by davidrobertlewis -

BRICS neo-colonialism demonstrated by Putin’s threat of war against South Africa

REVELATIONS of Russian dictator Vladimir Putin’s temper tantrums, with a threat of armed aggression against the Republic, including a possible declaration of war, have come to light, after a judge ordered that President Ramaphosa’s affidavit on an ICC arrest warrant be made public this week.

The Gauteng High Court ordered that President Cyril Ramaphosa’s confidential affidavit related to an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin be made public by 2pm on Tuesday.

Constitutional and international law expert André Thomashausen was reported as saying President Cyril Ramaphosa‘s confidential affidavit is of a “very high quality” and speaks of the seriousness of the Russia/Ukraine conflict which is the biggest crisis since World War II.

The saucy affidavit, which was made public on Tuesday, claimed arresting President Vladimir Putin if he travelled to South Africa for the Brics summit in August would be a ‘declaration of war with Russia’. Putin has previously threatened to attack any nation which resists his efforts to crush Ukraine, with nuclear weapons, a threat already discounted by the West.

The president told the Pretoria High Court in Gauteng that South Africa ‘does not have the capacity nor appetite to wage war with Russia and Putin’, which begs the question as to who exactly our partners in BRICS are?

BRICS is the fanciful result of an acronym invented by an economist at Goldman Sachs, Jim O’Neill in his report, ‘Building Better Global Economic BRIC’.

Rock, paper, BRICS?

The informal group, much like the now defunct FAANG, is dominated by China, but added South Africa in 2010, with the resulting politicking and economic intrigues, tending to distract attention and energy from another more important, tangible bloc, the African Union.

BRICS member states include members with an autocracy, and even a one-party state where trade unions are banned, have increasingly sort to formalise their political and economic ties to compete with groups such as the G7 and western nations, despite major secular differences in approach to issues such as Gay marriage, minority rights and women.

As part of this neocolonial, brutal one-upmanship, dedollarisation alongside the introduction of a much-vaunted new BRICS currency backed by gold, has been mooted by Putin supporters, eager to escape Western sanctions.

Lavrov promotes ‘dedollarisation’ as if not having access to Western markets (which account for over 50% of South African trade), is somehow a positive move, and all that is required for Russia to succeed, is to avoid post-Bretton Woods financial institutions, while engaging currency unification talks with China?

Return of the Gold Standard?

Exactly where all the required gold lucre would come from to pay for the war, and who would pay for the storage of the hard asset in a system long-since abandoned, is unclear. The gold standard was abandoned in 1971 due to its ‘propensity for volatility, as well as the constraints it imposed on governments: by retaining a fixed exchange rate, ‘governments were hamstrung in engaging in expansionary policies to, for example, reduce unemployment during economic recessions’.

In a speech filled with sketchy ideological keynotes, Dr Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma speaking in Durban, attacked South Africa’s financial institutions whilst promoting the BRICS bank (and by implication, gold standard) as some kind of panacea for development financing.

The problem with this rhetoric is that gold itself is in reality, a non-productive asset, since it does not produce interest nor even dividends as such. Gold as a metal is historically favoured for its being inert, but in an era of bitcoin and crypto-currency, it is not entirely certain what role such an asset should play in our future?

Dlamini-Zuma claims without any proven research, “we need an alternative public banking and finance system beyond the dominant one, and we need it urgently. The New Development Bank is thus a step in the right direction, but we need to domesticate alternative banking as a matter of urgency.“

Banks are a mirage, what is Dlamini-Zuma talking about?

While banking institutions have certainly opened up in South Africa over the past years, with several new online banks, some with zero-fees, being given licenses, the so-called BRICS bank is already hobbled by the fact that it exists, like most banks, as a patron and client of the global financial system, which begs the question, in which world, would the new system reside?

The mirage of a separate banking reality, is seen by the fact that China itself, has had a policy of yuan devaluation for decades in order to promote exports and would find it extremely difficult to move towards a system in which it provided a physical asset such as gold for every yuan or Renmimbi printed.

Brazil on the other hand is heavily in debt to its eyeballs, and would certainly benefit from offloading its debt and banana economy onto poorer nations such as South Africa.

India is the only shining light so far as real economics is concerned, but most of this is the result of the ICT service sector, in which the West and Western markets play an enormous role. Apple Computer for example, just posted outstanding results for its India division, with the kind of numbers that political appointees such as Dlamini-Zuma tend to ignore.

South Africa which is blessed with a modern and open financial system, after decades of exchange controls, could do better than empty rhetoric, by focusing on the key element that has driven India’s surging economy, a digital growth strategy that presents a vastly different picture to that of China’s state corporations, many of whom, like China Rail, are running at a loss.

Admittedly, Chinese policy-driven expansion, where the party pulls the strings, has delivered remarkable engineering achievements, but it is also leading to gross dislocations of capital, as seen by the recent Evergreen property boom and bust.

Jim O’Neill’s unproven theory seemed like a good idea at the time.

BRICS may seem like a good idea, but its political impact as shown by Putin’s threats of war, and fallout from the West, shows it also has a lot of shortcomings. Indeed the ‘BRICS Bank’ has already demonstrated its unwillingness to fund member states such as Russia. And thus a lot of the takeaway points being thrown around by cuckold politicos on the left, are really meatless bones provided to the masses to gnaw on.

