Clive Simpkins, SA’s top communications strategist: How Zuma can fix his image – fast
If anyone knows how to nip a reputational crisis in the bud, it is communications strategist Clive Simpkins. A consultant to CEOs and executive teams of blue chip companies, he has worked in advertising, has written speeches for late ANC first lady Mrs Adelaide Tambo and advised at least four heads of State. Two prominent South Africans who have been in the news for all the wrong reasons would do well to heed Clive's advice: Oscar Pistorius, on trial for murder, and President Jacob Zuma. A blog on how Oscar Pistorius can improve his image in the eyes of the world, which was published on Biznews, went viral earlier this month. So, Clive's suggestions clearly resonate with many people. Today, Clive shares his views on how President Jacob Zuma can fix his image – fast. The suggestion is unlikely to be music to Zuma's ears because it entails paying up for his own Nkandla refurbishments rather than leaving taxpayers to foot the bill of millions. – JC
ALEC HOGG: South Africa has been placed in the spotlight globally following the Oscar Pistorius trial…botched forensics, the Nkandla report, which comes out at 12:30 today, and the Minister's attack on the Public Protector. Then, there's the media spat between MTN and Cell C. Joining us to have a look at what impact this has on the country's reputation is Clive Simpkins, a communications strategist – the best in the company in my opinion. Clive, it's good to have you here. Maybe we can just start off with Oscar Pistorius. You wrote a piece for Biznews.com which went viral…well over ten thousand people getting into it, reading about it and presumably, not all in South Africa, about the international reaction to what's going on in that court case.
CLIVE SIMPKINS: That story has played out, as I understand it, from the figures put on social media by Chris Moerdyk, has been bigger than the Soccer World Cup 2010, which is extraordinary. We think that we're overdosing on it in South Africa, but the international media are really playing it and I look at it with total horror, because when it is all over, we have the Shrien Dewani story sitting in the wings and that may be a repeat performance.
ALEC HOGG: So what do people in other parts of the world, make of this?
CLIVE SIMPKINS: It's our obsession with high-profile people: we build them up, we develop the brand, we deify them, and we vicariously I believe, live our lives – our very mediocre and ordinary lives – through them. When they then do something wrong, we become terribly self-righteous, we all pontificate, and we all try to drag them down. It's quite a frightening phenomenon. We've seen it again and again.
ALEC HOGG: 'We' being South Africans, or 'we' being humans?
CLIVE SIMPKINS: Human beings generally, and it's the native-Canadian dictum of 'oh Great Spirit, grant that I may not judge another man until I've walked in his moccasins for two moons'. If we took one step back and just thought 'I have the potential for something like that in my own life in a fit of rage or under certain circumstances', the answer probably is 'yes' for many of us.
ALEC HOGG: Would people, looking at South Africa…? You get a guy like Miller Matola spending tens of millions of Rands, trying to improve Brand South Africa, the Homecoming Revolution doing a similar job or trying to do a similar job. Would that all just be wiped out by the perception that's being created of one of our sporting icons?
CLIVE SIMPKINS: I don't believe so. It's the same as when we think 'what about the sponsors' for example, who endorsed Oscar, endorsed (in his day) an O.J. Simpson, or a Lance Armstrong of the world – not really. We expect sporting people like that who are testosterone-driven, who are high-ego, and who are prima-donnas in every sense of the word, to behave badly for example, a Tiger Woods of the world. However, there are certain lines you can cross, you can come back, and there's a rehabilitation – Tiger Woods being an example – Lance Armstrong…no, he went beyond the pale. Oscar, I would say 'no' as well. It's a brand, which is irretrievably damaged.
ALEC HOGG: And from a South African perspective, I suppose he could have been from anywhere in the world – an Oscar brand, rather than Brand SA.
CLIVE SIMPKINS: In the grand scheme of things, if one considers what's going on in Ukraine, the Crimea, Russia, and the EU at the moment, there's chaos all over the world. Although we're obsessed and focused on this, and thinking 'it must be doing terrible damage', the world is in a mess, generally. As the PR gurus of yore would have said 'it's a great time to release bad information' so this, for President Zuma, has been wonderful because the focus has moved (until 12:30), right away from Nkandla.
ALEC HOGG: What do we watch out for in the Nkandla report?
CLIVE SIMPKINS: I would be really interested to see if our fabulous Public Protector, who is getting an amazing wave of support on social media this morning, has been tempted in any way to try to dilute or water this down, because she's in a very invidious position. There's no doubt that there are really big guns trained on her, and I really hope that she continues to exhibit the mettle and the moral fibre that she has, and simply push back and say 'this is my job'. Our government however, has a dreadful habit of reinventing positions, changing the job description, and making them null and void if we look at incarnations within the police force, for example, so the potential exists for that. However, I think the President would have to tread warily, given the upcoming elections.
