First Drafts: South African History in the Making

8/6/2019 First Drafts: South African History in the Making

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FIRST DRAFTS


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To my wie

Jenny Gandar


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Jonathan Ball PuBlishers

JohannesBurG & CaPe toWn

ALLISTER SPARKS

FIRST DRAFTSs afc y mkg


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All rights reserved.

No part o this publication may be reproduced or transmitted,

in any orm or by any means,

without prior permission rom the publisher or copyright holder.

Allister Sparks, 2009

The original date o publication is at the start o each column.

Published in trade paperback in 2009 by

JONATHAN BALL PUBLISHERS (PTY) LTD

PO Box 33977

Jeppestown

2043

ISBN 978-1-86842-374-3

Design and reproduction o text by

Triple M Design, Johannesburg

Cover design by Michiel Botha, Cape Town

Printed and bound by CTP Book Printers, Cape


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C

List o abbreviations ix

Acknowledgements x

Introduction xi

A generational change rom struggle to delivery 1

A three-in-one revolution 7

SADC leaders must pin Mugabe down 14

9/11 and the countdown to war 18

Yes, there was an exit plan or Mugabe 21

Swit death o a once invincible orce 24

In a turbulent world, SA looks like a haven 28Zimbabwe the crisis without end 31

New dialectic o the post-Cold War world 35

How to get the poor into the economy 39

Warning: Youre ignoring the rules o damage control 43

Israel through South Arican eyes 47

Looking back on the rst decade o democracy 51

And looking ahead 56

The Arms Deal and politics o the back alley 62Zim out o Commonwealth indenitely 66

The capture o Saddam Hussein 69

Mugabe turns on white struggle heroes 73

A shameul act o political expediency 77

Perverse hypocrisy o the hanging Christians 81

Mbeki sets his sights high 85

The passing o a saint 89

Devastating report on Iraqs weapons 93The start o a legal saga 96

Zim insult will sharpen alliance tensions 98

A squeaky win, but Bush returns with increased power 101

Watching Americas long rightward swing 105


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Beginning o the end or Tony Blair 109

Mbekis plan to help the poor 113

Shaik guilty - and a grave crisis or Mbeki 117

Mbeki replaces Zuma with stop-gap deputy 122

A surreal world o terror 125

The let fexes its muscles 129

Mbeki hits back as ANC crisis worsens 133

An unbreakable deadlock 135

The dangers o populism 137

Power vacuum as the smear campaign worsens 141

Rape charge means the end o Zuma 145Hamas victory shows West out o touch 147

Iran the big winner o Bushs war 151

New name or major new growth strategy 155

The growing crisis o our Big Nine cities 158

Zuma acquitted o rape, but stigma stays 163

Meeting with the leaders o Hamas 167

Then to Israel 171

Then to compare with SA 175A struggle or the elusive soul o the ANC 179

Political realignment looms or SA 183

The mother o all messes 186

Up next a helluva year 190

The revenge killing o Saddam Hussein 194

The rot that is corroding the ANC 198

Seeking causes o the high crime rate 202

An election without the electorate 206Mugabe begins election rigging campaign 210

Opportunity or DA to breach its white ceiling 214

When is oreign intervention justied? 218

New twist to the Mideast crisis 222

A preliminary bout in the big power struggle 226

Mbekis nal blunder 230

I hes innocent, why doesnt he clear his name? 233

Celebrating the liberal fag-bearer 237Mbeki heading or deeat 241

Eskom crisis exposes ineciency 247

A crime against the crime ghters 251

How Mugabe bilked his way out o deeat 255


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viii I RS T DRA T S v i i i

Tsvangirai withdraws 258

SABC a snake-pit o action ghting 261

A civil war among the desperate 265

Americas candidate o change 269

Dening moment in the Zuma saga 273

Mugabes blackmail deal 277

Judge throws out Zuma charges 281

Humiliated Mbeki leaves graceully 283

Manuel resigns, then returns 287

irst hint o a new party 290

End o the ree market theology 294The second transition 298

A multicultural leader or the global village 305

The age o the serialised scandal 309

COPE makes a great start 313

Brutal Gaza war brings only negatives 318

The truths Israel wont ace 324

Lavish promises as recession looms 328

Appeal Court trashes Zuma case withdrawal 332Man with a massive mission 336

COPE shoots itsel in the oot 340

Zim generals trying to scuttle deal 343

Changing dynamics in the Middle East 348

Zuma charges withdrawn 352

Now hes our OJ Simpson 355

A careully balanced Zuma Cabinet 359

Election shows deep rit in Iran 363Lie beyond the social engineers 367

Taking responsibility or our ailures 371

Obscene symbolism in hard times 375

The whitewashing o Judge Hlope 378

The Zuma era its problems and prospects 382

Index 393


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i x

l f bbv

AIDS Acquired Immune Deciency Syndrome

ANC Arican National Congress

ASGISA Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative o South Arica

AU Arican UnionBOSS Bureau o State Security

CHOGM Commonwealth Heads o Government meeting

COPE Congress o the People

COSATU Congress o South Arican Trade Unions

DA Democratic Alliance

GEAR Growth, Employment and Redistribution policy

ICASA Independent Communications Authority

JIPSA Joint Initiative or Priority Skills Acquisition JOC Joint Operations Command [Zimbabwe]

JOMIC SADCs Joint Monitoring and Implementation Committee

MDC Movement or Democratic Change

Mercosur Common Market o South America

MERG Macro-Economic Research Group

NATA North American ree Trade Agreement

NEPAD New Partnership or Aricas Development

NPA National Prosecuting AuthorityPA Palestinian Authority

PLO Palestinian Liberation Organisation

SACN South Arican Cities Network

SACP South Arican Communist Party

SADC Southern Arican Development Community

SASCO South Arican Students Congress

SEATO South East Asia Treaty Organisation

SCOPA Standing Committee on Public AccountsUD United Democratic ront

URP United Rhodesia Party

ZCTU Zimbabwe Congress o Trade Unions

ZEC Zimbabwe Electoral Commission


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x

ackwdgm

My thanks rst o all to the newspapers The Star, Business Day, Cape

Times, The Witness, Daily Dispatch and Pretoria News as well as to the in-

vestment houses Standard Securities, Andisa Securities, Standard Bankand Noah Investment Solutions or whom I have written at various

times over these past ten years, or giving me the opportunity to stay

close to events as they unolded during this ascinating new phase in

the building o a new democracy rom the dreadul past o apartheid. It

has been an enriching new chapter in my long career as a journalist and

political analyst.