As delegates arrive in South Africa for the BRICS schmoozefest, attempting to show a unified face while dining on cream puffs, remember that efforts to expand the BRICS group in recent years, to include nations such as Saudi Arabia and Iran, both of whom practice gender apartheid, would lead to a paradox of shrinking influence for smaller states according to Patrick Bond. It has also resulted in the diminution of the AU as a focal point in our own backyard.

The Democratic Alliance (DA) thus went to court on Monday to compel Ramaphosa to share the Putin document” on a ‘mission of clarity regarding the ICC threat of arrest’. Ramaphosa had argued the contents could not be shared because he was prohibited from doing so due to international law that governs the workings of the International Criminal Court (ICC).

by davidrobertlewis -

Putin presents Pretoria with a not-so-pretty pickle

NO SOONER had Pretoria (Tshwane) shown the world that it cared very little for the UN Charter codifying the major principles of international relations, from sovereign equality of States to the prohibition of the use of force in international relations, it found itself facing a legal problem presented by the International Criminal Court (ICC).

The issue of Putin’s attendance at a BRICS summit  the upcoming 15th BRICS Summit from August 22 to 24, in Durban following the ICC issuing an arrest warrant, comes after the SANDF conducted military exercises with Russia and China on the anniversary of the invasion of Ukraine.

It was an embarrassing show of support for the aggressor, presenting a major predicament. On the one hand foreign minister Naledi Pandor claims South Africa is neutral on the issue of the Ukraine war, supposedly practising a ‘continental tradition of non-alignment’, on the other, the country has aligned itself with an emerging power-bloc that includes Russia.

The embattled Ramaphosa government may just have to decide which side its bread is buttered. It cannot simply pretend the world is not watching, or that ANC civil rights history translates into eternal immunity from world opinion. The fading Mandela Miracle which birthed a Rainbow Nation has rapidly turned into a tragic story of hubris and self-defeating political intrigue.

While many within the ruling party, see the BRICS Development Bank as an all-important counter to ‘Bretton Woods’ financial institutions, the reality is far from the rhetoric — most of the country’s economic activity involves the West, with trade far outweighing business within the BRICS bloc. Though China ranks ahead of the USA $11.69B vs $10.73B, the addition of the EU, UK and Japan make such a comparison seem absurd.

Germany$8.83B2022
Japan$8.50B2022
United Kingdom$6.30B2022
Netherlands$6.02B2022
Trade with the West far outweighs BRICS trade

The BRICS bank, a hallmark of the political project which begun under Zuma, is by no means independent, and the price of gaining an international banking conceit, one which translates into an essentially unproven claim, a counter-weight to the Washington Consensus, (Putin’s much vaunted “multipolarity”), may yet turn out to be a unsustainable, too expensive and complicated in the long run.

Much like the G20, BRICS (a product of the Left) is merely an artificial acronym invented by Goldman Sachs economist Jim O’Neill , to denote the five biggest emerging economies. It is currently neither a political nor an economic union, and stands awkwardly on the world stage, unlike the more important African Union and SADC, both also teetering on the brink of collapse, the product of ANC neglect.

South Africa’s economy has been unable to post meaningful growth figures over the past five years, despite the launch of the African Continental Free Trade Area (ACFTA). The welcome trade surpluses (a factor under Ramaphosa’s drive for R1 trillion investment) have swung into a deficit of R23.05 billion — a significant decline from January 2022’s R4.64 billion trade balance surplus — amidst signs that multinationals like BP may be quietly withdrawing from the country, sensing sanctions on the horizon?

Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor is thus effectively steering the nation down a rather bleak path, (in step with Iranian Ayatollahs) one that could lead to outright sanctions, trade embargoes and equivalent loss of influence and prestige.

Twenty-six African countries voted in favor of a resolution rejecting Moscow’s controversial 2022 referenda in four Ukrainian regions, with South Africa increasingly isolated and outmanoeuvred on the continent.

Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana is already battling grey-listing by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) for falling short of international standards for the combating of money laundering and other serious financial crimes, and Pandor appears to be working hard to essentially sabotage his efforts. It is no coincidence the FATF action also occurred on the anniversary of the Ukraine invasion.

More worrying is the manner in which the country, (more so under its previous President Zuma), appears to be importing organised crime — adopting Putin’s kleptocratic system of state capture and oligarchy to some extant, a system benefiting economic elites at the expense of ordinary citizens.

The findings of the Zondo Commission into corruption and state capture have yet to translate into meaningful prosecution and jail-time for the culprits.

South Africa may yet return to the period in which it was viewed as the polecat of the world.

SEE: Pandor’s prevarication over Ukraine, Lavrov parallels Pik Botha statements on special military operation against SWAPO

by davidrobertlewis -

Flogging an Eskom dead horse? You’ve got it all wrong

SO LONG as this country myopically persists with it’s strange obsession in maintaining the Eskom energy monopoly, there will be load-shedding and blackouts. Consumers desperately require choices in energy provider, options on who can connect their home grid, to power the toaster and microwave oven. But practically nobody here is speaking out on the lack of consumer choice when it comes to electricity.

Its as if energy analysts are brainwashed morons flogging the proverbial dead horse, each year they call for inquiries into why the horse died, reclassifying the dead horse as ‘living impaired’, arrange for officials to visit other countries to ‘see how they ride dead horses’, call for additional funding and training to ‘improve the dead horse’s performance’, or the hiring of outside contractors to ‘ride the dead horse’, and so on, but are simply too afraid to ‘let go of the horse’, lest they be out of a job.

