Motlanthe escapes
It seems that African National Congress deputy president Kgalema Motlanthe has escaped the career suicide of cabinet - for now. Motlanthe, recently sworn in as an MP, will remain a back-bencher for the forseeable future.

This gives him, and his high-powered backers, the time to monitor the situation with Jacob Zuma and have an 'on the ground' presence to challenge for the Presidency. It also most likely signals Motlanthe's willingness to challenge for the position. Time will tell...

The trouble with Umshini Wami
I must say I did take some interest in Jacob Zuma trying to wriggle his way out of the fact that Umshini Wami, such a rallying call during his journey to president-elect, has become a rallying call during the xenophobic violence recently.

While many of these thugs have been singing "his" song between belting some poor Somalian, Zimbabwean and/or anyone else in their paths, Zuma asks "Umshini wami belongs to the ANC. Who are these people abusing this song while they are doing wrong things?".

While it seems incredibly disengenious to suggest that those perpetrating this violence cannot be from the ANC as they are "doing wrong things", it does show the razor's edge that has to be walked as a leader with largely populist support base.

He went on to say that "Maybe we (ANC) haven't been able to explain how much African countries helped us during the struggle for our freedom." For me, this shows a fundamental disconnect and continuing signs of cracks in the much vaunted "freedom voting" in the electorate.

We continue to see signs that the electorate (please note that I'm not talking here about the xenophobic attacks, but much more broader debate and criticisms) is starting to criticise the grand party of emancipation on socio-political issues and more importantly, to reduce the respect for the party as such. This can only be a good thing within the confines of our democracy.

Apologies...
...for the lack of posting. I've been really swamped at work. Normal service to resume.

You have got to be kidding...

NPA date blunder casts new doubt on Zuma trial

I'm speechless...

Mbeki falls away
This really is a sad, sad end for Thabo Mbeki, a once-proud international leader now reduced to the stature of a naughty pet no-one wants around. Over the weekend, the SACP failed in its bid to have Mbeki removed from office at the ANC conference, but more because that nobody seemed to think he was a real threat to their interests anyway. We also heard this weekend that Mbeki is being publicly castigated for refusal to heed the advice of two appointed judges that the 2002 Zimbabwean election was rigged. International affairs was all the Mbeki had left, and its rapidly being stripped away. If you think that it was coincidental that these allegations surfaced this weekend, think again.

Looking forward, of some concern for Motlanthe is him losing the fight to stay within the ANC rather than be sent to Mbeki's Cabinet. If Motlanthe is to make a run for the presidency whilst Zuma is caught up in the graft trial later this year, he needs to be able to be on the ground, not stuck being a spy in Mbeki's cabinet. No wonder he's not that happy about it...

Drama in Vusi's office
Well, we're finally getting proof that Vusi Pikoli's sacking was solely due to his refusal to obey orders from the Presidency not to arrest police chief Jackie Selebi. Now this has obviously been South Africa's worst kept secret over the past two years, and it's not surprising that Mbeki's having more trouble than usual keeping the lid on it, giving his current standing within the party and the Government.

At present, the best the Presidency can do is to claim that he wasn't booted for wanting to continue to arrest Selebi after the President's order, but that he didn't want to treat his arrest "sensitively". And by "sensitively", they obviously mean "swept under the carpet"...

Is the bad mood justified?
For all of you looking for guru analysts to lead you through the turbulent intellectual times defending South Africa at present, look no further than one of my personal heroes, JP Landman. Landman has been BOE Private Clients' (not that I'm one - it's available on the internet!) chief analyst on political and investment research, and his latest document rebuffs a few of negative South Africans greatest myths.

For example:

One hears a lot that SA spends on social welfare but not on investment. This fiscal year the country will invest 7% of GDP …. and spend 4,6% of GDP on social security, including the Road Accident Fund, UIF and of course the 12,4 million social allowances paid out every 30 days. Whilst the state probably spends 80% of what is spent on social security (churches, NGOs and individual do the rest), its investment spend is only about 30% of what the country invests. The private sector does the rest.

Can we now please bin this nonsense that we spend more on social welfare than investment?

