Fury at diplomats a sign of ubiquitous rot
The timing of reports about the letter foreign investor countries are said to have sent to President Cyril Ramaphosa is almost perfect for good and bad reasons. It is a seminal lesson in the politics of foreign economic relations.
Crucially, it is a lesson in the abject failure of SA’s foreign economic policies and (pay attention at the back) how the near-complete breakdown of trust and failures of public service delivery at home are reflected in the country’s relations with the world. It is the same public service, after all.
It would be foolish to imagine that the maladministration, rentseeking, lack of professionalism, unethical conduct, insolence and crass displays of selfimportance among public servants that have dragged the public service down stopped at the border. It would be foolish to believe the country’s foreign affairs machinery is not part of the broken or dysfunctional departments of state overall.
There are almost daily reports of policy failures, lack of professionalism, incompetence, a sense of entitlement and of corpulent cadres living the life of Riley, generally applying illconceived and short-sighted policies domestically. The department of international relations & co-operation cannot be absolved, nor can it be excluded from closer, more critical scrutiny.
SA’s foreign policy machinery should get the same treatment as that being prepared for other departments and state-owned entities.
Where, then, has the department gone wrong? What is the significance of the document that was reportedly sent to the presidency? Let us go back 10 years, a convenient country place to’start s positioning evaluating in the the world. Let us also keep the focus on the “international”.
We could, of course, go back to 1999, but it is safer to start at the time Jacob Zuma arrived at the Union Buildings and began to make cabinet appointments that would carry the imprimatur of his presidency. At the time you would get a cabinet position that was part of a grand bargain Zuma struck with friends and family, and with odious characters from the business world.
We were still in an era where appointments were made to reward old comrades of the liberation struggle, who would be guaranteed “protection”. The cynosure of such an appointment (and protected employment) was probably Jerry Matjila, whose “current position” is still listed on the department’s website as director-general, though he is also identified elsewhere on the site as “permanent representative of SA to the UN during the UN Security Council meeting on Venezuela”.
In 2013, about halfway through the Zuma presidency, Matjila was caught in a web of financial mismanagement involving an estimated R250m disbursement of funds earmarked for humanitarian support in the Sahel region through the World Food Programme. It was alleged at the time that Matjila personally appointed his preferred company in a R53.9m contract.
It was alleged that he instructed that this service provider be paid 75% of the contract price before any services were provided, and allegedly failed to disclose an unspent balance of R13m resulting from the prepayment of said company.
Matjila was also accused of understating the fund’s irregular expenditure by more than R141m, disclosing R388.1m instead of R529.5m.
Let us assume that Matjila was and remains innocent and that the matter was resolved.
However, as a kind of affirmation of his “protected” status at the time, Matjila sent a defiant memo to staff at the department confirming that he would be safe and that all accusations would wash off his back. One senior official said at the time that Matjila had created the impression that he did, indeed, have political protection.
“He doesn’t seem to realise how serious this thing is. No matter how connected you are, you cannot survive something like this It shows arrogance,” the official said.
“He’s basically showing all of us a middle finger.
“Anyone can conclude that he is protected by people at the top,” the official said.
Recall also how the Norwegian government was approached by an ANC cadre for lunch money.
Anyway, as written in this column previously, it would help if the Zondo commission and the new director of public prosecutions took a closer look at issues that mysteriously disappeared into the ether during the Zuma presidency.
Finally (though there are very many examples), the significance of the document sent to the presidency is an illustration of the dog-and-bone approach to SA’s foreign policy in the democratic era.
While the Europeans were major investors in the country (imagine that as a bone in the dog’s mouth), the easy money the Chinese and Russians waved about was just too tantalising. And we know what happened to the dog next, and the bone.
HE’S BASICALLY SHOWING ALL OF US A MIDDLE FINGER. ANYONE CAN CONCLUDE THAT HE IS PROTECTED BY PEOPLE AT THE TOP Department of international relations & co-operation official
● Lagardien, a visiting professor at the Wits University School of Governance, has worked in the office of the chief economist of the World Bank as well as the secretariat of the National Planning Commission.