My thanks especially to my publisher, Jonathan Ball, or having the

courage and imagination to respond to an eccentric idea and or gettingthis project under way. Also to publishing director Jeremy Boraine or

helping to resolve a lot o structural conusion at the outset and giving

shape to the idea; to rances Perryer or helping with initial selections

rom a daunting pile o paper; and to my step-daughter, Collette Hurt, or

the remarkable job she has done in scanning and collating the material

into digital orm ready or the printers.


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x i

idc

It was Philip Graham, legendary publisher oThe Washington Postin the

1960s, who coined the epigram that the journalists role is to write a rst

rough drat o history. It is a concept that has long ascinated me, becauseit means that a collection o those rough drats can present a dierent

kind o history, a contemporaneous history. As it is, all conventional his-

torical writing is retrospective. With the perect vision o hindsight, histo-

rians can reconstruct events as they actually turned out, making the way

they unolded look so clear and logical that one can only wonder at the

inability o the contemporary policy-makers and analysts and ordinary

olk to oresee what should surely have been obvious to them.

But the question is, what did it look like at the time when the u-ture was anything but obvious? Phil Grahams ull quote, beore it was

sleeked down to the snappy sound byte that is todays popular epigram,

puts the point more thoughtully. Addressing oreign correspondents o

Newsweek, a subsidiary o his company, Graham spoke o our inescap-

ably impossible task o providing every week a rst rough drat o history

that will never really be completed about a world we can never ully

understand.

Edward Gibbon can tell us retrospectively about the decline and allo the Roman Empire, but how ascinating to read the contemporaneous

accounts o Lucretius, Cicero and Tacitus o what lie was like in Rome

back in the rst century AD. We all know the story o Nero ddling while

Rome burned and o the persecution o the Christians. But how did all

this look to the Romans at the time? Tacitus tells us. Ater the great re,

he wrote in hisAnnals, a rumour spread that Nero had ordered it to clear

space or his new palace. To quell the rumour, the Emperor sought a

scapegoat. Tacitus goes on:

Nero astened the guilt and inficted the most exquisite torture on a class

hated or their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus,

rom whom the name had its origin, suered the extreme penalty during


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xii I RS T DRA T S

the reign o Tiberius at the hands o one o our procurators, Pontius Pilate,

and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked or the moment, again

broke out not only in Judaea, the rst source o the evil, but even in Rome.

Accordingly, an arrest was rst made o all who pleaded guilty; then upon

their inormation, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much o

the crime o ring the city, as o hatred against mankind. Mockery o every

sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins o beasts, they were

torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to

the fames and burnt, to serve as a nightly illumination when daylight had

expired.

Nero oered his gardens or the spectacle, as i he was exhibiting a show

in the circus, while he mingled with the people in the dress o a charioteer

or stood alot on a car. Hence, even or criminals who deserved extreme and

exemplary punishment, there arose a eeling o compassion; or it was not, as

it seemed, or the public good, but to glut one mans cruelty, that they were

being destroyed.

(A History of Knowledge, Charles van Dooren, Ballantine Books, New York, p 82.)

It would be presumptuous to imply that the unolding story o the newSouth Arica has anything so stupendous to present to the world, but I o-

er the example o Tacituss rst drat o a great historical moment simply

to illustrate the special slant that contemporaneous reporting can bring

to our understanding o history.

In this selection o writings, taken rom my syndicated column, At

Home and Abroad, which appears in several South Arican newspapers,

as well as reports that I have written as a political analyst or various

investment institutions, I have ocused on the rst decade o the newmillennium. I have done so or both political and personal reasons,

because this has been a special transormational passage o time or my

new-born country and indeed or the world as well as or me as an

individual.

As the old century drew to a close and the enchanted Nelson Mandela

era with it, the Thabo Mbeki presidency ollowed to trace an extra-

ordinary parabolic arc across most o the decade. The golden boy o the

Arican National Congress (ANC), born into the struggle as the scion oan iconic amily, came to power on a wave o expectations. He succeeded

brilliantly at rst, ocusing on black economic advancement to match

the political emancipation, which in turn produced an unprecedented

consumer-driven boom. The Mbeki era soured as the presidents complex


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Introduction xiii

personality and manipulative ways generated a horde o enemies who

cut him down and cast him into the wilderness a year-and-a-hal beore

the completion o his second term.

Then came the even more controversial presidency o Jacob Zuma,

sworn into oce in the closing year o the decade with a cluster o seri-

ous criminal charges hanging over him, rom corruption and raud to

racketeering and money laundering. It means that this decade has been

bracketed by the epitome o morality under the saintly Mandela and its

nadir under Zuma. What the uture holds under this tainted presidency

is part o Phil Grahams uncompleted history o a world we can never

really understand.or the ANC, too, it has been a roller-coaster decade, starting with

stratospheric electoral majorities that made its dominance unassailable,

and ending with a sel-inficted split that will leave it open to deeat and

possible demise in the decade ahead.

or the world as a whole the parabolic pattern was the same, beginning

with 9/11 and the triumphalism o George W Bush as he launched his

avenging war on Iraq and on terror at large, causing his popularity rat-

ings to reach unprecedented heights only to plunge again to undreamed-o lows until nally he exited near the close o the decade with a legacy o

having been perhaps the worst American president in history. A decade

that began with Rambo Bush as the most extreme right-wing president

there has been, is ending with his diametric opposite, the cool intellec-

tual liberal, Barack Obama, in power.

The decade was bracketed, too, by the most extravagant economic

boom in modern times and the worst economic crisis since the Great

Depression 80 years earlier; by the triumphalism o the ree market un-damentalists and the total discrediting o their ideologies and certitudes;

by Wall Streets dizzy heights and its ignominious collapse.

An extraordinary decade indeed, while or me personally it was also

a transormational time that ortuitously gave me a close-up view o

these tempestuous events. As the old century ended, so did my career as

a ull-time employed journalist. A brie stint as Editor-in-Chie o SABC

Television News and Current Aairs, where I had been engaged to try to

ginger up the newsroom as it sought to transorm itsel rom apartheidpropagandist into a genuine public broadcaster, was drawing to a close.

