A jump to the left
Zvakanaka
Business Day
13 May 2008
IN STRUGGLING to make sense of President Thabo Mbeki’s determined policy of
appeasement towards Robert Mugabe over the years, some analysts have
suggested it may have been motivated primarily by concern over the ripple
effect on the politics of the region if a labour-led party such as the
Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) was allowed to turf out Zimbabwe’s
liberation movement-turned-government.
While this is almost certainly simplistic, the inference that Mbeki did not
want South African labour leaders getting ideas above their station in the
governing alliance is not.
However, whether or not this was a factor even contributing to the
much-criticised “quiet diplomacy” approach, the strategy has clearly
failed — not only has the MDC won the Zimbabwean election despite having
the
table tilted severely against it, but South African labour federation
Cosatu
and ally the South African Communist Party (SACP) managed to achieve the
same end within the ruling African National Congress (ANC) at Polokwane.
While it is hard to imagine that an MDC government could be anything other
than a vast improvement on Zanu (PF)’s legacy of hyperinflation,
corruption,
economic mismanagement and repression, the same cannot necessarily be said
for the looming “leftist” era in SA. Mbeki’s leadership of the ANC has left
much to be desired in many areas, not least Zimbabwe, HIV, race relations,
the management of state institutions and industrial policy. But the past
weekend’s summit between tripartite alliance partners the ANC, SACP and
Cosatu did little to inspire confidence that the new power brokers have
much
to offer in the form of viable alternative policies.
It is true Cosatu and the SACP have consistently adopted a far more
pragmatic stance than the government on matters such as Zimbabwe and HIV,
and while the summit identified a number of key challenges facing society,
the proposed response was alarmingly short on detail. Criticising Mbeki’s
eccentricities is easy compared with actually coming up with better policy.
The ANC outside government is enjoying the best of both worlds, blasting
Mbeki at every opportunity while avoiding responsibility for the fine mess
he has got SA into in its name.
Little wonder the alliance partners decided not to push for Mbeki’s removal
from office before his term is complete — it suits them to go into next
year’s
election without having to identify too closely with the practical
implications of their more blatantly populist proposals. Calling for the
removal of VAT on basic foods is all very well, for instance, but there are
sound economic reasons this is not the best means of easing the burden on
the poor, and they know it.
Similarly, the summit’s call for land reform to be speeded up “so that more
land can be made available for food production to ensure food security” may
appeal to the masses but would have precisely the opposite effect on food
security if the way the current land reform process is unfolding is
anything
to go by. And, rejecting Eskom’s request for a stiff tariff increase
without
coming up with practical suggestions for alternative means of funding the
utility’s capacity expansion programme is simply irresponsible. The power
crisis was caused by the dithering of the governing alliance: the buck now
stops with that alliance.