The UK is South Africa’s biggest trading partner and home to the greatest concentration of its expats – the country’s 10th Province. So its connections with SA are both close and important especially after last week’s shock election result has made the terms of Brexit even more difficult to call. In today’s contribution, Quentin Wray offers some insights into a leadership crisis that has infected the world – not just South Africa.
Quentin writes: “I’ve lived in the UK for three years now and have already been through two general elections and a referendum. I’m an unapologetic political junkie, but even I’ve got sick of not knowing what I’ll be waking up to the day after the polls. Because the UK is a global financial capital and the world’s fifth biggest economy (at least until the monumental cock up that is Brexit starts giving sterling a proper pounding) this is not just a parochial problem, but a global one.
Brexit and, by extension, the latest UK election is going to have a particularly profound impact on South Africa, given that our economy, which is in such deep trouble anyway, is so reliant on our free trade agreement with the EU and capital flows and trade from the UK. Any prolonged conflict between them will not be at all good for us.
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Even sitting in the midst of it, it is difficult to grasp the magnitude of what happened last week. How do you get your head around the fact that one of the biggest missteps in modern political history was driven by two unelected officials? Sure, Nick Timothy and Fiona Hill, Theresa May’s two top aides, were eventually ousted but this was far too little, way too late. They were supposed to be the handlangers, not the boss.
Despite that, it appears that they were able to drive a manifesto guaranteed to alienate core Tory supporters without winning sufficient new ones. I’ve argued before that the reforms they were aiming for are long overdue – it makes sense to stop an unending transfer of state wealth from the poor young to the relatively wealthy elderly – but now was not the time to push it. Not when Brexit is looming so large.
Students of leadership are partial to inspirational tales about how to make the ordinary extraordinary and drive success whilst others drop by the wayside. But I find the other sort, cautionary tales of bitter loss and crushing failure, far more useful. As the world faces an unprecedented crisis in political leadership – from Donald Trump to Jacob Zuma by way of Robert Mugabe, Vladimir Putin and Nicolas Maduro – these are the lessons that those of us in the middle would do well to learn.
I’m not for a minute suggesting that either Theresa May or Jeremy Corbyn belong in such company, but this rogues’ gallery teaches us the perils of blind ego, rampant corruption, swivel-eyed populism, unrealistic economics, blind nationalism and, finally, sheer stupidity. And that’s just the voters.
Just as most households are a paycheque or two away from financial ruin, most democracies are never more than one or two elections away from box-of-frogs crazy. And this is something we should never, ever forget.”
You’ve nailed it again pal.