I was 66 years old, my wie was stricken with terminal cancer, and I

ound mysel acing a hiatus in my lie. A colleague suggested I oer my

services to an investment institution as a political analyst. It sounded


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xiv I RS T DR A TS

like a nice, low-key semi-retirement job, so I made an approach and was

accepted.

Thus began a whole new career that quickly and unexpectedly bal-

looned in scale and ascination. I ound mysel covering not only the

ast-moving events in South Arica but in the world as a whole, because

it soon became apparent that my own country was no longer an iso-

lated entity. This was the age o globalisation, and any major event any-

where impacted on everyone. We were all living in Marshall McLuhans

global village, where an airplane fying into a skyscraper in New York

could cause economic shudders in Johannesburg, a war in the Middle

East could send oil prices and thus living costs rocketing world-wide.Even the political ideologies being cooked up by the neo-conservatives

in Washington could impose constraints on the policy choices aced by

President Mbeki in Pretoria.

This awareness o global interconnectivity gained ground when I went

to the United States twice in the early part o the decade, rst to the

Woodrow Wilson Institute in Washington, then to Duke University in

North Carolina, to study, teach and write the third book o my trilogy on

the political transormation o South Arica,Beyond the Miracle. The rstsojourn was at the tail-end o the Clinton Administration, the second at

the start o the Bush Administration. Watershed events aecting both

South Arica and the US occurred during each sojourn.

The rst was an acerbic letter rom Mbeki to President Clinton which

revealed or the rst time that the South Arican president, whom I had

known or years and greatly admired as both rational and highly intel-

ligent, was in act an HIV/AIDS denialist. The American public was in-

credulous. What did this mean? What kind o new leader did we have?I was at a loss to explain, but in time came to realise this was a turning

point in our status as the darling o the world.

The second great watershed event o the new century, the terrorist

attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, occurred while I

was at Duke. It was an event that was to change the course o world his-

tory, but what struck me rst was the shock o the ordinary American

people. Why do they hate us? was the ubiquitous question, revealing

a universal lack o awareness o the deep resentment o Americas domi-neering oreign policies towards the Middle East going back many years.

The United States acts as though it has suzerainty over the region en-

capsulated in the popular quip: How did our oil get under their sand?

Most Americans have an image o their country as a benign giant using


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Introduction xv

its immense military power to bring the great benets o their way o

lie to the less ortunate o the earth, and it comes as a shock to them to

discover that the recipients do not always appreciate this.

I returned to South Arica in July 2002. I had kept in close touch with

events back home throughout my absences and continued writing politi-

cal analysis articles or the investment house I was contracted to, at that

time Standard Equities, but a ew months ater my return I decided to

again write a syndicated newspaper column as I had done some years be-

ore. Since by now I was deeply aware o the importance o understand-

ing global interconnectivity, I decided to call the column At Home and

Abroad a title appropriated rom my old riend Anthony Lewis, whohad written a marvellous wide-ranging column under that tagline in The

New York Times or many years until his recent retirement. My idea was

to write primarily about the unolding drama o the new South Aricas

transormation, but to set it in the context o a transorming world with

all the cross-cutting infuences between the two.

No sooner had I begun this than a new dimension opened up, when

ortuitously and quite out o the blue I was invited to become part o

an international committee o consultants to help advise Al Jazeera, thehighly successul Arabic television channel based in the Gul state o

Qatar, on its plans to launch an international English channel. Under

its enlightened Emir, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalia Al Thani, Qatar is a re-

markably ree society by Arab standards, which, with Al Jazeeras wide

network o correspondents, makes it a wonderul observation post rom

which to study the Middle East. It is a tiny, neutral and extremely wealthy

Switzerland in the heart o the Arab world.

I quickly ound mysel drawn in to the ascinating social and politi-cal complexities o this highly important region, the epicentre o the

post-Cold-War worlds most explosive problems. So I began writing about

Middle East issues, too, as I became more and more aware that our South

Arican experience gives us a special insight into binational conficts

in other words conficts between two rival national groups both laying

claim to the same homeland territory o which the Middle East has

several but none more intractable and dangerous than that between Jews

and Palestinians ollowing the establishment o the state o Israel.My travels there, which are ongoing, have taken me to Damascus to

meet and break bread with the exiled political leaders o Hamas whom

the Israelis (supported by all the Western powers) execrate and reuse to

deal with, just as the old South Arican regime abjured and reused to talk


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xvi I RS T DR A TS

to the terrorist ANC until late in the day but who in the end will have

to be central players in negotiations i there is ever to be any hope o a

lasting peace agreement in that raught patch o land.

This selection o writings, then, is drawn rom the ull range o issues

I have covered over this decade in my syndicated columns and my arti-

cles or investors plus one or two verbal presentations made to special

audiences. The central theme is the new South Arica, to try to present

in rst-drat orm the events as this journalist saw them unold as our

new democracy let the sae haven o Mandelas benign rst years and

plunged into the stormy waters o the new millenniums rst decade. It

is contemporaneous history in snapshot orm.But the selection is not conned to South Arica. In keeping with my

deep-held belie that the interconnectivity o the global village makes

every key event everywhere relevant to our own society, and that we in

turn through our own unique transormational achievement have les-

sons to oer others in a similar situation, I have included articles on

Zimbabwe, the United States, and the Middle East. I have preaced each

item with a brie introduction to set the context in which the events oc-

curred. The whole may be read either in sequence or by dipping in as youplease. My hope is that they may add to the readers understanding o the

sometimes bewildering times through which we are living.

Allister Sparks

Rivonia, 2009


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a g cg fmgg dvy

21 June 1999

Even as I wrote this the signs were there that Thabo Mbeki would run a less

open administration than Nelson Mandela, that he would centralise power onan imperial presidency, scornully dismissing his alliance partners objections to

his market-riendly GEAR policy. Yet he did achieve much, more than he is given

credit or, in building up a black middle class and bringing about 36 consecutive

quarters o economic growth or the rst time in South Aricas history. His was

an important presidency, i an ill-ated one.

