By Alec Hogg
With so much noise about, one needs to look in the right places for answers. And when it comes to the economic future of South Africa under president Cyril Ramaphosa, there are few better positioned to guide us than a direct adversary from his old labour union days, former Anglo exec turned futurist Clem Sunter.
Sunter’s assessment in a piece he wrote for Fin24: “If he shows the positive qualities which I know he has from frequent meetings with him when he was the leader of the NUM, we have a chance of moving back once more to the High Road trajectory. If he is overwhelmed by internal divisions inside his own party, or by outside forces which render him powerless, the Low Road beckons with an extreme ending not to be dismissed.”
Clem puts the High Road probability at 60%. But says this will require skilful addressing of six issues: firm treatment of the corrupt; a turnaround in the education system; inclusive leadership; replicating rather than eliminating SA’s pockets of excellence; opening the economy to everyone; and sensible management of land reform.
Get those right, he says, and SA is on track for the 5% economic growth rate needed to make a meaningful and sustained dent in unemployment. Mess up on those six key challenges and the current Low Road will continue. Some good news in all this, though, is Sunter puts the prospect of the country declining to Zimbabwe-like chaos at just 10%. Ahead of the ANC’s December vote that would have seemed hugely conservative.
Response from Biznews community member Paul Bannister
I read this morning’s note regarding the chances of South Africa returning to the ‘High Road’ with interest as the High Road Scenario provided a platform for optimism in the dark days of the 1980s.
I can’t argue with Clem’s six factors but would like to suggest two further factors that need to be included in the critical actions – both are necessary to create an ‘enabling environment for the successful implementation of the factors he has listed.
The first additional factor is ‘South Africanness’ as a vital concept that has to be nurtured amidst the current morass of divisive racism which is sadly amplified by politicians and the media. Brand South Africa, a concept that evolved in the 10 years leading up to the 2010 FIFA World Cup (but sadly appears to have disappeared since then), was established essentially to help drive and strengthen the Nation’s competitiveness through reputation management. But as part of what was a very strong and influential Board we also identified perhaps an even greater purpose which was to define the very essence of Brand South Africa and what defines South Africanness?
I would argue that it is necessary to create the right ‘enabling environment to facilitate the achievement of the six factors Clem has listed and the first element of an enabling environment is to help rebuild the spirit of our Nation through the creation of an understanding and commitment to a sense of ‘South Africanness’ that is defined by a common set of National values and behaviours to which we all subscribe regardless of our demographic or psychographic differences – we have to move beyond divisive descriptions of our people in terms of race, creed, ethnicity, gender, etc and we have to start talking about ‘South Africans’ and we need to all start behaving as South Africans – #CR seems to get it!
The second element in the enabling environment (and there are undoubtedly others) is that we simply have to learn to live within our means as a Nation and that, in turn, means more efficient and effective use of the tax revenue generated. This has to start with the removal of corrupt practices, as identified by Clem, but it has to go further and reduce the costs involved in running an over-resourced but under-performing civil service. I appreciate that the latter point may not be palatable to the ruling party (a term that should be ‘binned’) as it provides ‘employment’ for a great number of ANC voters!
We know that Clem’s six factors are on the right track to return to the High Road but isn’t it time for a conversation about the enabling environment and lets start that by defining South Africanness as a concept which can unite us as a Nation?