What is wrong with you people?

A decade ago I attended a talk by David Lipshitz, founder and CEO of MyPowerStation. A company which aims to provide a ‘virtual power station’ solution via online billing and provisioning of energy services to consumers. His magnificent idea of introducing information technology to the sale of electricity to the end-user and consumer, has been stymied by a regulatory environment which is more in keeping with a 19th Century model of distribution than the 21st century.

Lipshitz’s website is now merely a link to his book, The Last Blackout, available via Amazon.

“What would happen if city dwellers in cities with more than 1 million people suddenly had no electricity?” asks Lipshitz in an ‘electrifying, shocking, and powerful thriller’, that is too close for comfort. The past week has seen some areas of South Africa experiencing 9 hour blackouts. The weekend was a series of 6 hours of load-shedding for my own household.

South Africa’s model of energy distribution requires urgent and drastic intervention. And I don’t mean to re-engage the debate on where our electricity should be coming from in other words, how it is produced. Doing so merely adds to the pile of doggy-doo dolled up by consultants, analysts and self-proclaimed experts dished up on national television on a daily basis.

Whether or not, electricity is provided by the state, or Independent Power Producers (IPPs) is of no real consequence in a system in which the end-user is placed at the forefront. There are no rational reasons why consumers should not be given the choice of purchasing energy from sustainable resources, whether women-owned utilities, or listed companies with a high ESG and BEE component. Let the people decide.

Unfortunately, and despite the mooted plans to open Eskom’s grid to the ‘wheeling of energy’ by third parties, there remain a number of obstacles. The first is the fact that our government and especially its Marxist Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe, continues to embrace a blind focus on centralisation. You can read my piece on why the state is rooted in an ideological fixation, the problem of ‘Socialist Complexity’, and my proposal for an Energy Commons. I continue to believe a commons is a ‘way out of the debt trap’.

Eskom is heavily in debt and clearly unprofitable when it comes to the generation of electricity, and is a prime example of why governments and bureaucrats are less efficient than the market and free enterprise when it comes to allocation of capital. Which is why we continue to see the introduction of tariff increases several times over the inflation rate. Is more money really going to solve the problem?

Not when we have the bizarre situation in which our Muni’s and Metro’s, alongside the corner Cafe ‘prepaid token’ store, are all added to the game of profiting off the bulk sale of electricity, energy provided by a grossly inefficient pyramid scheme by a solitary, underperforming producer of electricity. Nobody is fooled by people like Cape Town mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis promising the City will bring new capacity online, give or take a megawatt, or our President Ramaphosa, racing home to declare yet another electricity crisis requiring a crisis committee.

Without actioning on our rights as consumers, rights enshrined in our constitution, we will be left in the dark. It is essential for Eskom to open up the grid, not only to the ‘wheeling of electricity’ but to the dealing and virtualisation of billing and provisioning of new services. Then we might take a cue from New Zealand where deregulation has proven incredibly successful.

The country has 5 major electricity generating companies. Genesis Energy, Mercury and Meridian Energy operate under a ‘mixed ownership model’ in which the government holds a majority stake, while Contact and Trustpower are private sector companies. The country once struggled with a system very similar to our own, before dumping a socialist government.

Sadly, despite promises, there appears to be no genuine enabling legislation nor incentives in South Africa to allow a third party to purchase electricity, from either the state or the IPPs, and to resell the result on the open, rather than captive market, to the consumer. This is clearly why our system is failing. Embracing Lipshitz’s modest proposal and learning from the example of New Zealand, would be a step in the right direction.

In fact one does not have far to travel, to examine the case of another state monopoly, to see why deregulation when it comes to South Africa is the only solution. The fate of Telkom, once the country’s sole cable monopoly, provides us with a good case in point. If we had not opened up, we would still have a situation in which the only telephone available, was from the same company, with a single color, beige. Left to its own devices (excuse the pun) Telkom would still be in the copper age.

Look at how Internet Services Providers (ISPs), just like IPPs began to emerge in the 90s, while our government to its credit allowed a semblance of competition (initially only in the mobile market). With the result these companies grew up and essentially outflanked Grandma Telkom. In the process provisioning fibre cable infrastructure to the suburbs, and FTTH, all of which cost the taxpayer not a single penny.

Given enough time, our IPPs might eventually begin rolling out similar infrastructure. In fact they would be negligent if they did not. Best to get Eskom into open competition mode as soon as possible. The alternative is living with a permanent threat of massive grid failure just around the corner, alongside a collapsed economy.

Published by Cape Argus 17 October 2022

by davidrobertlewis -

Blame for the energy crisis needs to be placed fairly and squarely upon the failed ideology of the ANC and its coalition partners.

In many respects the ANC policies of Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) and its flipside Radical Economic Transformation (RET) resemble the policies of Nico Diederichs’ ‘reddingsdaadbond’ whose Nationalists of the 1940s viewed the state as the primary instrument whereby the Afrikaner capitalist would come to the fore via ‘volkscapitalisme’. Like so many socialist experiments, the ‘capital of the state’ was seen as synonymous with the ‘capital of the Volk‘, as the party mobilised for a ‘transformation of economic consciousness’.

Version two of ‘state capitalism’ in other words, government-directed economics (dirigisme) under the ANC, the proverbial ‘mixed economy’ has certainly turned into an abject failure. In the process ordinary South Africans — small businesses, patients in hospitals, commuters, and other categories of workers, are being sacrificed to accommodate what is essentially a Marxist fantasy.

