PREMIUM: RW Johnson on Frene Ginwala: “I do lament her, though not in the same way that many others do”

By RW Johnson.I find myself somewhat bemused by the general lamentation over Frene Ginwala's death. Ramaphosa has decreed no less than seven days mourning. The Sunday Times headline is "A democrat, a feminist and a true national hero". Not that I do not lament her passing but because it seems to me that most of what has been written about her omits the tragic aspects of her life. .Frene, the daughter of a wealthy Parsee family, found her natural milieu amongst the Durban Indian community (and perhaps particularly the Hindu community). Fittingly enough, it was in that milieu that her life came to a close. .___STEADY_PAYWALL___.The big point about Frene was that she was, by a considerable margin, the most able of the exiled ANC generation that returned to South Africa in the early 1990s. Doubtless aided by her privileged background she had great self-assurance. She was in no doubt about her own abilities, was always focused on the task in hand and she had a track record of fulfilling whatever tasks she set herself. .The record of ANC students in universities abroad was usually pretty poor, whereas Frene's was first class. When she set herself to write an article, a book or a thesis you could be sure that it would be satisfactorily completed and on deadline. Her first degree was at King's College, London and she later completed a D.Phil. at Oxford – both elite institutions..Frene threw herself into ANC activities in the late 1950s and was responsible for setting up the "underground railway" routes whereby many ANC and Natal Indian Congress figures were able to escape from South Africa. She herself played a considerable role in these exploits. Like many able people she often worried whether she could really leave critical tasks to others – and ended up doing them herself. .But the ANC – including even its leadership – was mainly composed of poorly educated people and even those who had attended university had often failed to complete a degree or had performed poorly because most of their attention was focused on politics. Inevitably, operating in such a milieu was often very frustrating for Frene. She was not one to suffer fools gladly and would frequently find herself in situations where she knew she was right and could not bear to see wrong decisions made. As a result she gained the reputation of being bossy..Frene went into exile in 1960, along with Oliver Tambo and Yusuf Dadoo who established an ANC-in-exile office in colonial Tanganyika. There she founded and edited the newspaper Spearhead and also wrote articles for the British press. But her very definite views soon brought her into conflict with Julius Nyerere, who had become President at independence in 1961, and who was not prepared to be publicly contradicted by a foreign Indian. Embarrassingly for the ANC, he had her thrown out of the country..Frene then returned to Britain and managed to gain entrance to Oxford, which was where I met her. She had rented a very desirable apartment near the city centre but, having completed her degree, was off to Tanzania again (for Nyerere had relented and invited her back). I had just been elected as a Fellow of Magdalen and my wife and I were looking for somewhere to live. We approached Frene and agreed to take over her apartment and, indeed, bought various pieces of Frene's furniture. .Nyerere had invited Frene back because he needed someone to edit The Standard, the newspaper he had nationalised – and whatever their past differences, he knew that Frene was well up to the job. But it was ill-fated. Nyerere, having nationalised the paper, expected it to take his line more or less slavishly. This was hardly Frene's style and after only a year she was sacked as editor. Once again it was clear that she was no longer welcome in Tanzania. So she returned, again, to Britain which was where she mainly stayed until 1991, working closely with Tambo in the ANC's London office..This was a fruitful era for Frene. She ran Tambo's department of political research, wrote articles for the British press, wrote several books and latterly acted as the ANC's official spokesperson..I had myself spent the 1980s going to and from South Africa and by 1989 I was convinced that De Klerk was about to end apartheid and invite the ANC back to South Africa. I decided that, with this large change clearly imminent, it would be good to talk to Frene so I arranged to meet her near the London ANC office..I told her that a huge change was in the air and that she'd probably be returning to South Africa very soon. She didn't exactly disagree – to do so might have sounded defeatist – but it was clear that, like the rest of the ANC, she seemed wholly unprepared for what De Klerk was shortly to announce..Indeed, I suggested, the ANC had better be thinking of how it would govern. The beginning of wisdom, I thought, was to realise that an ANC government would inevitably face many of the same problems and issues as the National Party government had. .This was a red rag to a bull: Frene furiously denied that there might be any comparison. I pointed out that the country