Some o my comments about the relative abilities o Mbekis rst Cabinet

turned out to be justied, others less so. Steve Tshwete did not do well as

Minister o Saety and Security. And or all his charm, energy and ne academicqualications, Kader Asmals decision to introduce Outcomes-Based Education in

our schools was a major blunder. But the real, unmitigated disaster was Manto

Tshabalala-Msimang, Mbekis cats-paw and prime provocateur in his disastrous

AIDS denialism.

THE TRANSER O power rom Nelson Mandela to Thabo Mbeki is more

than just a smooth political transition, rare though that is in Arica. Italso marks a generational change within the ANC, rom a generation

that was committed to struggle and liberation to a younger one whose

task is to deliver. The roles are sharply dierent, and it is apparent rom

Mbekis statements since becoming President and rom his Cabinet ap-

pointments that he has a clear perception o this.

It was the theme that ran through his inaugural address on 16 June.

Paying tribute to a generation epitomised by his own parents sitting on

the stage beside him that had pulled our country out o the abyss andplaced it on the pedestal o hope on which it rests today, he said it was

now the task o we who are their ospring to deliver on that hope.

As a new light dawned over the land, he said, what [it] must show is

a nation diligently at work to create a better lie or itsel ... What we will


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2 IRST DRATS

have to see in the rising light is a government that is ully conscious o

the act that it has entered into a contract with the people, to work in

partnership with them to build together a winning nation.

This is the kind o language business in particular has been waiting

to hear. It will wait now to see whether the new Presidents deeds match

his words. So ar the signs are promising. The Cabinet appointments an-

nounced on 17 June contained some good merit appointments in what

might be called the key delivery portolios, with some under-perorming

ministers either dropped something Mandela never did or shunted

into relatively minor portolios. Plus a ew appointments that refect

Mbekis one known weakness o avouring old allies o mediocre ability.The most pleasing appointments were the retention o Trevor Manuel

as inance Minister, Alec Erwin as Minister o Trade and Industries, and

Membathisi Mdladlana as Minister o Labour. This team in the key eco-

nomics portolios was strengthened by the appointment o Phumzile

Mlambo-Ngcuka, who did a good job as Erwins deputy at Trade and

Industry, to the important Ministry o Minerals and Energy Aairs where

Penuell Maduna had been a conspicuous ailure.

Another welcome appointment was that o Je Radebe as Minister oPublic Enterprises the key to aster privatisation that can produce rev-

enues to reduce domestic debt, which in turn is crucial to reducing inter-

est rates to promote growth. Radebe, who perormed well in the Public

Works portolio, replaces the ineective Stella Sigcau whom Mbeki has

retained in the Cabinet (at Public Works) or purely political reasons. As

the daughter o the Paramount Chie o a major Transkei tribe he needs

her to prevent the United Democratic Movements Bantu Holomisa rom

making inroads into ANC support in what has historically been theCongresss main power base.

Taking a longer view, the single most important appointment is that

o Proessor Kader Asmal as Minister o Education. I South Arica is to

compete successully in the global marketplace it is vital that it upgrade

its skills base, crippled by generations o apartheid and the industrial

colour bar which prevented the black population the countrys working

class rom doing skilled work. This was probably the single most dam-

aging thing that apartheid wrought on South Aricas uture economicprospects, and sadly the rst ve years o democratic government did

little to start the process o rectication as the Department o Education

stumbled rom one blunder to another under the inept Sibusiso Bengu,

who has now merciully retired.


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A generational change from struggle to delivery 3

Kader Asmal is a horse o an altogether dierent colour. He is a major

academic with degrees in law rom the London School o Economics and

Trinity College, Dublin, who qualied as a barrister at both the London

and Dublin bars, and who later lectured in law at Trinity. On his return

to South Arica Asmal ounded the Chair o Constitutional and Human

Rights Law at the University o the Western Cape.

Even more important than his deep involvement in education he

was a school teacher in Natal beore going into exile is that Asmal is

an action man. He was the driving orce behind the establishment o the

highly eective Anti-Apartheid Movement in Britain, then its equivalent

in Ireland. He was also the star perormer o the Mandela Cabinet, turn-ing the hitherto dull Department o Water Aairs and orestry, or years

the dumping ground o inept ministers, into the success story o the new

regime by delivering water to 3-million households in squatter camps and

rural areas, so transorming the quality o lie or the poorest o the poor.

Typically, Asmal has already leaped into action in his new job. As the

Sunday Times has reported, within 24 hours o taking over he summoned

a meeting to shake up the management o the Education Department,

ring the inept Director-General and ordering reports rom key sectors tobe on his desk within two weeks.

The other critical area is crime. The appointment o Steve Tshwete as

Minister o Saety and Security has come in or media criticism, but I

think he may do well and in act tipped him or the job in a pre-election

analysis paper. I it is toughness that is required and there has been a

huge public demand or the Government to get tough on crime then

Tshwete is your man. With his solid rame, gravelly voice and blunt man-

ner, he is the quintessential tough guy with a long record as a rabble-rousing speaker and guerrilla ghter.

Tshwete spent 15 years in prison or guerrilla activities, and later be-

came rst political commissar and then chie o sta o Umkhonto we

Sizwe (Spear o the Nation), the guerrilla arm o the ANC. He is not pol-

ished nor is he a diplomat, but he does have a gru charm and a one-o-

the-boys manner that may enable him to get on well with the police.

Although Deence is no longer a portolio o high importance in the

new South Arica, Patrick Lekota will be an asset to the Cabinet as anintelligent and independent thinker. He is a man o considerable charm

who was one o the driving orces in the United Democratic ront, the

alliance o civic organisations which mounted the massive internal dem-

onstrations against apartheid during the 1980s.


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4 IRST DRATS

Mbekis axe has allen most heavily on the Department o Environmental

Aairs and Tourism, where he has red both the Minister, Pallo Jordan,

and his Deputy, Peter Mokaba. Delivery ailure is the main reason. The

government sees tourism as the main labour-intensive sector where

large numbers o jobs can be created to compensate or the employment

squeeze in other sectors o the economy. Although under Jordan and

Mokaba South Arica has moved to the top as Aricas most popular tour-

ism destination, ahead o Egypt and Morocco, insiders say Mbeki eels

they have not shown the degree o energy and commitment he wants in

that department. Jordan in particular is notoriously laid back: colleagues

euphemistically describe him as a hands-o minister.That, however, is not the only reason. Jordan is highly intelligent,

perhaps the only one in the ANC leadership with an intellect to match

Mbekis, and there has long been a tense relationship between the two.