ALEC HOGG: If you were consulting first, to Thuli Madonsela – the Public Protector – what would you be advising her?
CLIVE SIMPKINS: I would say to her, 'appeal to the international community's sense of right'. When you make it a big enough thing so that it becomes a matter of international conscience, it's very difficult to have more parochial interests pushing against you and trying to subvert that process, trying to put a blanket over it, or trying to contain it. In a very similar way for example, death threats made against people: if those were put into the public domain, the power of the death threat goes because suddenly, if you were to be 'blotted out' everybody would know where it came from. I think that's what she should do. She should take this to a bigger platform. Right now, we're rather obsessed because it's all about Nkandla, but it isn't. It has to do with the fiscal probity of the government of South Africa. That must affect investor sentiment. It must affect the way people look at South Africa with a view to 'do I want to engage? Do I want to get behind you and build nuclear power stations etcetera'.
ALEC HOGG: And can find one trillion Rand somewhere, to do it with. All right, if you were consulting to Jacob Zuma – remember, this is the guy who was booed at our icon's memorial service. He now has this problem of a 20 million Dollar, because they look at it in a global perspective – Nkandla mansion. What would you say to him?
CLIVE SIMPKINS: If I were to sit directly opposite him I would say you could do the most incredible thing if you took out a loan, borrowed that money or however you did it and said, 'in the national interest, I don't accept full accountability – perhaps – for how this all gathered momentum and got to where it did, but I am repaying that money. What came from the taxpayer is going back to the taxpayer. It's my private residence'. He would come up smelling of roses, but I think that is a bridge too far for him or the ANC to contemplate. That really, would completely rip the rug from under the feet of the critics.
ALEC HOGG: You'd earn many votes no doubt, because I think surely, many potential voters are saying 'not for this man'.
CLIVE SIMPKINS: Indeed.
ALEC HOGG: I like the party, but I don't like the leader. What the point is, which hasn't come out in all of this, is that the President does have two official residences. He has one in Cape Town and one in Pretoria, so why does he need a third one?
CLIVE SIMPKINS: The initial spin on that was 'he might have to host people from the White House'. The fact is if you go to the U.S.A., you don't live in the White House with Barack Obama. You would stay somewhere else in Washington DC – nowhere do you stay in the Presidential mansion. Even during Thabo Mbeki's tenure for example, Mahlamba Ndlopfu (if I have the name correctly) is the Presidential residence – the official one in Cape Town. Even Helen Zille lives in Tuynhuys – is it in Cape Town – the Opposition Leader's official one. This is unprecedented, and I think that's why Nkandla gets the flak it does. It's someone's private residence. Did we spend about 20 million Rand on – as I understand it – upgrading former President Thabo Mbeki's residence in Houghton? Yes, because there is security that goes along with the package of being the former Head of State, but this amount is largesse and excess.
ALEC HOGG: Clive, the fake interpreter at the Mandela memorial, the fact that Zuma really is coming from a low base: does he care? It seems as though whenever he appears in public, the reaction is not good.
CLIVE SIMPKINS: Mac Maharaj made a fatal mistake when he used a particular phrase describing the President's reaction to the booing, when he said he's not concerned about it. That sends a very dismissive 'do your damndest' message. If he had said 'the President acknowledges that that is the citizenry's right to boo even the Head of State ', that would have sent another message, which would have said 'it's not a nice thing to be subjected to, but we understand that this is what democracy is all about'. This dismissive 'oh, we couldn't care what you do' unfortunately, seems to be symptomatic of many of President Zuma's responses to things, which is… He is so blatant – there's no other word for it – in terms of the things he does and orchestrates, and he's brilliant. You have to give him credit for it. He was not the ANC's Head of Counterintelligence in exile for nothing. There clearly, are incredible street smarts and incredible nous, and as with Bob Mugabe, he is able to wrong-foot his opposition every single time. Whilst people may sit and mock his standard of education or his perceived intellect the fact is, he's a very canny politician.
ALEC HOGG: He's a shrewd operator. Just to close off with, in the private sector…this clash of egos perhaps, between MTN and Cell C…
CLIVE SIMPKINS: I'm sorry. I'm just thinking of the headlines that have gone about Max Clifford and his tiny private parts, which everybody internationally, has enjoyed hugely. This does rather smack of males in a testosterone battle, and I think it's a bit unfortunate. Somebody very perspicaciously put on social media, 'imagine if they'd taken all of that advertising budget, which has not built their brand in any way – in fact, its created negative perceptions in consumers – and they used that to lower call rates' – nice one.
ALEC HOGG: So, if you look at that from a different perspective, you might just switch your account to Vodacom.
For more by Clive Simpkins on Biznews, see