One has merely to look at the huge cost overruns orchestrated during the building of the Medupi and Kusile projects, involving continual extension of catered lunches and free banquets for personnel. At the time contracts to feed workers were among the biggest catering contracts in the country, proving that providing a reliable source of energy was certainly never the game-plan. The projects have essentially turned into white elephants, considering the related climate factors.

Anyone who suggests otherwise, is living in cloudcuckooland or like so many political analysts, groomed on our nation’s campuses, armed solely with the tools of radicalism instead of data-analysis, fails to draw truth from facts instead, myopically deriving ‘truth’ from an ideological position.

Wherefore the Genie in the Gini?

A good example is the endless repetition and political cant involving the Gini coefficient. While the country may have a high score on the Gini Index a measure of the distribution of income across a population, which is cause for concern (a higher Gini index indicates greater inequality), continually harping on about this unfortunate statistic, fails to take into consideration other factors — for example, the country ranks relatively well on the human development index with a score of 0.705, above Egypt and Bolivia but just below Indonesia.

Unlike the Gini, the human development index is a ‘statistic composite index of life expectancy, education (mean years of schooling completed), and per capita income indicators’, which are used to rank countries into ‘four tiers of human development’.

Incorrectly suggesting that South Africa is effectively ‘under-developed’ or that life-expectancy is somehow on par with Chad or Niger, belies the fact that as an emerging nation, South Africa has a lot to be positive about and despite current difficulties with energy supply and the fuel price caused by failure to implement policy already in place, for example policy when it comes to biofuels (see below).

It is not all that difficult to see which aspects of the economy prospered under the ANC, and which parts continue to create an unnecessary burden on both the treasury and the taxpayer. Despite financial head-winds, those parts of the economy remaining in private hands are still in relatively good shape, with the country recording consecutive trade surpluses, R28.35 billion in May, and even modest growth of 1,9%in the first quarter of 2022, with many corporates posting a return to profit following the decline under Covid.

South Africa has a “mixed economy in which there is a variety of private freedom, combined with centralized economic planning and government regulation” according to website GlobalEdge. It is this structural centralisation and focus on market intervention as opposed to Keynesian, social democratic welfarism, ‘based on the social rights of citizenship‘ which has received criticism from the World Bank and other aid agencies.

Far from providing for its primary mandate, Eskom and Transnet have become nothing more than massively costly exercises in sheltered employment for the party faithful, requiring efforts to trim down a bloated workforce. In both cases, these parastatals were used to siphon money into the pockets of Jacob Zuma and his cronies and are the subject of a 5 volume report into corruption.

Fuel or Fool?

Analysts continue to dress up the ANC and its SACP/COSATU “RET faction” ambitions of “transformation of economic consciousness” with phrases like “the working class” and “means of production”, essentially promoting failed economic policies — policies that are at the heart of the nation’s perennial inability to drive growth and economic expansion.

In 2019 cabinet approved a ‘biofuels regulatory framework‘ mandating blending regulations, feedstock protocols, subsidy mechanisms, selection criteria for projects, licensing of product storage and blending facilities, and containing environmental, water use and land use approval mechanisms.

The legislation was published by the Government Gazette and approved by Cabinet on 13 December 2019, this after some two decades of debate on the topic, including input from the environmental justice movement. By all measures the country should have been amply-armed and primed for the current global fuels crisis. Similarly plans to restructure and unbundle Eskom were proposed as early as 2015 and an energy roadmap released in 2019, so what happened?

Instead of embracing the constitutional imperative of sustainable development our Minister of Energy Gwede Mantashe took us all on a wild goose chase in the quest to mine the ocean for gas, promoting dodgy Karpowership deals, fossil fuel, nuclear power and big coal. Instead of embracing a just transition and change at Eskom, unions dug in their heels. Instead of seeking out environmentally-friendly alternatives and demand-side reduction, we are involved in the intrigues of Russia’s Gazaprom, the closure of refinery capacity and the collapse of the national power grid. We are all paying for it at the pump, and at the electricity meter.

Though the apartheid-era steel monopoly ISCOR was sold off to Mittel, and the telephone monopoly Telkom was listed in the face of competition from mobile providers, the government retained monopolies in rail transport, sea ports, energy generation and distribution, in other words Transnet, Portnet and Eskom.

The results are plain to see. Our government’s stake in listed entities like Sasol (8.4%) have outperformed its troublesome direct holdings — state-run enterprises have thus fared dismally — demonstrating why markets are more efficient at allocating capital than governments, and essentially represent the lesser of two evils insofar as our development path is concerned.

Note: There are currently over 700 state-owned entities dependent upon the treasury.

(You can read one of my earlier postings on this subject here)

SEE Volkskapitalisme: Class, Capital and Ideology in the Development of Afrikaner Nationalism, 1934–1948

by davidrobertlewis -

SA Astonishing failure to plan transition away from ICE

EVEN if there was no war in Ukraine and no embargo against Russian oil and gas, South Africa would find itself in a pretty pickle, forced to import fuel directly. It is not just our strategic fuel reserves which have been plundered, but our capacity to refine crude in the face of a global transition away from the Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) which stands at the heart of massive increases at the pump.

Attempts by government to restructure and partially deregulate the fuel price by lowering or dropping levies are merely band-aids on a serious problem, whose root cause is the pivot away from fossil fuels towards Electric Vehicles (EVs).