During their exile years they clashed ideologically in the vicious arena o

Marxist interpretation, with Jordan taking a more Trotskyite line. Their

personalities clash as well. Where Mbeki is a hands-on workaholic, Jordan

aects an air o arrogant alooness and indolence. There can be no doubt,

though, that Jordans sharp intelligence and independent-mindednesswill be a loss to the Cabinet something that again reveals the most

worrying eature o Mbekis personality, which is his preerence or per-

sonal loyalty rather than strong advisers with challenging ideas.

The most widely criticised appointment is o the grouchy Nkosazana

Dlamini-Zuma as oreign Minister. She is a controversial gure who ru-

fed many eathers at home and abroad with her high-handed action as

Health Minister in banning tobacco advertising and overriding patent

rights to allow the use o cheaper generic drugs. There is no doubt she is ahard worker and an achiever, but she has handled these and other contro-

versies with a singular lack o diplomacy. Tony Leon, the new Leader o

the Opposition, has described her appointment to the countrys top dip-

lomatic job as letting a bull loose in a china shop.

What is clear, however, is that Mbeki himsel, as the ANCs top dip-

lomat or the past 25 years, will in act be running oreign aairs and

he will do so through one o his closest allies, Aziz Pahad, who remains

in place as Deputy Minister o oreign Aairs. Pahad is experienced andcompetent, having already done a ace-saving job as number two to the

less than impressive Alred Nzo who has now retired. Why he didnt

get the top job himsel as just reward is puzzling. Presumably it is be-

cause Mbeki was keen to project a progressive image by promoting more


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A generational change from struggle to delivery 5

women: already he has boasted that the new Cabinet has 100 per cent

more women than the old one. Another actor is that Dlamini-Zuma is

a long-standing Mbeki ally whom the new President recruited into the

ANC in Swaziland in the mid-1970s.

Other Mbeki loyalists who have been retained or promoted into the

Cabinet are the new Minister o Health, Manto Tshabalala-Msimang,

who let the country with Mbeki in 1962, and the ongoing Minister o

Housing, Sankie Mthembi-Mahanyele, an Mbeki protg rom exile days

in Lusaka.

Most noteworthy o all is Aziz Pahads brother Essop, Mbekis oldest

and closest buddy rom student days at Sussex University, a man o lim-ited ability and sometimes abrasive personality, who is now Minister o

State in the Presidents Oce arguably the most powerul position in

the country ater the President himsel.

The restructuring o the Presidents Oce is one o a number o sub-

tle changes Mbeki has made to increase the centralisation o power on

himsel. He has incorporated the Deputy Presidency into the Presidents

Oce, which will operate under the direction o Essop Pahad and have

our Deputy Directors-General reporting to the DG, rank Chikane.Mbeki has also bumped up the Department o Intelligence Services to

a ull Ministry under old ANC spook Joe Nhlanhla, who will now report

directly to the President instead o the Minister o Saety and Security

whose Deputy he was in the Mandela administration.

At another level, Mbeki has changed ANC procedures to assume the

power to appoint and dismiss regional Premiers instead o leaving this to

the democratic choice o the ANC branches in the provinces they control.

This is ostensibly aimed at gaining disciplinary control over corruptionin the provinces and ending actional squabbles that have undermined

some provincial administrations, but it will also give Mbeki more direct

control to co-ordinate policies throughout most o the country.

Not least is the act that, despite the governments insistence that the

Reserve Banks independence is not being diluted, there can be no doubt

that the appointment o two ANC members, Tito Mboweni as Governor

and Gill Marcus as Deputy Governor, intelligent and independent-

minded though they both are, is bound to result in a closer co-ordinationo monetary policy than has been the case in the past with interest-rate

hawk Chris Stals, inherited rom the old apartheid regime, as Reserve

Bank Governor. Marcus takes up her new job on 1 July, Mboweni on

1 August.


22/32

6 IRST DRATS

It all points to a less collegiate and more imperial presidency than

Mandelas, with Mbeki the technocrat very much in charge o the direc-

tion and co-ordination o policies on all ronts. Nothing will be allowed

to divert or disrupt the drive or delivery.

An early example o this is the way the trade union ederation,

COSATUs, threat to mount a campaign o rolling mass action in protest

against the coalition between the New National Party and the Democratic

Party to keep the ANC out o power in the Western Cape has melted

away. Moving quietly behind the scenes, as is his style, Mbeki put a swit

stop to the strike plans which were alarming business in the region and

would have sent the wrong kind o message to potential investors abroadright at the start o the Mbeki presidency. Today the ANCs provincial

leader, Ebrahim Rasool, is saying there will only be demonstrations to

protest against transormation ailures by the coalition as these become

apparent.

I delivery is going to be the keynote theme o the new adminis-

tration, then GEAR the market-riendly Growth, Employment and

Redistribution policy will be the means to achieve it. The ANCs alli-

ance partners, COSATU and the South Arican Communist Party (SACP),are not happy with GEAR but Mbeki made it clear at their respective

congresses last year that he will brook no public opposition rom them.

They may grumble in private, but GEAR is entrenched as undamental

ANC policy and, as Mbeki told them at the congresses, We are not going

to change it because o your pressure.

Now he has gone a step urther and in a classic act o political co-

option has drawn the entire top echelon o COSATUs leadership into

government Mbhazima Shilowa, the powerul secretary-general, has be-come Premier o Gauteng province, while John Gomomo, the president,

Connie September, the rst vice-president, and Ronald Mookeng, the

national treasurer, have all become ANC Members o Parliament.

Once there, experience has shown, the responsibilities o government

and the economic realities it aces soon outweigh their narrower unionist

concerns. Thus both inance Minister Manuel and Trade and Industries

Minister Erwin, both trade union leaders beore they entered government

in 1994, are now the two lead players in the GEAR programme.Mbekis imperial presidency is going to be a little less open, perhaps

even a little less democratic than the Mandela administration. But it is

likely to be signicantly more eective on delivery.


23/32

7

a -- v14 June 2000

I spent the all o 2000 at the Woodrow Wilson Institute or International Scholars

in Washington, studying the phenomenon o globalisation and its eects on

emerging economies such as South Aricas in preparation or my third book,Byd Mc. Towards the end o my stay I was invited to give a talk to a

high-prole audience on The making o the new South Arica.

