Business missed its chance to oust Zuma
Private sector lobbies against junk status but failed to stipulate one condition, says Sipho Pityana
THE people of South Africa will not forgive the ANC if it allows the country to be downgraded to junk status by not recalling President Jacob Zuma, says Sipho Pityana.
“The ANC will be punished in 2019 as it was in the local government elections,” says the former director-general of the departments of labour and foreign affairs and chairman of AngloGold Ashanti and investment company Izingwe Capital, among others.
“It will be signing its own death warrant. If there is a downgrade, the ANC must kiss the 2019 elections goodbye.”
Pityana is highly critical of the business lobby for allowing itself to be used by the government to try to stave off a sovereign ratings downgrade without insisting on the removal of Zuma as a condition of its assistance. As long as Zuma remains president, these efforts are as useful as spitting in the wind, he says.
“I am disappointed that business has not come out more clearly and unequivocally to make the point that it doesn’t serve the project we are driving as business of saving the country from a sovereign downgrade as long as we have a leader with questionable credentials.
“Business should have come out firmly to say it doesn’t augur well for the country or the economy or attracting investment if the word of the president of the country cannot be trusted.”
Business should have laid down firm conditions for its partnership with the government, he says.
Business leaders are damaging their credibility by promising ratings agencies and the international investment community that South Africa will meet commitments relating to government spending and stateowned enterprises that they know cannot be met as long as Zuma remains in charge.
The ongoing disaster at SAA proves his point.
“You have business leaders focusing on the establishment of an entrepreneur fund, on this or that aspect of the economy.
“Meanwhile, the parastatals are being destroyed by corruption and mismanagement, and Zuma is protecting those responsible.”
The impeccably educated (University of London, University of Essex) Pityana, 57, is himself among the business elite which he suggests has lacked courage.
The only thing that rescues him from a charge of hypocrisy perhaps is the blunt condemnation of Zuma and the leadership of the ANC which he delivered to their faces (except for Zuma, who wasn’t there) at the funeral of ANC veteran Makhenkesi Stofile.
In spite of warnings to tighten up on personal security and expect the South African Revenue Service to start taking a very close interest in his affairs, he has no intention of backing off. He is propelled by desperation as he watches the country hurtling to a downgrade which he says will be a “catastrophe” of a scale most South Africans cannot begin to imagine.
Business has not insisted that the government should take tough action and clean up its act “because these are uncomfortable matters to raise when we meet with the government”, he says.
“So we go for soft options that leave everybody feeling comfortable and at peace with one another. But the tough questions are not being asked.
“There is no voice from business that says: ‘We are facing a sovereign rating downgrade the consequences of which would not only obliterate the economy but create sociopolitical instability.”
“There is no voice from business saying: ‘We need fresh, decisive leadership.’
“Who would have thought at a time of crisis like today we as business leaders are incapable of doing what business leaders under apartheid were able to do: break ranks with the state and say it as it is.”
Business leaders would argue that this is what they did when they forced Zuma to reappoint Pravin Gordhan as finance minister after he fired Nhlanhla Nene.
“That was dealing with the symptoms of the problem, not the problem. The issue was, why was Nene being removed? Because he was refusing to play ball with certain powers that be. That’s the reality.”
Business should have insisted that the government and the ANC deal with it before being party to a global and fundamentally misleading public relations exercise.
“It doesn’t help for business leaders to be running around the world meeting with the markets, trying to persuade the markets that things are going to come right. As business leaders, we are risking our own reputations in promoting a project that has no prospect of success.
“We should say it as it is. That in this president we do not have a leader that enjoys our confidence as business. We do not have a leader who can help rescue this country.”
Business leaders must confront the president in the presence of his cabinet and ask him to step down.
Then they must meet with the ANC and ask it to recall the president.
Third, they must meet the speaker of parliament and chair of the National Council of Provinces and get them to table a letter from business calling on parliament to pass a vote of no confidence in the president.
“The voice of business saying to government ‘This is what must happen’ is a very powerful voice.”
Business Leadership South Africa, Business Unity South Africa and the Black Business Council must join forces to do this. Those who are part of Zuma’s patronage network must be made to understand that his leadership will bring them down with the rest of the country.
If none of this works, then business leaders must come clean with potential investors.
“We must let the world know that we have a president who is not capable of doing the things that will result in good returns for the investment that they make in this country.”
First, they must “warn” the government and ANC that this is what they will do if Zuma remains.
“Because we are the custodians of the investments of workers and pensioners from other parts of the world.
“To invest in a country that is led by leaders who have no sense of the negative impact that an unstable government, a corrupt regime, has on the economy, doesn’t help at all.”
Pityana wants ANC members to push for “an urgent elective conference and get rid of this leadership. We do not have good-quality leaders.”
South Africans need to call their public representatives to account because they elected Zuma.
“They must go to parliament, they must go to the ANC to say that this person is in breach of his oath of office, he is untrustworthy, he is no longer honourable, he cannot be trusted to live up to any promises he makes to anybody in the world.”
He stops short of calling for a march on Luthuli House and parliament.
“The members of the ANC must act in accordance with their conscience and responsibility. They must tell their leaders, the national executive com- mittee, that this is what they expect.”
Consultation processes are happening between the NEC and various other ANC structures, he says, but “these structures must tell their leaders: ‘Don’t talk to us until Jacob Zuma is out.’ ”
Pityana says the levels of unemployment, “social distress” and service delivery protests being experienced now will seem like a picnic if South Africa receives a junk investmentgrade rating.
He doubts the government would be able to contain the situation. “We would have all that at a point when the leadership in office would enjoy even less credibility with the masses than it has now.”
The business people funding the ANC “should use the leverage this gives them to put pressure on the ANC to get Zuma to step down”.
Business leaders should make it “very clear” to the government that their assistance in trying to avert a downgrade is conditional on Zuma going.
Otherwise, what business is doing is “spitting in the wind”.
He says Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa, who told him after his speech “We hear you”, needs to “start showing the country he is ready to lead. He should make it clear he is not prepared to be part of what is going on, even if this means sacrificing his chance to be president.”
He needs to confront Zuma head-on and tell him to go.
If Zuma refuses, then Ramaphosa must step down as deputy president and “lead an internal revolt within the ANC. There is a large body of people within the ANC, including within the leadership, who would support him.”
If there is a downgrade, the ANC must kiss the 2019 general elections goodbye Ramaphosa, who told him ‘we hear you’, needs to start showing the country he is ready to lead