More than meets the eye in e-toll debate
THE Supreme Court of Appeal’s ruling in favour of the South African National Roads Agency (Sanral) on the issue of the Gauteng e-tolls raises a number of side issues in addition to those that made headlines. One of these is the question of the usefulness of the provincial tier of government, which many people seem to have written off as a waste of resources. I have always maintained that no matter how poorly some of the provinces perform, we should think twice before scrapping the provinces in favour of governance from the centre for fear of unforeseen consequences. Actually, some of the potential negative consequences are completely foreseeable, especially as our entire system of political accountability, as set out in the constitution, is based on checks and balances between the two houses of Parliament — the National Assembly and the National Council of Provinces. It is true that this system does not function very well, leaving much to be desired in the area of MPs’ accountability to the electorate in particular, but that is largely a function of the electoral system and the African National Congress’s (ANC’s) political dominance for the past 20 years. With all but one of the provinces controlled by the party that also holds power nationally, the system has never really had a chance to prove its mettle.
But that might be about to change and the e-tolls debacle could be the catalyst in Gauteng. The provincial ANC has got itself in a pickle trying to disassociate itself from e-tolls while simultaneously toeing the party line, a contradiction the Democratic Alliance (DA) exploited with its recent highway billboard campaign. And the ANC sank even deeper into the mire by allowing itself to be sucked into the #BroughtToYouByANC Twitter “debate”. If you want to avoid a beating in political gangland, don’t wander alone into the opposition’s stronghold, which the social media undoubtedly are for the DA.
Now the Gauteng ANC will have to go into next year’s election alternating between a half-hearted defence of the e-toll concept and wringing its hands apologetically, while supposedly campaigning handin-hand with its alliance partner, the Congress of South African Trade Unions. The latter remains implacably opposed to e-tolls, to the point of leading calls for a civil disobedience campaign. What a mess, one that could cost the ANC dearly in middle-class votes next year just as its support base is simultaneously eroded from the left by Julius Malema and his Economic Freedom Fighters.
It is clear the Gauteng ANC dropped the ball on the e-tolls issue and that this was largely because it took its re-election for granted. The party would have done the same in the Western Cape were it not for the fact that it lost control of first Cape Town, then the province, to the DA. A similar toll road process has been suspended in the Cape through legal action by the city, which first asked the Western Cape High Court to review Sanral and the national government’s decision to declare parts of the N1 and N2 highways in the winelands approaching Cape Town as toll roads, and then obtained an interdict preventing Sanral from concluding any toll-related contracts before the judicial review has been completed.
There are several reasons the Cape project is more difficult to justify than its Gauteng counterpart and easier for its opponents to halt, and with the ANC desperate to win back the province, it is going to be interesting to see how the party handles the toll road issue once the court process is out of the way. Will it stick to the principle it has sacrificed so much to establish in Gauteng, killing all prospects of a political comeback in the Western Cape, or allow the DA to score a popular victory?
Governments have a right to pass unpopular laws, as long as they follow due process, are rational and comply with the constitution. The factor that has been missing in SA for the past 20 years is political consequences — there have been few or none as far as the ANC is concerned. But that is changing as the electorate wakes up to the truism that the price of freedom really is eternal vigilance, a role provincial governments and the National Council of Provinces have shirked for too long.
Marrs is Cape editor.