Graft, rigid quotas behind meltdown

IN ACCOUNTING for the bleak state of municipal finances in KwaZulu-Natal, Finance MEC Ravi Pillay makes no reference to the two fundamental causes of the meltdown of governance in South Africa, namely, corruption and the ideology of transformation (The Mercury, August 18).

He ascribes the situation to “high levels of vacancies and the resignation of key officials” and that “most municipalities struggle with basic financial management processes”.

Unwittingly, Pillay is conceding that the ANC’s policy of transformation is the cause of the disastrous state that prevails in governance.

Institutional memory and skills are available, but because they do not qualify in terms of the ANC’s rigid racial representivity quotas, they are ignored. Then, of course, there is the ANC’s policy of employing cadres irrespective of their skills or qualifications – a situation which facilitates looting.

Lamenting the state of municipal finances and service delivery without providing a solution has become the mantra of officials like Pillay, who are powerless to fix the problem because their policies are the problem.

The ANC has had 26 years to prove their 1994 claim that they were “ready to govern”.

In failing to do so, they have retarded every functional aspect they inherited in 1994.

In seeking to transform South Africa from an apartheid state to a non-racial state, the only and obvious policy that should have been applied is that of merit.

Instead, greed and racial vindictiveness has resulted in a new apartheid and baasskap based on black majoritarianism, to the detriment of all.

DUNCAN DU BOIS | Bluff