National dialogue is problematic and should have been held before the elections

A Mark Twain dilemma has beset South Africa in as far as the quest for a national dialogue is concerned. The Foundations which were instrumental in galvanising the idea have decided not to be present at the launch on the 15th of August. Former president Thabo Mbeki had also released a statement a few weeks ago on what would determine the outcome of a dialogue as the credibility of its constituent composition. President Cyril  Ramaphosa is going ahead with or without the Foundations. A national dialogue under the prevailing circumstances, especially those of guaranteed incumbency after an election was certainly going to be problematic because interests will have been entrenched.

Mindful of this difficulty, on the 19th of December 2024, I penned an article titled, Next year’s elections should be postponed, says former Statistician-General Pali Lehohla

After attracting attention on both sides of the arguments for and against I outlined why the postponement of an election would serve a good purpose both in terms of defining what South Africans desire through a dialogue and what a democratic process would give meaning to those desires. The next article was on the 7th of January 2024 titled, The new SA has failed blacks and coloureds while the elite thrive, and elections won’t fix it

The title elaborated the content of the dialogue. It provided the detail of the content of the discontent the dialogue would have to confront. Drawing from the reports of the Statistician-General evidence pointed to a deteriorating trajectory for Blacks and Coloureds, with a clear path towards a demographic disaster. In contradistinction to this the path for Whites and Indians was one of a demographic dividend. The article went further to discuss the evidence from the Indlulamithi research positing three pathways that could be taken in the future, but stating the fact of the reality of South Africa as of 2023 – that the country was in a Gwara-Gwara state which it defined as a state of restless immobility but not only that but one of a Gwara-Gwara state. 

As soon as it published the new scenarios of Weaver Bird, Hadeda Bird and Vulture Culture, President Ramaphosa fell for the Weaver Bird and that became possibly the basis for a Government of National Unity right in the midst of a likely Vulture Culture nation we possibly had slid into from a Gwara-Gwara Plus Nation as measured by the latest Indlulamithi barometer.   Lieutenant General Nhlanhla Mkwanazi address to the nation laid bare the evidence of a Vulture Culture Nation.

Trapped in a Vulture Culture by all counts and evidence as early as the post-election period, the politicians decided to side step this reality by usurping the verdict of the electorate to mean an affirmation desirous of a Weaver Nation. In fact, the President went further to coin the moment as 1994 de javu and a chorus followed this nonchalant misinformation. The major question certain should have been who are the protagonists in this 1994 de javu? Who would be the Blacks and who would be the White establishment?

This characterisation of that moment to 1994 suffered an ecological fallacy. What the moment represented was a vulture culture, which saw business getting into the belly of the state and executing privatisation. The language was that growth as a consequence of that would come. It has not come. Of course now the excuse is Trump and tariffs.

Truth be told Trump’s tariffs are just recent and South Africa should answer the question of why has it performed at a growth rate of about 1% for the last 15 years. The answer to this is not Trump and tariffs. The answer is a wrong macro-economic framework.

The Indlulamithi Scenarios of 2021 showed this evidence abundantly as it outlined in detail, the policy framework and policies that generated the Gwara-Gwara and Gwara-Gwara Plus outcomes. The government failed to pay attention to what the Nai le Walk scenarios policies were in contradistinction to the Gwara-Gwara policies that generated low growth, high poverty and high inequality outcome. Government of National Unity has happily gone on the same Gwara-Gwara inspiring policies and dream a different outcome.

And alas when Trump comes with tariffs the governor of the Reserve Bank trumps up fear of an increase of a loss of jobs by a hundred thousand. That is a scarecrow. The right question is why are we not achieving half growth of a million jobs and more per year. That hundred thousand jobs more will be lost now because of Trump and tariffs is disingenuous given that we have 12 million people out of jobs anyway.

Successive governments should look themselves in the mirror and answer the question of what is so different they are doing that falls so far short from the first three administrations. The problem is successive governments from the fourth administration have been so ruptured that they created serious discontinuities in rhetoric whilst keeping a neo liberal policy framework par excellence of privatisation on steroids especially in the sixth and seventh administration.

Poverty, unemployment and inequality are not going to depart from the shores of South Africa with these policies. They are predictably entrenched as the Indlulamithi Scenarios Report showed in its extensive econometric modelling and the Vulture Culture we have entered is not a Trump Culture but his tariffs will put the Vulture Culture on steroids.

Mark Twain had answers for every question and he gives one to our Vulture Culture "October. This is one of the peculiarly dangerous months to speculate in stocks. The others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June, December, August, and February. Perhaps a national dialogue set in motion when contestants have become comfortable in incumbency makes August the most difficult month to start a dialogue, but September, July, January, April, November, February, May, March, June, December, and October are equally difficult. The best time was before a national election. Because then the dialogue would have defined for us who a responsible leader looks like and who would therefore be worthy of our vote. That the foundations are not going to participate is an affirmation that the dialogue as a people’s formation has started as much as Mkhwanazi’s media briefing did so will the one by the President on the 15th. The dialogue is on and it is not going to be dominated by any one voice and ultimately convergence will emerge on what makes South Africans gatvol and it will not smell like roses at all.

Dr Pali Lehohla is a Professor of Practice at the University of Johannesburg, a Research Associate at Oxford University, a board member of Institute for Economic Justice at Wits and a distinguished Alumni of the University of Ghana. He is the former Statistician-General of South Africa.

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