The blame needs to be placed squarely on both the Minister of Energy and Resources, Gwede Mantashe and Minister of Transport Fikile Mbalula whose porfolio’s intersect.

It seems strange that a former spokesperson to the Minister of Human Settlements, Water and Sanitation, Yonela Diko should be generating after the fact opinion pieces pointing out that ‘depending solely on fuel imports threatens energy security”, as if this strategic reality were not already at the heart of our energy policies, and especially given our countries past experience with sanctions?

Diko’s demonstration of the lack of refining capacity caused by the unwillingness of energy companies to invest in upgrades is only part of the problem in dealing with the harsh reality that the entire world is transitioning away from fossil fuels, towards electric vehicles:

He writes: “The latest closure of Shell and BP-owned Refinery Sapref in Durban which had a peak capacity of 180 000 bbl/d, a whooping 35% crude refining capacity of the entire country, becomes the latest blow in the countries refining capacity leaving the country with only one option, to import.”

“We are now left with the only worlds coal-based synthetic fuels refinery, Sasol’s Natref, which has a peak day production of a 150 000 bbl/d, which is not enough to carry the entire country and replace the lost refinery capacity. We also have the ever so incapacitated PetroSA which is supposed to be a gas-to-liquid refinery in Mossel Bay which never seems to find any gas.”

Instead of defending the capacity already in place and coming up with a mitigation plan, we have seen a veritable, wild goose chase. Readers may remember the debacle involving Shell and Mantashe’s search for oil and gas off our coast? The entire energy strategy, which found its origin in Jacob Zuma’s Operation Phakisa, has been to pivot towards ‘prospecting’ (read: Adventurism) and the parceling out of future ocean rights to oil companies, none of which have panned out. It is only Namibia which has benefited.

As the saying goes, a bird in the hand is always better than two in the bush.

In some respects the environmental justice movement is also caught offside with its mantra of “Just Transition Away from Coal”, instead of a ‘Just Transition Towards Renewables in Transportation’.

Although there are tentative plans involving so-called “Green Hydrogen” impacting upon heavy industry and mining vehicles, the government has failed to deliver any tangible incentives to transition towards Electric Vehicles. No rebates, no tax incentives, no assistance to an industry which desperately needs to be retooled.

Petrol attendants and ‘pump jockeys’ may just go the way of the lift attendant, elevator operator and ice-hauler, who no longer haul ice to the proverbial icebox. All categories of work long considered redundant. Unless SADC is able to co-operate in finding a solution, the transition will come-about via accident if not force majeur, and not according to any particular plan.

Unlike the USA and Europe, South Africa faces a hybrid future, where bio-diesel, methane, hydrogen fuel cells and electric all play a role. One would expect the Minister of Transport to have announced plans for moving South Africa’s massive fleet of Quantum minibuses towards sustainable bio-diesel or methane. Ditto the trucking industry.

To date there are no plans to my knowledge to assist in the retrofit of private and public transport.Talk about the introduction of Chinese-produced, electric-powered ‘Bullet Trains’ seems to be just empty talk, as consumers are forced to pore fuel at the pump.

SEE: https://www.outa.co.za/blog/newsroom-1/post/reclaim-sas-strategic-oil-reserves-946

by davidrobertlewis -

Or Else, Dr Nie and the coming of the Warlords

IT WAS a series of ‘inflammatory speeches’ made outside former president Jacob Zuma’s estate in Nkandla which had initially lead to the suspension of Carl Niehaus’s ANC membership on 7 July 2021. At a press briefing flanked by camouflage wearing cadres of uMkhonto weSizwe Military Veterans Association (MKMVA) and members of the ‘Hands off Zuma’ campaign, Niehaus had issued an open threat of public violence the day before:

“We’ve warned the national executive committee of the ANC and also the justices of the constitutional court, and also the deputy chief justice Zondo that if cool heads and minds do not prevail, if president Zuma continues to be targeted and if president Zuma is eventually sent to prison, that our country will be torn apart.”

Railing against the manner in which the Zondo commission of inquiry into corruption, was being used in a ‘selective manner’ for party-political infighting, or so he claimed, he promised that members of his organisation would ‘form a human shield to protect Zuma’.

Thus set in motion a series of events which would ignite Kwazulu-Natal and parts of Gauteng, as Zuma’s support base was nevertheless, and despite such warnings, drawn into a partisan factional battle that had been brewing for months.

Convoys of supporters had already descended upon the Zuma compound over the weekend, and thus an early attempt at the arrest of the former president had been thwarted. Firing live bullets, singing struggle songs, they formed themselves into regiments, and told the press that they were ‘not scared to die for Zuma’.

It was then that the unthinkable happened, the ANC divorced its former military wing.

Niehaus had in turn released a statement of open defiance, flouting the ANC national executive committee (NEC) decision to disband the uMkhonto weSizwe Military Veterans Association (MKMVA).’

Shortly after the NEC announced its decision to disband the MKMVA, Niehaus had issued a ‘statement saying the NEC — the ANC’s highest decision-making body in between conferences — had been emotional and angry.’

Niehaus said the move was ‘unacceptable and the MKMVA would not accept it.’ “We are an autonomous structure, and it is not legally nor politically possible for the ANC to disband the MKMVA,” he said.