As the text shows, I was aglow with pride at my countrys achievements. But

the talk had one major faw. I let President Thabo Mbeki o the hook by suggest-

ing that he had claried his murky position on HIV/AIDS during his rst visit to

the US, which he had just completed. He had in act compounded the conusion

and I did not see at the time what a serious faw in his personality this revealed

and what grave consequences it could have.

MY AIM TODAY is to try to portray the transormation o South Arica

in a global context. As a revolution within a revolution, i you will. The

South Arican revolution, the transormation o my countrys grievously

distorted socio-economic structure, is taking place within a global revolu-

tion o historic dimensions.

I am reerring, o course, to globalisation, a revolution as prooundin its impact as the Industrial Revolution o the nineteenth century and

which at the same time is replacing the old, amiliar bipolar world o the

Cold War with a whole new and radically dierent geopolitical rame-

work. This global revolution is itsel a stormy sea or any country to navi-

gate, as witness the Asian crisis o 199798, which almost wrecked those

much-vaunted tiger economies. How much tougher, then, to be under-

taking a massive internal transormation in the midst o such a global

storm.In act I see the making o the New South Arica as a three-in-one

revolution. There is the socio-political revolution o transorming the

country rom apartheid authoritarianism to a nonracial democracy in

itsel as daunting a transormation as any country has ever attempted,


24/32

8 IRST DRATS

especially in a world that has seen so many intractable ethnic and sectar-

ian conficts rom Northern Ireland to the Indian subcontinent, to say

nothing o Rwanda and Angola, Ethiopia and Eritrea and the inappropri-

ately named Democratic Republic o Congo.

This is the revolution so many predicted could never happen in South

Arica, which would surely end in a racial bloodbath.

The other two are transorming an isolated, inward-looking economy

that was under siege and acing sanctions, into a competitive player in

the global marketplace. And thirdly, transorming a primary producing

economy based on mining and agriculture into a manuacturing exporter.

Gold is ading ast as the mainstay o the South Arican economy theequivalent, i you like, o Saudi Arabias oil. Its price is alling and it is

getting nished. The 1980 price o gold was above $800 a ne ounce;

yesterday it was $291. And as the price alls, more o South Aricas deep-

level shats have to be closed. So there is less gold earning a third o the

price. Agriculture is also dwindling as a contributor to the economy.

The main problem is that the requirements o these three interlock-

ing revolutions tend to be in confict. The socio-economic revolution

requires the ANC government to deliver on Nelson Mandelas pledge tohis people o a better lie or all. That means more jobs and better pay.

Yet, as we are nding out, becoming a competitive player in the global

marketplace means privatising, rationalising, downsizing, outsourcing

and generally cutting labour and other production costs as much as pos-

sible. So globalisation increases unemployment and squeezes wages.

Meanwhile, the transormation rom a resource-based economy to a

manuacturing economy is doing the same. The closure o gold mines

and the decline o agriculture have thrown tens o thousands o peopleout o work. This combination o actors has resulted in the loss o hal a

million jobs in the six years since the ANC government came to power.

Thats tough or a liberation movement that came to power promis-

ing its people a better lie or all ater generations o oppression and

exploitation.

Worse still, globalisation tends to widen the gap between rich and

poor, at least in the short term. And the new South Arica began lie

with the second highest gap between rich and poor in the world thehighest being Namibia. A black middle class is emerging now to join the

wealthy whites, but the gap between this new multiracial middle class

and the overwhelmingly black underclass is actually widening even as

the economy as a whole grows.


25/32


The heart o the problem is that globalisation rewards the skilled and

punishes the unskilled. And apartheid deliberately kept the black popula-

tion unskilled. Not only was education separate and maniestly unequal,

but black people were prohibited by law rom doing skilled work. A black

person could carry the paint pot but not do the painting; he could hand

the white mechanic the tools but not do the repair job, and so on.

Black people were shut out o the major universities and technical

training institutions. Until 1979 they were prohibited by law rom join-

ing trade unions and so could not become apprentices. They were pro-

hibited rom orming companies or business partnerships. They were not

allowed to buy shares on the stock exchange. They could not establishbusinesses in the major urban areas except or small stores supplying

what were called the basic necessities o lie, which means things like

bread, milk, resh groceries, wood and coal.

It must be the only instance in history where a government, as a mat-

ter o policy, deliberately and systematically destroyed the skills base o

its working class.

And now the liberation movement, which reed its people rom this

iniquity, must build a new manuacturing economy that can competein the global market-place on that base. O all apartheids crimes against

humanity, this was surely the worst. Certainly it was the longest lasting

in its deleterious eects.

There are other daunting problems, too, some o which you read about

endlessly in your newspapers to the exclusion o just about everything

else. Such as crime, which is endemic to all transorming societies but

which in South Arica is aggravated by the collapse o the policing struc-

ture. The police were the ront-line deenders o the apartheid system,indoctrinated to believe that they were ghting a holy war against com-

munist atheism and terrorism. They were equipped with draconian laws

and they went about their task with anatical zeal, committing appalling

crimes against humanity in the process.

Then suddenly they saw their political masters, who had trained and

encouraged them in this work, strike a deal with the hated enemy and

leave them hanging out to dry. It doesnt require much imagination to

understand that such a police orce is going to be seriously disillusioned,demotivated and angry. And o course once the big international crime

and drug syndicates smell a weak law enorcement system anywhere,

they close in like scavengers. The only solution is to build a new and

more eective police orce. But that takes time.


26/32

10 IR ST DRA TS

The other daunting problem is AIDS. It is a problem that crept up on

South Arica, making its silent inroads between 1990 and 1995, at a time

when the country was massively preoccupied with the great national ne-

gotiating process. So no red-alert buttons were pushed until well into the

Mandela era.

According to William Makgoba, a world-renowned micro-biologist

who is now president o the Medical Research Council o South Arica,

the pandemic could have been curbed during this period. But it wasnt,

and when the new ANC government ound itsel acing a daunting array

o problems, the HIV epidemic, Makgoba suggests, was simply one chal-

lenge too many. The ANC, in his judgment, went into denial. irst, it en-dorsed a cheap quack remedy called Virodene which it hoped would re-

duce the crippling costs o dealing with the disease. Then, says Makgoba,

it retreated behind revisionist theories.

