Not yet time for SA to celebrate
THE news of President Jacob Zuma’s imminent departure is probably the best thing we have heard over the past 10 years.
Save for the newly formed Zuma government’s decision to roll out ARVs to HIV-positive people, there has been nothing to celebrate of his government.
If anything, he spent his two presidential terms eroding and reversing every gain and progress that this country had made since the dawn of democracy in 1994.
Nelson Mandela’s project of nation building and the rainbow nation brought us much closer as South Africa’s racial groupings. This could not have been an easy task, given our bitter and painful past of racial hatred driven by the murderous apartheid regime.
Thabo Mbeki’s mission was to grow the economy and create jobs.
He struggled with achieving the latter objective, but during his presidency not only did the ANC record its highest electoral success, we also saw the country’s economy grow at an average of 4.1%.
It has been on a downward spiral since then with an average gross domestic product growth of 1.7% under Zuma.
Granted the global financial crisis of 2008 negatively affected our economy, as it did others around the world.
However, other developing countries of similar profile to ours have continued to grow at better rates than we did. For instance Kenya – with a population of 48million – continues to confound economists by growing at remarkable rates (5.8% in 2016; 5.5% in 2017 and 5.8% projected this year) despite the instability in the region and the country.
This suggests that were it not for Zuma’s mismanagement of our economy, we would be in a far better position than we currently find ourselves.
The ANC was expected to hold a special national executive committee meeting yesterday at which Zuma’s fate would have been decided. But clearly Zuma has finally read the mood and came down from his proverbial high horse – after meeting with ANC president Cyril Ramaphosa and agreeing to finally step down.
The two are understood to have agreed on Zuma’s long-overdue departure subject to a number of preconditions being met.
The latter part should concern us for one reason – we should not be bargaining with Zuma. It is a recipe for disaster.
Given his dodgy behaviour and his inclination to associate with people of questionable conduct, it is unlikely that any deal struck with Zuma will be in the interests of justice. While our immediate reaction at the news of the impending Zuma departure would be to pop the champagne bottles and toast the demise of a destructive president, we should not lose focus and be blinded by the temporary euphoria over his imminent departure.
Rather we should begin to ask ourselves the crucial questions: what do we all, individually, have to do to ensure that we contribute to the rebuilding of our country and economy? We need to get the stagnant economy moving again, to create the muchneeded jobs, and restore citizens’ faith in the state. We do not have time to waste.