Like a pack of hyenas smelling blood, there is a crowd out there who will do anything to hunt down Cyril Ramaphosa and destroy him and what he stands for. They are aggressive, disingenuous and hypocritical. At worst of all, many of them are from within the ANC, spurring a vicious factional battle.
Cyril Ramaphosa, South Africa’s president, came to power promising to crack down on corruption and setting the country on a new path of growth, the so called “new dawn”. This after nine wasted years under the previous president Zuma, who’s only notable achievement was how long he could stay out of the courts while 700+ charges against him were tangled up in the court system. Besides that, the period was marked by the amount of money that flowed into fraudulent schemes. The beneficiaries were routine passengers of the gravy train, like the Guptas, and reputable international companies such as McKenzie, SAP, Bain, KPMG, Hitachi and China South Rail. Billions of Rands were stolen, which could have been spent on education, health, infrastructure, security and helping the poor.
Ramaphosa vowed to crack down hard on corruption and mismanagement, encourage investments into public-private partnerships and bring down the disastrous unemployment rate. The expectations were high, so were the leading indicators. But the reality of health of the economy paints a grim picture. The business confidence is sinking again, the economy is close to its second recession in two years and unemployment is edging even higher. Cape Town is now known for the extremely high murder rates (thanks to its gang wars) and the army is now patrolling the streets of the Cape Flats, something they haven’t had to do since the early 90’s. Tourists are staying away which in turn is playing havoc in the housing market (due to the high amount of Airbnb’s staying empty).
The president’s biggest battle will surely be Eskom (the monopolistic electricity supplier). In its current state, it is a ticking timebomb for the fiscal stability of South Africa. Eskom charges almost three times as much for electricity as they did ten years ago and sell less. Currently they are not able to cover their operating costs and interest expenses. They are overstaffed by as much as 30% and their new power stations are being built behind schedule, over budget and are plagued with design flaws. It is a fiscal sinkhole, that could drag the whole of South Africa down. The government needs to take bold and decisive actions, which will set them up on a collision course with the powerful trade unions. This should be Ramaphosa’s Thatcher moment, where he takes a firm stand against the Unions who continuously demand higher than inflation wage increases, even if it means that more people will have to lose their jobs for the companies to stay competitive.
Ramaphosa needs a strong backing to drag South Africa out of this mess, but some of his own comrades have got nothing better to do than being treacherous and backstabbing. Ace Magashule , the ANC general secretary reads out press statements that differ from those agreed to by the leadership, and he takes every opportunity to incentivize disruption among their own ranks. This suits Malema, who is the commander in chief of the fascist EFF, the third largest political party. The Public Protector, who was found by the Constitutional Court to have lied under oath and acted in bad faith, wastes no time to find any possible reason to file a charge against anybody involved with fighting state capture. Gordhan was charged with a bogus offence that has been twice dismissed by the courts, Ramaphosa is charged with lying about a donation (even though he immediately corrected the mistake) and money laundering, which is outside her jurisdiction. No wonder Gordhan said at a conference I attended last year that the fightback against the state capture will be one of the hardest battles he has ever fought.
We are at a crossroad now. Either South Africans stand behind Ramaphosa, support his strategy to clean up the government, prosecute those involved in state capture and focus on getting the economy more competitive again. In that case, South Africa will have a bright future, with many opportunities. Or the hyenas win, in which case there will be a lot more carnage, think of Venezuela and Zimbabwe. The costs will be too high to contemplate, the hardship too sorrow to handle.
Many South Africans have decided not to wait until the battle is decided. Emigrations are at all-time highs, and it would be negligent not to at least think about a Plan B. Ramaphosa currently is the best option South Africa has, and should enjoy a strong backing by everybody, no matter which party you voted for. If he and his team don’t win the battle, we are going to lose our country.
Is Alan Paton right when he said: “Cry, the beloved country, for the unborn child that is the inheritor of our fear. Let him not love the earth too deeply. Let him not laugh too gladly when the water runs through his fingers, nor stand too silent when the setting sun makes red the veld with fire. Let him not be too moved when the birds of his land are singing, nor give too much of his heart to a mountain or a valley. For fear will rob him of all if he gives too much.”