Government holds the thread to start stitching together a more equal SA

Astitch in time saves nine, the proverb goes. But what if we don’t heed it? What if we need 10 stitches and we’ve already run out of cotton?

I did quite a bit of flying last week. I don’t enjoy it, even when I do get the occasional lucky upgrade. On an early morning flight from Cape Town to Durban I looked out over the wing. It was an old wing. I could tell — a few more rivets here and there.

Many aircraft in service are more than 20 years old, particularly those used on long-haul flights, because they go through fewer pressurisation cycles.

I wasn’t at all concerned. Aircraft maintenance is mandatory. Airlines fly people across the world and have to know that aircraft pass the flightworthy test, because the consequence of failure is fatal. There is ultimate common cause — survival.

The consequence of neglect and absence of maintenance of other assets and people has similarly disastrous consequences — it just takes a little longer than a plane crash.

Addington Hospital in Durban is joining the list of state hospitals that are dying because of a lack of equipment and a critical shortage of staff.

Even the most hardy doctors and nurses who stick it out in the appalling conditions are wanting to leave. It won’t be long before the fatalities expose the extent of the problem.

The story in education is no better. Without health and education, we expose the core.

Anarchy inevitably follows neglect. Rules of societal coexistence crumble. Force becomes the currency of survival instead of civil rights.

I read with dismay that Johannesburg was going to be without electricity for 33 hours at the weekend. This time it’s not due to load shedding but cable theft. What with commodity prices up where they are and the weaker rand …

The truth is that vandalism and anarchy have already taken hold of Johannesburg’s inner city. Thugs rule when law and order stands aside.

We have to come up with an investable grand plan that attracts foreign domestic investment into SA by the bucketful. We need permanent investment into assets that stay here.

To attract foreign capital, our endgame must be known and credible. To reach consensus on the endgame we must have common cause. To get started, we must have local priorities. We can get to the endgame incrementally, but we cannot expect incremental, short-term plans to create an endgame.

The good news is that the endgame has already been decided — we all voted for it in 1994. A better life for all.

If every investment decision was driven by that axiom, we would succeed.

It is structurally incompetent to presume that economic inequality, which is at the root of the problem, can be resolved by promoting the notion that if select groups look after themselves, the entire national ecosystem will survive.

The primary inputs to a competitive economy must be assured by the state, whether or not in partnership with the private sector. Minimum levels of comparative output must be assured for all citizens. A matric must be a matric.

Safety, education and healthcare are not negotiable. Elements of design for the solution will be found in what may at first appear to be unlikely partnerships. Technology is an economic equaliser. At the margin, the incremental cost of technology roll-out to the masses approaches zero.

It is different in the roll-out of physical infrastructure — the last building still has to be built from the foundations up, but at least an asset remains. It should therefore come as no surprise that a marriage between physical infrastructure and technology has virtue. It provides access to the markets at the right (the same) price for everybody. No one gets left behind.

Business and labour obviously need to partner, to match the economic attributes of the business model to the economic aspirations of the workforce. Year-on-year inflation-linked salary increases simply don’t match fluctuating profitability — incentive schemes do.

The government is the main player in the economy. If it does not naturally engage in partnerships with business, then dual economies will emerge that will entrench, not solve, inequality.

The investment-harvest cycle is known to all of us in life, let alone business. Neglect anything — your body, your relationship, your friends — for long enough and you will surely reach that point of no return at which there simply aren’t enough threads left to stitch together again.

We’re close to that point. We’d better start stitching.

ANARCHY INEVITABLY FOLLOWS NEGLECT. FORCE BECOMES THE CURRENCY OF SURVIVAL INSTEAD OF CIVIL RIGHTS