itself wouldn't change: it would still be water-scarce, would have the same population and the same industries. It would, for example, still have a large mining sector and the ANC would be just as keen as the Nats to see high commodity prices..To my astonishment, Frene said "That's just where you're wrong. The ANC has set up a commission on the future economy and we've decided that mining is passe and that our economy will be based far more on computers and high tech." .I pointed out that South Africa had no competitive edge in that field but a large competitive edge in mining: it was impossible to believe that mining wasn't a big part of the future economy. After all, that was the case in rich countries like Canada and Australia – and they weren't leaders in hi-tech, despite having far better educated populations than South Africa. Again, she demurred..In truth I was saddened and amazed. I knew Frene was a whole lot smarter than that but, I realised, in the topsy-turvy world of ANC ideology there was doubtless a lot of pressure to believe many impossible things. I had just assumed that Frene would rise above that but, alas, if you spent every day in the ANC office you clearly ended up believing some of the nonsense. .Whenever there has been a commodity boom since 1994, each time rescuing the government's finances, I always think of that conversation with Frene. There is, of course, still little sign of a South African hi-tech sector..In exile Frene had been closer to Tambo and a more valuable assistant than anyone except, possibly, Thabo Mbeki. Clearly, an Indian couldn't be President, but everything suggested that Frene would play a very powerful role in any ANC government. And perhaps she would, had Tambo lived. .But lo and behold she became Speaker of Parliament. This despite the fact that she had been a long-time member not only of the ANC NEC but of its far more elite National Working Committee too. In terms of sheer ability she was head and shoulders above all the ministers appointed..I realised that for her this would be a crushing disappointment and I asked around as to how on earth she had been omitted from the cabinet. .The answer was invariably the same: the ANC was a conservative male hierarchy and the one thing that its African patriarchy was clear about was that it was not going to be lectured to by "a bossy Indian woman". Indeed, a story had already circulated in which Mandela had once had to order that Frene be removed from his presence – doubtless after a furious argument in which she was quite likely right..So Frene had to be Speaker and endure all the pomp and circumstance and nonsense. It was not at all her cup of tea and I cannot believe that she enjoyed it for a moment. It must have been utterly galling for her to see clearly inferior people becoming ministers and then making stupid decisions or, often, just doing nothing. .Meanwhile Frene was in great demand by many UN and other international organizations, all of whom recognized her abilities. But this can hardly have helped. Nobody else in the ANC gained that sort of recognition, after all, which just made the point all over again that her merit was welcomed abroad but much less at home..Then came the awful denouement of the arms deal and the crushing of a proper parliamentary investigation into this obviously corrupt scandal. Andrew Feinstein and Gavin Woods played an outstanding role on the Standing Committee on Public Accounts but Frene, clearly under great pressure from the ANC leadership, prevented them from pursuing the investigation. This was a great and terrible blemish on her record as Speaker and it will never be forgotten. The damage to Frene's reputation will thus be lasting. .Now that the corruption of the arms deal is a matter of public record it is clear that it represented a key moment in the decline and descent of the ANC. I have no doubt that Frene understood the seriousness of the situation and I would like to believe that she strongly resisted the pressures to which she was subjected. It would have been fully in her character to do so..But that is why Frene's story is a tragedy. She fought the good fight for a good cause – though for a severely defective organisation – for most of her life. But at the end her obvious merit was spurned by the movement she had fought for and instead she was compelled to undermine even her role as Speaker and thus as the guardian of parliamentary integrity. .Yet she was a highly moral as well as an intellectually able person. She could have had a comfortable life outside politics but she gave that up in order to do what she believed in. She believed passionately in the struggle as an ethical imperative and no one ever accused her of corruption. So I do lament her, though not in the same way that many others do. .Read more:.RW Johnson: Home truths about the DA and coalition governmentsRW Johnson's message of hope: As end of catastrophic ANC rule draws nearer, far better awaits South AfricaPremium: RW Johnson on policy dreams and disasters

PREMIUM: RW Johnson on Frene Ginwala: “I do lament her, though not in the same way that many others do”

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