Johannesburg: Two anniversaries this year, in many ways, book-end South Africa’s transition from an apartheid state to a constitutional democracy.
The first, on March 17, marks 25 years since a whites-only referendum, gave the apartheid government a mandate to begin negotiating the end of apartheid, with the now ruling African National Congress (ANC).
Today, the referendum has faded into insignificance in South Africa, overtaken by the much more significant events that followed in the history of South Africa.
The other, marks twenty years of the adoption of the South African constitution. Signed into law by former President Nelson Mandela, it came into operation on February 4, 1997. That occasion symbolises the end of formal apartheid. There are plans to commemorate the founding document, widely acclaimed but whose institutions are in many ways being tested as never before, throughout this year.
The executive director of the Council for the Advancement of the South African Constitution, Lawson Naidoo, credits the constitution with helping to guide South Africa through the tumultuous years after apartheid, and ensuring ordinary people benefited from the social and economic rights which came with democracy.
“The Constitution and its institutions, despite some failings, have held firm in protecting its values and protecting the interests of South Africans,” he said.
Weaknesses in the parliament and the executive have pushed the Constitution and the judiciary, into increasingly contested political terrain.
In a landmark judgement last year, the Constitutional Court found that the president, Jacob Zuma, had failed to uphold the constitution and that Parliament had not held him accountable for his actions. The judgement set the tone for increasingly acrimonious debates between political parties in Parliament, around Zuma’s fitness to hold office, which has led to members of the opposition being violently removed from the National Assembly.
And what is perceived by some as a high-handed actions by the executive and weak oversight by Parliament, has led political parties and others to repeatedly take the government to court — where it has often lost. Most recently, South Africa was forced to retract its notice of intent to withdraw from the International Criminal Court, when a South African court ruled that the executive action was illegal.
Frustrated by the stymying of its more doubtful policies and regulations, some factions in government are seen to have resorted to white-anting the rule of law and constitutional institutions. In part because of divisions in government and the ruling ANC, South African law enforcement agencies are tied up investigating claims and counter-claims of corruption and abuse of power, in state institutions.
Perhaps most worrying, the finance minister, Pravin Gordhan, widely credited with maintaining fiscal discipline and promoting good governance, has often been the target of institutions and Cabinet colleagues who want a freer hand in the national treasury.
But Naidoo is confident that South Africa will remain a functioning constitutional democracy. “While the judiciary has played a key role in holding institutions to account and upholding the rule of law, we also have a vibrant and alert media and civil society,” he explained. “But, he also warned: “Society must take responsibility for protecting the constitution and strengthening its institutions, and civil society is beginning to wake up to this challenge.”
ANC
Approximately seventeen million South Africans depend on social grants to help their families survive. The massive expansion of the country’s social security system is one of the major achievements of the African National Congress (ANC), which has governed South Africa for the past 20 years. The grants are an essential stopgap to social unrest in South Africa, which continues to battle persistently high levels of unemployment, poverty and inequality.
But now the programme is mired in legal pitfalls, tainted by allegations of corruption and being harmed by self-interested politicians — much like the ANC.
South Africa’s Constitutional Court has ruled that the contract, awarded to a company to distribute social grants in South Africa, was flawed and ordered that it be replaced by 1 April 2017. Now, weeks before the deadline expires, the agency and its minister, Bathebile Dlamini, have admitted to the Court that they do not have an alternative means of making the payments. The matter is back before the Court. But, even if the grants are paid, public faith in the ANC’s stewardship of the social grants programme — an election winner for the party — has been shaken.
South African President, Jacob Zuma, has continued to back his minister, who is perceived to promote and protect the interests of a head of state who has 783 counts of corruption hanging over him. South African risk analyst, Justice Malala, says: “The crisis is symbolic of an ANC that has lost its connection with the poorest of the poor and is incompetent in government. It does not care about the people, only about connected politicians.” There is much talk that the ANC is on the same political trajectory as its namesake, the Indian National Congress.
Malala does not think the ANC will lose power at the ballot box in 2019 general election, but he is much less sure about the next poll. In the meantime, the country faces increasing popular unrest as a weak government remains unable to effectively tackle social problems, from demands for free education, to violent protests against, crime and corruption.