Though the stage had been set for a paramilitary showdown at Nkandla, with Zuma addressing both members of the ‘Hands off Zuma’ campaign, and his amaButho Zulu regiments, where he essentially worked the crowds into a partisan insurrection, the former president had appeared to blink, and seemingly backed off, instead handing himself over to authorities the next day.

On the following Friday, the high court dismissed an application to have Zuma’s arrest the previous night overturned in a case that was being seen as a ‘test of the post-apartheid nation’s rule of law’ by the international community. An hour before the ruling, a Reuters photographer saw a group of protesters shouting “Zuma!” burning tires and blocking a road.

By Saturday evening sabotage operations aimed at bringing Kwazulu-Natal and the rest of the country to a grinding halt were well underway as a powder keg of poverty caused by the ruling party’s lack of service delivery, turned into a weapon at the hand of KZN’s warlords.

This week, Niehaus released a statement essentially daring Minister Mbalula to arrest him and referring to a BBC interview in which the minister had not, contrary to his assertions, uttered so much as a word about the former ANC member.

That a virtual split in the ruling party was behind the sequence of events, can be seen by a march organised in its aftermath. The party was forced to issue a statement claiming that ‘motorcades and marches, held in the name of freeing former president Jacob Zuma, and linked to protesting “racist attacks” in Phoenix were not sanctioned by its provincial structure.

Meanwhile residents of neighbouring Ballito were bemoaning the fact that the Premier of the Province,  Sihle Zikalala, instead of assisting the community had attempted to prevent crowd-control barricades from being erected.

SEE: Suspended ANC Members Carl Niehaus and Andile Lungisa On WhatsApp Group for Planning Riots and Looting

by davidrobertlewis -

Senekal: Time for genuine Fair Trade Certification and income equalisation?

IT IS easy to become cynical following the events surrounding Senekal over the past two weeks. On the one hand, extremists who justify farm murders by driving an overtly racist Afro-chauvinist narrative (Africa exclusively for black Africans). A story which ignores the very real problem faced by rural murder rates, some 80% above the national average and related issues of food security and social stability.

On the other hand, lack of decent wages and career opportunities faced by thousands of seasonal share croppers, farm workers and rural labourers, is providing fertile ground to those driving a fascist post-Marikana narrative that feeds into an ongoing legacy of land dispossession, at the same time that it seeks to negate democratic transformation and the notable gains of the second Republic.

Undoubtedly solutions such as income equalisation and fair trade certification will be seen by the hard left as dissipating of revolt and reinforcing of the status quo. Maintaining the current state of affairs is not my intention. Rather, we should all be asking questions: Why is it that in order to drink tea from a label such as PG Tips which prides itself on delivering a product which is ‘farmed by workers earning a decent wage, with access to good quality housing, medical care and education for their children’, one has to look instead, towards an imported brand?

Where is the local equivalent of the Rainforest Alliance, whose certification process aims at “breaking the cycle of rural poverty—and tackling the ensuing impacts for people and nature ” a fact considered “critical for a more sustainable future for us all”?

Fairtrade, another international certification organisation “exists to empower farmers and workers around the world. Some 1700 producer organisations, representing over 1.7 million farmers and workers, are the foundation of the Fairtrade system.”

Given South Africa’s history of super-exploitation of labour, one would hope that consumers would be more actively involved in changing the cycle of wage exploitation, by demanding better work conditions on farms at the same time that we act to end farm murders, in effect creating an orderly process of empowerment of black farmer and farmworkers, without the need for political opportunism and grandstanding.

Clearly there is not enough land to give each and every citizen in South Africa a farm, and similarly we can’t all become farm managers over-night. Providing a different scenario to that faced by today’s share-croppers in the form of real shares and dividends would be a welcome start. So too would proposing an income equalisation fund, one that avoids seasonal fluctuations in wages whilst protecting the families of those affected.

by davidrobertlewis -

COVID-19: Our People’s Health is an Environmental Issue

SOUTH AFRICA is one of the few countries to have secured the right to a healthy environment alongside the right to health in its constitution, yet it took the crisis of a global pandemic for apartheid-era hostels in Alexander township to be deep cleaned. As our own Department of Health moved to contain the spread of COVID-19, questions were being raised as to why the Minister had waited so long, and why had the Department of Health (DOH) not acted with similar vigour during previous TB and Pneumonia epidemics?

As the nation went into lock-down, many found cause to question the apartheid spatial planning which meant that black South Africans were disproportionately affected by problems related to access to food, lack of water, sanitation and ablution facilities. As one mother put it, ‘Our family share a single tap with four other households, social distancing is problematic for us.’ While most white folk were hunkering down in luxury apartment blocks, the poor were being relegated to townships and informal settlements where little has changed during the democratic period.

The cause is a virus which many scientists believe has come to the fore because of the same underlying factors effecting climate change. One should talk here about the ecology of disease.

“The interconnectedness of our globalised world facilitated the spread of COVID-19. The disruption this continues to cause has made evident societal dependence on global production systems,” says Vijay Kolinjivadi, a  post-doctoral fellow at the Institute of Development Policy at the University of Antwerp.

He observes a disjuncture in our response to the double crisis: “Although both COVID-19 and climate change are rooted in the same abusive economic behaviour and both have proven to be deadly for humans, governments have seen them as separate and unconnected phenomena and have therefore responded rather differently to them.”

“While we do not get daily updates on the death toll caused by climate change, as we do with COVID-19, it is much deadlier than the virus.”

