The cure for a wounded nation
Justice Malala deserves positive recognition, even accolades, for inviting Mamphela Ramphele onto his "Justice Factor" television show for the purpose of consulting the good doctor for a diagnosis of the ailments of the nation.Modestly, but accurately, describing herself as a lifelong "change agent", Ramphele expressed the view that the malaise which is holding South Africa back is the "woundedness" of its people. By this she was referring to the wounds from being oppressed and indeed of doing the oppressing too. In the nation's past there were racial, gender and class fault lines creating the categories in which oppression occurred. The greatest of these was of course the institutionalised racism of apartheid, which, on this diagnosis, left many in the nation with what psychologists might call "an inferiority complex" (self-disrespect or even self-hate) and those guilty of oppressing with a "superiority complex" engendered by a false belief in the veracity of their own humiliating propaganda. The ravages of the pernicious bantu education policy under which maths and science were not for the Verwoerdian "hewers of wood and drawers of water" have left their mark on current generations of teachers and learners. The former have no self confidence and treat the latter "as if they are imbeciles", as the former UCT vice chancellor put it during her wide ranging interview.
Ramphele's "woundedness of the nation" analysis is provocative. Helpfully, it posits that we are all wounded in different ways and will carry these wounds forward with us unless there is a concerted national effort to treat the injuries that have given rise to the wounds.
The parlous state of the education system, the unsustainable reliance of over 10 million people on the state for hand outs, the irresponsibility of politicians, corruption and protests for ever more "service delivery" all qualify for sub-diagnosis as symptoms of the "woundedness" of the nation.
Dr Ramphele has apparently been facilitating "circles of healing" for wounded people in the Eastern Cape (a gaping wound of a province) in which they discuss their progress out of wounded status into a wholeness that is preferable by far to the perpetuation of "woundedness" whether attributable to being oppressed or being the oppressor. She prefers this to the "dialogue of the deaf" which so stifles healthy change.
The conversation with Justice Malala, a not to be missed piece of television journalism, did touch upon the reasons for the lack of progress made in treating the wounds of the past. This brought to mind the words of the preamble of the Constitution in which the "injustices of the past" are recognised and a nationally agreed prescription for addressing those injustices is foreshadowed with the poetic, and recently revived, phrase "unity in diversity" as well as the expressed intention to:
- "Heal the divisions of the past and establish a society based on democratic values, social justice and fundamental human rights...[a] government based on the will of the people [with] every citizen equally protected by law;
- Improve the quality of life of all citizens and free the potential of each person; and
- Build a united and democratic South Africa able to take its rightful place as a sovereign state in the family of nations."
"(a) Human dignity, the achievement of equality and the advancement of human rights and freedoms.
(b) Non-racialism and non-sexism.
(c) Supremacy of the Constitution and the rule of law.
(d) Universal adult suffrage, a national common voters' roll, regular elections and a multi-party system of democratic government, to ensure accountability, responsiveness and openness."
(emphasis supplied)
Medically speaking, these values were the "medicines" the founders of the new order prescribed to get us to have that better life we all seek, not only for ourselves, but also for all of our children.
According to the Ramphele diagnosis made 18 years after the new Constitution was negotiated and almost 22 years after the liberation movements were unbanned, the "woundedness" of the nation is still getting in the way of the realisation of that healing of which the preamble to the Constitution speaks.
Simply by examining the "national medicine shelf" quoted above, to see which medicines have not been used and which have perhaps been misused, it is possible, at a glance, to identify four causes of the continuing "woundedness".
1) The first, and most endemic, is the lack of accountability of both those who govern and those who are governed. Ramphele is justifiably critical of the "handout" mentality of too many of her fellow citizens. Too few ask what they can do for their country; too many seek to rely on what their country can do for them. She prescribes large doses of accountability as part of the cure needed. The inappropriate role of Luthuli house and other political party headquarters in our proportional representation system was singled out by her for well deserved criticism. Politicians generally answer to party bosses, not to the people who voted for them, hence their lack of accountability both to the people and to the values of the nation as a whole.
2) Secondly, there is a lack of responsiveness to the needs of ordinary people. The notion of an "elite compromise", in which the Afrikaner nationalists and the African nationalists made a deal that would result in "business as usual" both before and after the transition to chimerical democracy, is one in which the lot of the ordinary people has not materially improved since their supposed liberation.
3) The third is linked to this: a failure to take appropriate 'muti' to promote the achievement of equality is evident in the increasing gini co-efficient, the dysfunctionality of the basic education system and the persistence of poverty, unemployment and crime. BEE is aimed at making those least historically disadvantaged its beneficiaries while those most disadvantaged, the rural black women, continue to live in inadequate if not traditionally down-trodden circumstances. The new 'wabenzi' flash by in their posh vehicles so beloved of the bling-fixated new elite without apparently noticing that liberation, transformation and democracy have had very little impact on the lives of the mothers of most of the nation.
4) Lastly, and most perniciously, lack of openness has bedevilled any chance there was of achieving the healing for which Ramphele, and with her most right thinking fellow citizens, so long. Successive Secrecy bills, the proposed Media Appeals Tribunal and indeed the whole totalitarian farce that is called "the National Democratic Revolution" are the symptoms of the opacity with which those who govern feel constrained to operate. The fact that the aims of this "revolution" (embraced by the tripartite alliance) are deeply and darkly inconsistent with the whole notion of constitutional democracy that is encapsulated in our supreme law, the Constitution, makes it necessary to govern less than openly. Cadres are deployed in a manner that suggests we are at war. We are not. Cronyism in procurement, corruption in high places and capacity constraints all conspire to thwart the healing needed and envisaged by the nation. The drivers of the revolutionary agenda are forever bumping their heads (more wounds) against the values of the nation as adopted in the Constitution.
The cure, if the diagnosis is correct, is simple: embrace, implement and enforce the four highlighted values of the Constitution, abandon all revolutionary thought at odds with our supreme law and, in this way, heal the wounds of the nation. Perhaps, as Malala hinted, the good doctor should enter politics to help make this happen. Heaven knows, the nation needs healing.
Paul Hoffman SC
15 January, 2012
