politics

The Council for the Advancement of the South African Constitution (CASAC) says that the National Prosecuting Authority’s (NPA) downplaying of a court order to hand over President Jacob Zuma ‘spy tapes’ is another sign of the lack of a permanent head of the NPA.

CASAC’s Lawson Naidoo, who argues that a proper head who is beyond political influence is very important, points out that, “…there is a sense of foot-dragging taking place and this calls into question the integrity of the NPA and whether they are acting out their constitutional mandate.”

Meanwhile senior political analyst at Political Analysis South Africa, Fabian Scherer, says the case is proof that the NPA is subject to ‘the whims of politicians’ and the court order is evidence of a need for drastic changes within.

To read the article titled, “Spy tape handover due,” click here.

Opposition to Urban Tolling Alliance (OUTA) has noted with suspicion the press statement of 21 August 2013, where South African National Roads Agency’s (SANRAL) spokesperson, Vusi Mona, attacks the Democratic Alliance (DA) use of e-Tolls for political gain. Mona is reported to have said the following: "The DA is using e-tolling as an electioneering strategy and is continuously misrepresenting the facts to win votes in next year's elections and SANRAL is not going to entertain politics."
 
OUTA chairperson, Wayne Duvenage, says that statements of this nature are seriously worrying as they start to blur the line of separation between party and state. "Sanral is an organ of state," he said. "Its job is to provide services to citizens irrespective of their political affiliation," he added. "By making statements on the political activities of a political party, SANRAL is drawing an organ of state into the political arena and therefore undermining our democracy."
 
Duvenage said that all political parties were free to comment on the actions of state-owned enterprises (SOE), be it e-Tolls, arms procurement, energy generation, state expenditure on private properties etc. This is the space of political and civil action entities that forms part of healthy democratic discourse. "If the DA, Agang [Agang South Africa], UDM [United Democratic Movement] or other political entities are able to convince voters that they would be able direct Sanral or other SOE’s in a manner more beneficial to the country’s citizens that the current ruling party, they are quite entitled to do so," he said.
 
"Likewise, the ANC [African National Congress] or any other political party is free to argue a similar points. What is not acceptable is for state-run organs themselves to become politically aligned. They should answer the queries and give facts but never enter the space of political mudslinging."
 
Mr Mona then ends his attack on the DA with the following confusing comment "We understand the politicking but we are not interested in it." Why then attack the DA’s politicking behaviour if indeed they understand it and are not interested in it? OUTA expresses serious concern at Sanral’s statements and regular misrepresentation of facts, which has become a liability for this State Owned Entity. Duvenage says "SANRAL’s attempts as an SOE to enter the political fray is just another milestone in a series of public relations mishaps which includes the following recent dubious and misleading statements:

• On 31 July, Mona stated that the number of toll gantries required at e-Tag rates to reach the (R450) cap was around 301 or roughly 2 760 kilometres on the e-Toll roads, whereas this figure is closer to almost half that number at 164 gantries and 1 600 kilometres;
•  In June 2013, Mona denied that money from the GFIP e-tolling project would directly fund and benefit Austria’s Kapsch TraffiCom, whereas that company's own press release to the international investor community confirmed this was the case, to the tune of over R670 million per annum;
• Again, in June 2013, Mr Mona stated that at the end of April 2013, SANRAL had sales of 250 000 e-tags and following their recent ‘successful’ marketing campaign, e-Tag sales had been boosted by over 100 percent in six weeks, taking their e-Tag sales up to 600 000 by mid-June;
• However, the Department of Transport had announced a year earlier in April 2012, their eTag sales had reached over 500 000 and this number had crept up to 600 000 by December 2012.

"A major reason for the public’s rejection of e-tolling has been the failure of SANRAL to engage and communicate openly and honestly with the public", states Duvenage. "SANRAL now has to increase their marking and public relations budget by over 200 percent to R85 m per annum in order to rectify its shattered integrity and poor image, yet they continue to shoot themselves in the foot by making such rash and misleading statements on a regular basis. The public have lost faith in this once credible organ of the state and will not succumb to their spin doctor tactics and self-gratifying publications and press inserts," concluded Duvenage.
 
Ends
 
For more information contact:
 
Wayne Duvenage
Chairperson
Opposition to Urban Tolling Alliance
Mobile: 082 884 6652
 
For more about the Opposition to Urban Tolling Alliance, refer to www.outa.co.za/site/
 
To view other NGO press releases, refer to www.ngopulse.org/group/home-page/pressreleases

As the anniversary of the Marikana massacre dawns, this week has also seen the anniversary of one of the watershed moments in the resistance movement during the 1980s – also led by the workers. One can only hope that this latest watershed can be managed by extraordinary leadership that can guide us to much-needed development in our country, without further bloodshed.

Two events, separated by two-and-a-half decades, define our journey to democracy.

One year ago I wrote: “The headlines scream, 'Marikana Massacre'; 'Killing Fields of Rustenburg'. Radio and television talk shows and social media all display the anger and expose the psyche of a nation badly wounded. The bloodiest security operation since the end of Apartheid has left us shocked and asking what went wrong. The reality is, many things went wrong. Way too many things went wrong, for way too long now.”

I journey back to 1987, the year of worker discontent. It had been less than a decade since black workers had a legal right to join trade unions. Starting from small beginnings the various strands had come together into a fighting force united by the repression of a brutal regime and the exploding anger against an arbitrary and exploitative cheap labour system, ruled by an authoritarian management system.

The Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), barely two years old, the product of painstaking discussions, did not have the luxury of birth pangs. Its launch prophecy, to ‘rise like a giant to confront all that stood in its way’, had become a magnet for workers. It plunged into battle.

The country was on fire. Tens of thousands of retail and railway workers had launched rolling mass action that year, fuelled by the COSATU Living Wage campaign. Seeing COSATU as the most serious internal threat to its power, the Apartheid state, masterminded by its Minister of Police, imploded our headquarters in one of the most powerful explosive blasts, hoping to permanently disrupt our logistics and organisational capacity. But we were undeterred. We would not be cowed.

Years of organisation building, education training had built an army of tens of thousands of COSATU shop stewards connected by an umbilical cord to needs, aspirations and hopes of workers on the shop floor. We were ready. We stood fist to fist ready to slug it out in spite of many leaders being victimised, detained and offices bombed. Our survival was driven from the ground. We did not run our organisation through press conferences. There was no twitter or Facebook.

9 August 1987 was a cold morning. The frost hung in the air like a second skin. We were tense. It was our moment of storming the Bastille of Apartheid. A total of 360 000 mine workers marched over the shaft floor in disciplined regiments. What followed in the next 21 days shook the foundations of Apartheid. Close to 50 000 workers were dismissed and shipped back to the homelands and the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region, their leaders blacklisted forever. This was our life. Going on strike often meant that or death. It was a conscious choice.

While we lost the battle, it was a watershed that would define the war and the eventual negotiations process. The system was ready to implode. A political stalemate had been reached, on the shop floor and in the country. Our choice was a descent into a full-scale racial civil war of a scorched earth or a political negotiation.
Thankfully, guided by the extraordinary leadership of Nelson Mandela on our side, we chose the latter.

Turn the clock 25 years to 16 August 2012, and what we have is Marikana. It is the pinnacle of a growing ferment in our land. The people in our workplaces, townships, rural areas and squatter camps are bitter that democracy has not delivered the fruits that they see a tiny elite enjoying. Our leaders across the spectrum are not talking to our people, they are not working with them systematically to solve their problems, in providing the hope that one day, even in their children’s lives, things will be better. It is a debilitating threat not from enemies outside, but those who lurk within our bosom.

Thousands of workers are deserting our COSATU unions. They have lost trust in their branch leaders. I have been in many places where I am personally told: ‘Comrade, we do not see union organisers. We do not know what is happening in our union. Our leaders are too involved in politics and we do not get the services and education we did in the past.’

It is true. Union leadership is more engaged in looking up to the political jockeying than down to the base of its members where its real strength on the shop floor gives it voice. We cannot hide the disunity and divisions that cripple COSATU today.

Alongside millions of South Africans I feel bitterly disappointed. There is a deep-seated anger growing in the country. And yet the leaders are not at the coal face. People feel robbed of their voices and powerless.

In the absence of strong, legitimate political organisation in the communities, they see violence as the only language their leaders will listen to. It is a vicious cycle that sees our people burning down any institution representing the state, whether a school, a library or a public building.

Marikana is but a festering sore on the body politic of our country. These are not issues that a judicial commission will resolve. It requires political action first and foremost from our political and union leaders. There are some tough choices to make.

Like we had in the 1990s, to set up a National Peace Accord to deal with a torrent of violence as covert forces sought to destabilise the transition. It was a roadmap based on a set of political principles that established freedom of speech and assembly. But it had the structures that brought together the contesting parties and the state especially the security forces. We had a roadmap that instilled confidence in our communities, compelled us to work together in structures that brought the key protagonists together and created a battalion of peace monitors drawn from all parties that ensured we isolated those who sought to deepen the divisions amongst our people.

My greatest fear is that the massacre at Marikana has become the watershed of our post-Apartheid journey. It has wrought untold physical, financial and psychological damage on all sides and on our social fabric. But if this is not acknowledged and we continue our drift towards the shrill language of divisive finger pointing and muddled leadership and we will end up where we were in 1990.

My greatest hope is that in these extraordinary times, we ask that extraordinary leaders rise from our ranks and take those extraordinary actions to put our country back to the path we set to deliver the better life that we promised our people in 1994. As the proverbial Phoenix, we will rise from burning ashes of broken promises and rebuild the trust with our citizens. And to do this with the absence of political arrogance and with a humility and an honesty that compels us to serve not the interests of leaders but the interests of our people.

- Jay Naidoo is founding General Secretary of Congress of South African Trade Unions, former Minister in the Mandela Government and Chair of the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN). You can follow him on Twitter, or visit his Facebook Page or www.jaynaidoo.org.

Dozens of African health ministers and Chinese health officials this month gathered at the Ministerial Forum on China-Africa Health Development in Beijing, China, to map out new efforts to support Africa’s long-term health progress and shape the future of China-Africa health cooperation.

This was the first-ever meeting of health ministers under the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) since it was established in 2000, demonstrating the highest level of political commitment to tackle Africa’s most pressing health challenges together.

The meeting culminated in the launch of the Beijing Declaration of the Ministerial Forum on China-Africa Health Development, which sets a roadmap for jointly addressing key health challenges across Africa, including malaria, schistosomiasis, HIV/AIDS, reproductive health, immunisation and vaccine preventable diseases.

To read the article titled, “Chinese and African leaders herald a new era of health cooperation,” click here.