Although a lot has been made about animal rights and the beneficial decrease in pollution caused by the pandemic, the result of what researchers such as Kolinjivi see as a ‘positive degrowth’. Now is not the time for complacency on air standards, emissions and climate change.

Mary Robinson, former President of Ireland writing with Daya Reddy, President of the International Science Council, says: “The COVID-19 threat has shown that governments can act swiftly and resolutely in a crisis, and that people are ready to change their behavior for the good of humanity. The world must now urgently adopt the same approach to the existential challenge of climate change.”

In South Africa the ruling party has instead utilised the pandemic as an opportunity to escape commitments made during successive UN Conference of the Parties (COP) rounds. Readers awoke last week to find that Gwede Mantashe, had published new amendments to the Mineral Resources Development Act (MPRDA) on the first day of the Covid-19 emergency lock-down in order to escape accountability, while air pollution standards had been gutted, enabling Eskom and SASOL to double sulphur emissions.

There is palpable fear amongst activists, that in focusing on the pandemic, the nation will lose its impetus on climate change alongside its civil liberties.

“The disruption brought on by Covid-19 could reverse efforts made by governments thus far to reduce carbon emissions to tackle the climate crisis. What is needed is a way to connect the two calamities to capacitate a sustainable revival in the aftermath” writes Luveshni Odayar, a Machel-Mandela Fellow at The Brenthurst Foundation.

It is therefore imperative that we view public health (literally the people’s health) as an environmental issue, in the same way that apartheid was linked to the struggle for environmental justice by myself and others, back in the 1980s, resulting in the emergence of Earthlife Africa and other activist formations.

In fact the two health struggles, that of the public in general (and body in particular), and that of the environment at large, are so closely interlinked and intertwined, that they cannot be seen as distant relatives.

Whether food security, urban and peri-urban spatial planning, climate change or coronovirus, the rights of all citizens to live in harmony with nature, while enjoying quality of life, free from disease and illness is non-negotiable.

The result of this crisis must be an expanded concept of health and health-care-for-all, and thus a public policy which encompasses physical well-being as much as it does the Earth. That it has taken a virus to make us all aware of this deep connection, can only be seen as one of the positive lessons to be drawn from the pandemic.

Our recovery and future is dependent upon making this profound realisation a reality, and thus a yardstick which motivates and drives our country.

by davidrobertlewis -

This Land is our land: expropriation a poison pill or magic fix?

IN 1967, folk singers Des and Dawn Lindberg debut album, Folk on Trek, was banned. One of the reasons appears to be a rendition of Woody Guthrie’s This Land Is Your Land, ‘albeit South Africanised with local landmarks ‘and written as “This land is my land, this land is your land. From the great Limpopo to Marion Island.”

The pair appealed in court to have the ban on Folk on Trek lifted’, writes Charles Leonard, but lost the case. “All copies of the album were ordered to be destroyed although some fans hid theirs and, as a result, some copies survived.”

Land dispossession, in particular the aftermath of the Glen Grey Act of 1894, and 1913 Land Act, which both limited land ownership and restricted the franchise along colour lines, has long been a bone of contention.  Yet one hundred years later a new democratic order emerged, alongside property guarantees which enabled a black majority government to begin the process of land restitution on the basis of the ‘willing buyer/willing seller principle’.

Some R60 billion was pumped into land reform with mixed results.

The country experienced a 15-year long boom period which came to an end in 2009. Cut to 2020, and wholesale ‘land expropriation without compensation’ a policy at first introduced by the far-left opposition EFF, is being seen as a magic bullet panacea by the ruling party, one which will usher in a veritable Eden of opportunity. A constitutional amendment of article 25 apparently gazetted last year is being rushed into Parliament, with January 31 being the last opportunity for comment by the public.

In the midst of this, there is talk of doing away with legal scrutiny of the new Land mechanism which can only be put in place if the constitutional amendment is passed with a 2/3 supermajority in Parliament.

The bill must be passed by 267 votes of a possible 400 votes. Currently the ANC only has 230 seats. It would still need to garner support from either the official opposition DA, with 84, seats or 3rd largest party, the EFF with 44 seats.

It is significant that it is under the former President Zuma that one version of the Expropriation bill first emerged in 2016, where it was referred to the President and lingered in committee. As early as 2006, President Thabo Mbeki ‘used his State of the Nation address to revisit the “willing‐​buyer willing‐​seller” principle for land redistribution‘. Criticism of which is a perennial favourite amongst members of the ruling party.

Arguably, the single most disruptive policy, bar already weak economic performance, failing SOEs and the Zondo Commission. It is the threat of land expropriation which is driving both immigration and uncertainty within the country,  leading to a looming tax revolt, and criticism of President Ramaphosa, lead by banks which see the deleterious side-effects on property prices as a dangerous precedent.

Nowhere in the world, wherever property rights have been eroded or undermined by the state, has there been a contingent increase in economic stability, instead the reverse is true.

Both Venezuela and Zimbabwe provide abject examples, since state seizure of land, for whatever purposes, invariably sets in motion economic forces which are difficult to contain, the least of which is the impact on foreign investment.

Nationalisation is at the heart of the hyper-inflation experienced by these two countries.

Simply transferring arable land to the masses will not equate to instantaneous economic opportunity, as so many leftist commentators maintain, but risks a crisis situation in which current land tenants move from one economic model of exploitation to another — from land tenancy at the behest of private capital to land tenancy on behalf of the state.

