Zuma ‘repaying himself for being a herdboy’

DR MAMPHELA Ramphele says President Jacob Zuma is “repaying himself for all those years of being a herdboy”.

Speaking at Stellenbosch University Business School’s Leader’s Angle event, she said the country had allowed the president “and his mates from India” to do this.

She said the Gupta e-mail leaks were worrying examples of corporate complicity with corruption.

“It demonstrates the failure of business leaders, including corporates operating as auditors and assurers of propriety such as McKinsey, KPMG, and SAP to uphold the rule of law,” she said.

Ramphele added that public sector corruption would not thrive without complicity by the private sector.

“Business leaders have the opportunity to re-imagine both their country and their roles as citizens so they can be guided by an image of a future they can shape and believe in,” she said.

South Africa was reeling from “inter-generational trauma” caused by the Anglo-Boer wars, apartheid and the current government, she said.

“We need an emotional settlement. You can’t have freedom without socio-economic freedom,” she said, adding that the country had not completely healed.

“We have lost the passion that came with the dream of 1994.”

Ramphele said South Africa was “a one-legged pot”, with history and present events weighing it down.

Business schools, she said, had an opportunity to help current leaders to review their roles in re-imagining this country. She called on these schools to be active corporate citizens and to forge close relations with their employees.

“Is it not in the interests of business leaders to invest in promoting these civic values in their personnel development programmes so as to build shared value-based workplaces to enhance trust and productivity in business operations?” she asked.

“Business has a vested interest in ensuring that we promote the emergence of confident, skilled 21st century citizens from our schools and a higher education and training system.”

Citing a 2015 World Economic Forum report, Ramphele said the country’s maths and science education remained poor, with war-ravaged countries such as Yemen and the Democratic Republic of Congo ranking above SA in the report.

The country will never be competitive if we don’t tackle the gross levels of education, Ramphele said.

“African children were denied access to appropriate facilities to develop their capabilities. This ensured they remained under-performers. The tragedy is both black and white learners are reaping the whirlwind of a poor performing school system and demoralised teachers.”