Nobody reading national plan
DEAR SIR — I would like to congratulate, through your columns, the detailed response published in the media of the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) to the National Development Plan (NDP).
Presently, South African knees are sore and foreheads bruised from perpetual bowing and scraping to the god of the NDP — but how many of us have actually read it? Who has actually downloaded 400 pages from the internet and studiously absorbed it? President Jacob Zuma? I wonder. Business leaders? I wonder. The editor of Business Day? Conceivably, and shame on you if you have not.
Last week saw the convening of a workshop for the authors of chapters for the next edition of the New South African Review (the third annual edition of which has just been published by Wits University Press). The review brings together leading scholars and civil society activists to reflect on diverse and multiple aspects of the South African experience. In other words, this was a gathering of highly informed people. During a session I was chairing, when the NDP was mentioned, I asked who of the 30odd people in the room had actually read the plan. A few said they had looked at particular aspects, such as what it had to say about gender, or the financialisation of the economy. No one, not even the economists present, had read the whole thing (and that includes me). I suspect this question could be posed in meetings countrywide, with the same dismal result.
So here we have this absurdity. The NDP is now being touted by the government and elites as the biblical source of authority for South African development over the next 20-30 years, and devout reference to it seems to have the effect of shutting down debate. Yet, virtually nobody has read the document in total. The reason? Because the National Planning Commission has not done its job properly and made it generally available in a conveniently readable form. Is this deliberate, or what?
Come on Trevor Manuel! If SA could afford the arms deal, Gautrain, and the large subsidisation of Fifa for the World Cup, surely it can afford to publish at least a few thousand copies of the NDP in book form? Then at least we might be able to encourage the debate that Numsa has sought to initiate.