In effect the failed SOE model is being allowed to reign supreme, as the state begins to supersede the private sector. The Johannesburg Stock Exchange risks becoming irrelevant in the greater scheme of things.

Alongside the logic of nationalisation, the invariably reduction of economic output, with consequent inability to fund growth without borrowing money. All evidence points to the failure of such policies wherever they have been tried.

While Western economies, though troubled, are growing, South Africa’s GDP reached a high of 416.9 USD billion in 2011, declined until 295.8 USD billion 2016 and is only now recovering at 349.4 USD billion, a factor of the world economy coupled with Rand deprecation which has made local goods cheap in comparison, rather than any policy per se.

Which brings one to question the entire modality of land ownership. Is land ownership really so desirable?

Would it not be better to create a co-ownership democracy in which each and every citizens receives dividends from the state which derives benefits from taxation and growth, rather than to jettison the private sector and risk dumping the capitalist economy entirely?

A policy of kaizen as practiced by the Japanese, consistent improvement as opposed to unpredictable change would also do wonders, as would household responsibility, a policy introduced in China under Deng.

Instead of building new cities and driving massive public projects, the state has instead focused on defending those few jobs which remain within SAs state enterprises.

Instead of having the courage to let go of those SOEs which have failed, or saving ESKOM the energy parastatel by splitting it up into viable parts, the ANC under Ramaphosa has chosen the path of centralisation, commandeer-ism and the dictates of the so-called dirigiste economy.

This is entirely the result of the ideology of the ruling party alliance which includes trade union COSATU and SACP, an alliance which has worked to stall progress at the same time that it looks for a quick fix, and appears to be short of ideas, save for its promises to those without land.

25 years of statist tinkering with the system has failed to deliver results for ordinary South Africans. It remains to be seen whether land expropriation will deliver anything more than a poison pill.

UPDATE: Deadline for public comment has been extended by one month.

SEE: Cato Institute sounds warning on expropriation policy.

Government can take your home, farm, or business premises under Constitutional Amendment Bill

 

 

 

by davidrobertlewis -

It’s not all gloom and doom

SOUTH AFRICA has had its fair share of disappointment. Corruption in every sphere of government. A ruling party that has to some extant, captured the judiciary. A leftist project which has delivered dismal economic performance and GDP figures which place us alongside Argentina, Thailand and Colombia. If you’re a clueless commentator like the Financial Mail’s Chris Roper, unable to see the wood for the trees, and who believes ‘the apocalypse is now now’, then here is a list of what is going right:

Thriving Arts Sector

The South African Cultural Observatory (Saco) in Port Elizabeth — which maps, measures, values and calculates the gross domestic product (GDP) contribution of South Africa’s cultural and creative industries — pegs it at R63-billion a year.

This is a small but not insignificant contribution to GDP, and unlike many sectors continues to deliver growth

Automotive Made in South Africa

One thing that our President is doing right, pumping the automotive sector, which continues to produce export quality vehicles. He recently unveiled the Tshwane Automotive Hub at the Ford Motor Company in Pretoria. Part of the Tshwane Special Economic Zone which diversifies the country’s already major auto hub in Nelson Mandela Bay. Almost 19% more vehicles were exported so far this year, compared with 2018.

Emerging Renewables Market

Although competing for government spend alongside parastatel Eskom, the groundwork has been laid for renewables to step into the gap left by unreliable coal projects. In 2016 South Africa was ranked first for its addition in concentrated solar power.  Latest Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) 2018 allocations indicate 8 100 MW for wind, 5 670 MW Solar Photovoltaic (PV) and 2 400 MW of small-scale embedded generation (SSEG) to be procured by 2030, which has the potential of attracting in excess of R200 billion in the next 12 years.

Internet Growth

While South Africa has a modest 54 percent internet penetration it experienced 7 percent growth from 2017. More citizens are gaining access every day and South Africans spend an average of 8 hours and 32 minutes on the internet per day via any device. Revenue in the local eCommerce market amounts to US$3,308m in 2019. Revenue is expected to show an annual growth rate (CAGR 2019-2024) of 8.3%, resulting in a market volume of US$4,930m by 2024.

Agricultural Haven

Thanks to post-apartheid reforms, the country’s middle class increased by 30% between 2001 and 2004. After a period of recession following 2009, this trend looks set to continue which is why the WWF observes ‘a shift from staple grain crops to a more diverse diet’. Accordingly South Africans have shown a decrease in the consumption of the staples maize and bread, and have massively increased their annual consumption of chicken from 6kg to 27kg per person.

Worth considering that despite land anxiety and uncertainty, climate change and water scarcity, the country remains a net exporter of agricultural products.

African Financial Hub

South Africa is well-positioned to take advantage of its position as a gateway to the continent. The sector contributes some 22% to GDP. Innovation in financial services has made South African banks extremely competitive, responsive and able to deliver what consumers need, low fees, digital access and more on the way.

BRICS development funds

Funds coming our way as a result of the BRICS bank initiative include $200-million loan to Transnet to expand the capacity of Durban port, $300-million loan to the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA) for on-lending to sustainable development projects, R1.15-billion loan to the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) for on-lending to renewable energy sub-projects $480-million loan,  to Eskom to retrofit flue-gas desulphurisation equipment, to make Medupi power plant compliant.

NOTE: Sorry Chris, if you want to apportion blame, Stephen Hawkings says, greed and stupidity is what will end the world, not merely politicians.