Better the devil you know in politics

Better the devil you know in political choices

The retired Terry Tselane of the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) possibly remembered more for attacks he received from some ANC politicians subsequent to the Kwesi sympathisers at the elections announcement centre, than for his sterling work at the IEC raised an important point of the continued imminence of coalition politics in South Africa. This is not only at the local government level but at the provincial and increasingly at national levels as well. Coalition politics are generally a positive feature of maturing body politic. But they are also a feature of a “second hand car dealership” of wheeling and dealing amongst the political elite. It thus facilitate corruption with no regard to severe implications on society. In that regard they are a feature of a weak state. Lesotho a country of my birth whose only neighbour is South Africa has classically perfected how this political wheeling and dealing is undertaken. South Africa seems to be a very brilliant student of Lesotho if the local government sphere of contestation is anything to go by. 

The season for 2019 Election season is now wide open and South Africans are not going to be short of a reality show as politicians of all shape and sizes, all walks of life come to the fore. The Zondo Commission on State Capture sits right in the middle of this and stands as perfect fodder for the public to assess where we have been and where we could be headed with our politics. The revelations from the commission stand very awkwardly between what could be matrimonial vows political parties and formations look forward to with society. In a very dramatic way the commission places before us as society questions about what informs our choices. This is however not new because in 2009 we were faced with a similar situation where society was served with allegations against the President of the ruling party and what would then be the President of the country. Our vows as society wereetched on better the devil we know. In fact all who argued in favour of the Tzunamirapidly fell out of favour and could be seen in the casualty ward of political contestation no sooner than the Tzunami took office. The Zondo Commission and many others now which mark the highest list of commissions on malfaecence in South Africa’s governance set for us the exact conditions of choice in the 2019 Elections as were prevalent in 2009. South Africa thus faces an examination and test on their capacity to learn from history in the making of choices.

With what we know to date from both the trove of the Gupta leaks to the VBS it is clear that the choices are not going to be about who is best to govern but about who is not worst. In that regard therefore coalition politics, is not a feature of maturing democracy it is a representation of a weak state. With a hollowed out economy, hollowed out credibility in institutions and hollowed out capacity to govern South Africa represents that which has fallen from the dizzy heights. The harder therefore it is thus poised to fall. 

What are then the crutches South Africa could use as it attempts to rise out of this sorry state of affairs? There are many and immediate and in this regard the Statistician-General of South Africa who in his own right is a legislative institutionprovides these crutches for society to be informed in their choices. In his recent mirror of society on labour markets, the Statistician-General Risenga Maluleke does not only show that the patient is in comatose but the evidence is one of a terminally ill patient. 

Stepping back from the near mortuary evidence on the state of unemployment in South Africa and understanding what this means and how it informs our planning, is it not time that we use this evidence that the Statistician-General provides for assessment of our politics, especially in the face of the imminence of coalition politics. This may go a long way to strengthen the state of the state. If it were so how then would the political parties assess the performance of their mayors? Possibly differently. Looking at the third quarter Labour Force Survey (QLFS) of the Statistician-General there is no doubt from the evidence that the executive mayor of the Cape Metro and that of Durban Metro have not been the worst in the contest of the ugly. Their unemployment figures have shown a consistent pattern of improvement and one well below the national average of 27.5%. When this evidence surfaces, the country has to ask what is it that these mayors of these two metros have done to address that which has set the country in comatose and near inescapable mortality and what can we learn from Patricia De Lille the ex-mayor of Cape metro? 

In our high political stakes characterizing weak states, our road out of it is through the use of the raft of statistics from the Statistician-General of South Africa. Thisshould inform our choices of political leadership and long term planning and plans, lest as excellent students of coalition politics of weak states we emulate our teacher neighbor Lesotho.  In politics it is true better is the devil you know. Statistics is that devil.

Dr Pali Lehohla is the former statistician-general of South Africa and former head of Statistics South Africa