary commitment.

And so one can often tell much about a leader by the manner in which they speak. Those leaders without a vision are dull and dreary, their offer defined by vague blandness, jargon or ‘facts’ – free-floating and never anchored to design or resolve. Those leaders with a vision understand that every undertaking must illustrate and embolden a common purpose and set concrete proposals against the backdrop of those principles and values that underpin them, so that an audience might appreciate the greater good they aspire to achieve.

Few things are better able to motivate for change than an inspiring vision; properly relayed it can have a powerful effect on people who, for the most part, look for a reason to do good, to grow and prosper.

Unfortunately, in the other direction, few things can quicker stall or retard progress than an environment defined by a lack of direction or purpose.

And it says much too, about any audience unable to distinguish the one from the other.

An abbreviated version of this column first appeared in the Business Day. For more columns from The Thing About series, click here.

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FEATURE:

Is Marius Fransman a flight risk?

By: Gareth van Onselen
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11 April 2013

Here is a short but simple story that raises a number of important questions. It concerns the ANC leader in the Western Cape, Marius Fransman, and his commitment to the party.

Fransman has recently been in the news, advocating for an army of ANC volunteers to help the divided and largely ineffective party in the province take back control of the legislature in 2014. It’s part of the ANC’s turnaround strategy to take back the Western Cape, an attempt to address years of infighting, a lack of direction and a generally lackluster performance.

In doing so, he was quoted as saying: “We want to kill the DA, not violently, but [by] mobilising people”.

Them’s fighting words! But there is a certain hypocrisy to Fransman leading the charge. According the Wikileaks cable below (the original can be found here) Fransman was all but set to abandon the party for COPE ahead of the last election, and only agreed to stay with the ANC after Chris Nissen, former ANC provincial leader, intervened and convinced him to stay. The cable suggests some other prominent Western Cape ANC types – former Premier Ebrahim Rasool for example – were likewise on the verge of leaving.

So, is he really the right man to be leading the ANC into “war”?

The cable, from the US consulate in Cape Town to Washington, was based on a meeting with Nissen, who set out how and why the ANC lost the Western Cape in 2009. Aside from the Fransman information, it is worth reading regardless, as an insight into the volatile condition the party is in; at least, of how ineffectual their strategy was.

The consulate had no reason to misrepresent Nissen, the cables were designed to send the best possible information to Washington (there would be no point to the US deluding itself) and, at the time, it was not known they would ever appear publicly.

So the question one is inevitably forced to ask is: how committed exactly is Marius Fransman to the ANC? Clearly, when times are tough, he is ready to abandon ship. Is this the right person to be leading the party when his own commitment to it appears so fragile?

Likewise, in an age of perks and privilege, one must ask whether anything was offered to Fransman for him to stay. Sure enough, soon after the election, he was elected leader. If support for him in that position was offered as an incentive, then it is all the more damning, for he would have accepted on the basis of power, not principle.

The cable has been put to Fransman before, in September 2011 by the Weekend Argus, but his response then was merely to say the ANC did not comment on internal matters and to suggest it was “information peddling” (the confidential nature of the cable, however, absolutely disproves any suggestion that it was). Perhaps more tellingly, Chris Nissen could not be reached for comment.

It might be well worth putting these questions to Fransman again. One would think all those delegates who voted for him deserved to know he stands on shaky ideological ground. Was his support for COPE disclosed to the ANC members in the province before they voted? Or were they kept in the dark? Surely this important piece of information is something they should have been made aware of, before they made their decision?

Certainly those volunteers who put their faith in the man should know.