I believe it has emerged rom that retreat now. I think President Mbeki

made his position clear during his recent visit to the United States and

that South Arica is now doing all it can, with its limited resources, to

cope with the disease. But there is no doubt much damage has been done

by the conusion, both to the countrys image and to the welare o itspeople.

Despite these massive problems, the new government has made sig-

nicant strides.

It has crated and bedded down a new Constitution that is arguably the

most progressive in the world, guaranteeing all the basic human rights,

including or all the ethnic groups, or women, or gays and or the disa-

bled, and which guarantees reedom o expression and o the media. It

has run three ree and air elections, two national and one local. It has aParliament in which 10 parties and all races are represented and in which

a third o the legislators are women, including the Speaker and Deputy

Speaker. It has a Cabinet in which a third o the ministers are women,

and it has a woman as ambassador to the worlds most important coun-

try. It is transorming the judiciary, which used to be all-white, and it has

established a multiracial Constitutional Court.

The new South Arica is now a rmly established constitutional de-

mocracy unctioning under the law.At the same time the new government has redrawn the political map

o the country, rearranging our provinces and 10 tribal homelands,

our o them nominally independent, into nine completely new prov-

inces with their own legislative and executive arms. And it has rebuilt


27/32


the local government structures o every city, town and village to bond

together their segregated sectors, such as Soweto and Johannesburg, into

single municipal councils.

Most striking o all is that the new regime has achieved a degree o ra-

cial reconciliation that ew would have thought possible only a ew years

ago, to the point where in last years national election the ar right-wing

party o the hardline white separatists achieved less than 1 per cent o the

vote, and the Arikaner National Party, which ruled the country or hal a

century, slipped rom 20 per cent o the vote to 7 per cent and was ousted

as the main opposition party by the liberal Democratic Party.

Segregated education has been ended, and residential segregation isgradually ebbing as members o the emerging black middle class move

into the ormerly whites-only suburbs. And even though the poor are

still poor, their quality o lie has improved. One apartheid era statistic

that has stuck in my mind is a 1993 nding that the average rural black

woman had to walk eight miles (12 km) every day o her lie to etch

water and rewood and the water was oten oul. Today more than a

million rural households have been provided with clean tap water within

100 yards, and three-quarters o a million o those households have beenelectried.

It is one o the terriying statistics o our electronic inormation age

that there are more telephones in the city o New York than in the entire

Arican continent. And i you dont have a telephone you cant get on

the internet, and i you cant get on the internet you cant become part

o the inormation age. You cant become part o the globalised world.

You become what New York Times columnist Tom riedman calls globali-

sations roadkill.But since 1997, in just three years, South Aricas Telkom has provided

1,6-million telephones in squatter camps and remote rural areas that

didnt have them beore.

These are solid material achievements. But the biggest task by ar has

been the total restructuring o the economy. In this the new South Arican

government has aced many o the same problems as the countries o

Eastern Europe. or it is one o the great paradoxes o modern times that

the old regime in South Arica, which presented itsel as one o the mostpassionate anti-communist regimes on earth, in act presided over the

largest amount o state-owned industry in the world outside the Soviet

bloc. And now the ANC, which or 50 years was committed to nation-

alising the commanding heights o the economy and which has come


28/32

12 IR ST DRA TS

to power in alliance with the let-wing labour union ederation and the

South Arican Communist Party, is privatising many o those industries

and committing itsel to a ree market economy.

It has brought down tari barriers, eased interest rates back rom 25

per cent to 14 per cent and brought infation down rom 25 per cent to a

current 8 per cent and set a target o between 3 per cent and 6 per cent.

It has brought results. oreign investment has increased substantially.

All the US companies which disinvested have returned, plus a crop o

new ones. There has been a surge o new investment rom some o the

emergent Asian economies: Malaysia has been the biggest oreign inves-

tor since 1994. Trade with Australia has increased sixold and is risingwith Latin America as well. There is a comprehensive new trade agree-

ment with the European Union.

Economic growth, which had been in a 20-year decline, has started to

rise again. It touched 6 per cent in 1996, two years ater the new govern-

ment came to power.

But again, South Arica is learning along with other emerging econo-

mies that globalisation can be as treacherous as it is enticing. You can

do all the right things and still nd that events over which you have nocontrol can knock you sideways. Just as the South Arican economy ap-

peared to be taking o in 1998, the Asian crisis struck and the rand cur-

rency plunged 26 per cent against the dollar in two months, while the

Johannesburg Securities Exchange lost 40 per cent o its value.

Slowly the economy recovered and by the end o last year prospects

were looking bright once more. Then President Robert Mugabe had a rush

o madness in neighbouring Zimbabwe, encouraging state-sponsored ter-

rorism and the seizure o white armland without compensation, rebelorces ran riot in Sierra Leone, Ethiopia went to war against Eritrea, civil

wars continued in Congo and Angola and The Economistran a cover

story bewailing The Hopeless Continent. Promptly the rand currency

ell back another 7 per cent to its lowest level ever and South Arican

share values declined once more.

The distinguished economist Jerey Sachs has noted that it helps a lot

i a developing country is close to a strong developed one, as Poland is

to Germany. It is South Aricas lot to be in a reverse situation. We are lo-cated in The Hopeless Continent. That is not only a disadvantage, it also

imposes a heavy obligation. or this is our continent, and just as ederal

Reserve chairman Allan Greenspan once observed about the United States,

we cant prosper as an island o afuence in an ocean o poverty.


29/32


We are the only regional superpower, just as the US is the only global

superpower, and with the world backing away in a mixture o despair and

indierence rom Aricas apparent hopelessness, South Arica must try to

do something about it.

We are Aricas last best hope. I South Arica ails, Arica as a whole

will ail. And i Arica with its close on a billion people ails it will be a

problem or the world as a whole. Because this is indeed the global vil-

lage and in the global village you are, you must be, your neighbours

keeper. Because i you are not, i you ignore your neighbours plight as

you grow wealthier and he sinks ever deeper into despair, he may pollute

your property, his amily may contract diseases that inect yours, he mayburgle your home, he may try to invade it, and in his resentment at your

indierence he may even throw a bomb at it.