Here follows the cable:

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 CAPE TOWN 000111

SIPDIS

STATE FOR AF/S FOR RMARBURG AND MJAMES
PRETORIA PLS PASS TO AMCONSUL JOHANNESBURG

E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/14/2019
SUBJECT: WHY THE ANC LOST THE WESTERN CAPE

(C) Summary. On May 14, Poloff met with Chris Nissen,
who spearheaded the ANC,s political campaign in the Western
Cape. Nissen discussed the ANC,s failure to win the Western
Cape in the recent April 22 elections as well as the ANC,s
plans for the future in both the City of Cape Town and the
Province. Although the ANC,s Western Cape office is
theoretically spearheaded by Mcebisi Skwatsha, the National
Executive Committee (NEC) is not happy with Skwatsha and
therefore asked Nissen to step in and run the election
campaign. Nissen, who is the Executive Chairman of
Boschendal Winery, holds no official role in the ANC, but has
been a party stalwart for many years. Boschendal gave him
four months of paid leave to run the ANC,s campaign. Nissen
said the ANC has never been hit so hard by factionism and
that the ANC has gone down because of it. He also said the
ANC lost most of its people to COPE in the Western Cape. End
summary.

(C) Nissen said that most of the ANC members in the
Western Cape who defected to COPE had legitimate reasons for
leaving the ANC, namely their dislike of Skwatsha and the
damage he has done to the party in the Western Cape. All
branch executive committee leaders in the Western Cape left
for COPE, &which left the ANC totally dysfunctional in the
Province.8 Richard Dunkie, Terror Lekota, Marius Fransmann
and Ibrahim Rasool were all about to jump ship to COPE, until
Nissen intervened. In January, Nissen approached each of
these men and asked them not to leave the ANC. Nissen had
the full support of the ANC,s NEC including Gwede Mantashe,
the ANC Secretary General, but did not have the support of
the ANC in the Western Cape. When he took over the election
campaign in January, the polls showed 18 percent support for
the ANC in the Western Cape. However, Nissen worked hard to
bring back people to the ANC and he was able to increase the
percentage of the vote to 32 percent on election day.

(C) Nissen said the ANC,s biggest mistake was &it
didn,t keep its eye on the ball with regards to the
Democratic Alliance (DA).8 One predominantly colored area
in the Western Cape, Mitchell,s Plain, didn,t have a single
functioning branch so how could the ANC be expected to win,
said Nissen. Nissen continued by saying there were 50,000
voters in the Western Cape who voted for the ANC nationally,
but not in the Province. He continued by saying there were
20,000 spoiled ballots in the Western Cape and if the ANC had
gotten those 70,000 votes the ANC would have deprived the DA
of winning more than 50 percent of the vote and wining the
Province.

( C) Nissen asked the NEC to remove Skwatsha from office
and asked that the Provincial Executive Committee in the
Western Cape also be dissolved. He believes the NEC will
follow his recommendation. If so, there will be an interim
committee, which will work towards building more branches
since there are currently very few branches in the Western
Cape. Nissen continues to work to try and bring people back
to the ANC from COPE and said the ANC will welcome them back.

(C ) When asked about the relationship between the DA
which leads the Western Cape government and the ANC that
leads the National government, Nissen said it will be a
&competitive/love-hate relationship.8 He does not think
there will be violence, but said people could rise up in the
townships if they don,t get service delivery and the DA
Qtownships if they don,t get service delivery and the DA
would likely blame it on the ANC saying they are not
receiving enough money from the National government. Nissen
added that &Premier Helen Zille was completely out of line
regarding her recent comments about Zuma being a womanizer,
but also said Malema (the head of the ANC Youth League) is a
loose cannon, although Malema has done good things (for the
ANC) in the poor communities.8

(C ) After the elections Nissen drafted a comprehensive
report to the NEC entitled &Building a platform for the 2011
local government elections.8 In his report, he explains
that the colored communities do lack hope for the future and
he argues that the DA instills fear in these communities
against the ANC. (Note: In a similar vein, the ANC campaign
in the Wetern Cape accused Zille of wanting to return South
Africa to white minority rule. End Note) He reasons the
colored people don,t feel black enough to receive the
benefits of what the ANC has to offer, such as receiving a
job, and the ANC failed in its duty to instill hope in these
communities. Nissen said he would volunteer to work on the
2011 elections. He also said he knows he can have a prominent
position within government if he wants it, but it would be a
hard decision to make since he would have to give up his job
with Boschendal.

CAPE TOWN 00000111 002 OF 002

MAYBERRY

• Gareth van Onselen (@GvanOnselen) is the Editor of Inside Politics (@insidepols), Winner: Best Political Blog 2012.

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