30/32

14

saDC d m p Mgb dw10 sePteMBer 2001

What a hope! The Abuja Agreement, signed by Zimbabwes Foreign Minister

and agreed to in principle by Mugabe verbally aterwards, could have ended

the Zimbabwe crisis there and then had the SADC leaders and President ThaboMbeki in particular had the political will to pin him down. The threat o sanctions

coming rom his ellow Arican leaders would have made it hard or Mugabe to

dey them. But sadly, the SADC leaders lacked that will, so the Abuja Agreement

was stillborn and the Zimbabwe election the ollowing year was indeed rigged.

THE MEETING IN Harare today o six leaders o the Southern Arican

Development Community (SADC), including South Aricas PresidentThabo Mbeki, will be critical in determining whether last Thursdays

Abuja Agreement ostensibly ending Zimbabwes land crisis can be made

to stick or not.

President Robert Mugabe, who mysteriously disappeared or a week

on what has now been described as a working holiday in Libya and did

not attend the negotiations in the Nigerian capital, turned up in Harare

yesterday and announced that he accepted the agreement in principle.

That is encouraging, but inevitably there is still a great deal o scepticismabout what he will actually do, or Mugabe has gone back on his word

many times in the past. It also remains to be seen whether the so-called

war veterans will heed him i he does order them to back o and vacate

the commercial arms they have occupied.

This makes it imperative that the SADC leaders pin him down to rm

time rames or implementing the Abuja Agreement in all its details. They

must also extract a solid commitment rom the Zimbabwean President to

hold a ree and air presidential election next March with internationalobservers allowed in to certiy as much. And they must spell out serious

consequences that will ollow such as the withholding o recognition o

a rigged election result and the closing o his borders with them should

he renege on any aspect o the agreement. All o which will require a


31/32

SADC leaders must pin Mugabe down 15

good deal more resolution and courage than the SADC leaders have dis-

played thus ar. But i they ail and let Mugabe o the hook, the whole

region will suer irreparable damage.

There are signs that they recognise this, which gives one hope. or

President Mbeki the moment o truth came in late July when he con-

essed to a BBC interviewer that Mugabe is not listening to anyone. It

amounted to a recognition that his strategy o quiet diplomacy had

ailed.

Since then Mbeki has worked quietly behind the scenes with Nigerias

President Olusegun Obasanjo and the new British oreign Secretary,

Jack Straw, to develop a tougher strategy. The Commonwealth, o whichMbeki is currently chairman, became the instrument o that strategy.

With its summit, or CHOGM, meeting due in Australia next month,

the threat o suspending Zimbabwes membership was raised, adding to

sharpened threats o European Union and United States sanctions plus

international travel restrictions on members o the Mugabe Cabinet and

senior ZANU-P ocials, and, toughest o all, the reezing o their per-

sonal assets abroad.

All this was wrapped into a package and quietly presented to theZimbabwean delegation, led by oreign Minister Stan Mudenge, at Abuja

last Thursday. This was a dierent kind o quiet diplomacy, with Mugabe

in Libya, the South Arican President and oreign Minister both heavily

involved in the Durban racism conerence and most international atten-

tion ocused on that event. Quietly Nigerias Obasanjo, a tough and expe-

rienced negotiator, put the chips on the table and Mudenge olded.

Ten hours ater the meeting began Mudenge signed the ar-reaching

agreement, which commits Zimbabwe to halt all urther occupation oarm lands, to speedily de-list arms that dont meet agreed criteria or

redistribution, to move occupiers rom arms that are not designated on

to legally acquired land, and most important o all to restore the rule

o law to the process o land reorm. Zimbabwe also pledged to take rm

action against violence and intimidation.

In return, Britain has pledged to honour a commitment to pay 36-mil-

lion (about R4,4-billion) towards a programme that will compensate

white armers transerring land to black armers and to encourage otherdeveloped countries to help nancially.

Mugabes absence, however, let a cloud o doubt hanging over the

deal. Mudenge, still quivering with doubt as to how his boss might re-

act, tried a preliminary wriggle himsel as he landed back in Zimbabwe,


32/32

16 IR ST DRA TS

saying all the agreement meant was that the government would move

occupiers o land that had not been designated or resettlement, which

was less than 5 per cent o all commercial armland. What he ignored

was the clause committing the government to return to the rule o law:

the Supreme Court has already declared the whole ast track land reorm

programme illegal.

Joseph Chinotimba, leader o the war veterans, also sought to dismiss

the agreement, saying his supporters would not move o the land yet.

I dont know about any deals in Abuja, he said. I dont get my news

rom the radio. I am waiting or my oreign Minister to come back and

tell me.Opposition leaders and the white armers are equally sceptical. Its

hard to imagine that a government which has ailed to respect bind-

ing treaty agreements such as the United Nations Charter can be trusted

now, said Tendai Biti, the opposition Movement or Democratic Change

(MDC) shadow oreign secretary, while a leading white armer remarked

wryly: I dont know whether I should celebrate this or question .

The scepticism was reinorced on Saturday, just two days ater the agree-

ment was signed, when 150 war veterans invaded a arm in the Beatricearea, 40 km south o Harare. They assaulted arm workers, burnt down

20 o the arm workers houses, threatened to kill the armers wie and

children, then let. The police, who were alerted, ailed to intervene.

But now Mugabe has publicly accepted the agreement. He did so

ater a two-hour meeting yesterday with the Nigerian oreign Minister,

Sule Lamido, who few in ahead o him and brieed him on the Abuja

agreement.

Make no mistake, Mugabe does not want this deal. It will carry im-mense political costs or him, or as this service has noted or many

months the redistribution o land is not the real issue behind the vio-

lence aficting Zimbabwe. It has been no more than a populist pretext

or launching a campaign o violent intimidation against opposition sup-

porters in a desperate bid to ward o otherwise certain deeat or Mugabe

at the polls next March.

His massive egotism aside, Mugabe also ears the consequences o

such a deeat. He ordered his military to crush political opposition inMatabeleland in 1983 in an operation that led to thousands o deaths,

and he also unleashed a violent campaign against MDC supporters dur-

ing last years parliamentary elections that resulted in 34 o them being

killed and hundreds injured. He has every reason to ear arraignment

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First Drafts: South African History in the Making

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