Landman writes with an ease and a knowledge that I could only hope for, and all of his commentary pieces are well worth a read here.

I'll leave the last word to him:

* Rising incomes mean resources to tackle problems, create jobs, fight poverty and build infrastructure. To paraphrase Bill Clinton, it is about per capita incomes, stupid.
* Over the next seven years per capita incomes can rise as much as during the last 14 years. This will trump the negative fallout from politics. The economist prof De Kiewiet wrote several decades ago that SA progresses through “political disasters and economic windfalls.” Between rising incomes and post-Polokwane political uncertainty, it will happen again.
* SA is responding to its infrastructure crises (which will be around for a while, make no mistake) with a massive investment programme.

All that remains now, is to put one foot in front of the other, carry on and expect a lot of messiness. Sometimes I think it is our inability to live with messiness that paralyses us. If Whites can make this paradigm shift their mood might not be so bleak. More importantly, they can capitalise on the opportunities.

And now for something completely different...
Most of the time blogging on politics can be a very serious pastime, but every now and then there's something of (usually dark) humour. And so to today, where Western Australian Opposition Leader Tony Buswell has admitted to an allegation that he "sniffed the chair of a female staffer in late 2005"... Not that I'm for a minute dismissing his deeper issues as frivolous, but do read on

Help send one of our sharpest political minds to Harvard
One of our great political minds, Jonathan Faull (IDASA analyst), has been accepted to pursue a Masters in Public Policy at Harvard, and he needs your help to get there. Jonny is looking for interested parties to pledge to assist with the large tuition costs at Harvard. If you're interested in supporting quality political analysis and research in South Africa, help him out here.

Some Great Journalism
These are tough times for South Africa politically, both domestically and internationally, but it's unearthing some great analysis and journalism. Two examples of it are:

Foreign policy begins at home

ANC freed a genie it might not control

Both well worth a read.

Zuma shifting with the wind
Jacob was in Germany yesterday, calling on all the "leftist governments to unite in their lobby for United Nations and World Trade Organisation reform as well as conflict resolution and climate change". Jacob spoke about the need for the governments of India, Brazil and Germany (and seeing as he is visiting France as well, probably them too) to form a more united front on fighting for leftist issues at the WTO and UN.

It will probably be seen as another shifting message from Zuma, as he flatters the capitalists and stokes up the socialists in alternating weeks. However, it may also get some South Africans to investigate the policies of the countries he mentioned to see how successful they are with policies that are further to the left than South Africa's.

Bullard and the Nuance of Racism
Analyst Xolela Mangcu writes a good op-ed piece in the Business Day this morning regarding the creeping racism in South Africa and the dangers of the creeping response from the black population.

y purpose here is indeed to sound the alarm bells about the rise of racial recidivism in the white community, and the response it is generating in the black community. By recidivism I mean the relapse into the mud of backward theories of racial superiority by the likes of Bullard.

The mistake we made was to equate our political transition with a transition in social attitudes in the white community. Yet many white people were indeed socialised in those backward, eugenicist social attitudes. Once we accept that social reality, Bullard stops being extraordinary. He has simply lanced the boil and released the underlying pus of racism into our social life.

Max du Preez responded to this social reality thus: “The Polokwane show and Zuma-mania didn’t upset me, nor did the Selebi/Pikoli/Scorpions debacles. Not even Eskom’s disastrous outages shook my faith in my nation’s future. But the possibility that there is a large section of our nation still producing the likes of the Video of Shame Four, the Skielik killer, the Waterkloof Four, is the most depressing thought I’ve had in decades. Especially because that community is my own.”

Du Preez has shown leadership. But how many will join him in pulling the white community back from the brink? I say this after a depressing conversation with some of my friends this past weekend. For the first time in a long time, I began to ask myself whether I had indeed become the coconut that some of my critics have called me. I was alone in holding to the argument that we need to do more to assure white people, and marginalise the likes of Bullard, in building a new nonracial moral majority.

Under attack that evening was nothing less than the model of racial reconciliation epitomised by Nelson Mandela. My friends insisted it was this model that emboldened the likes of Bullard. I felt guilty for having invited Bullard to be a panellist at the launch of my book earlier this year, and for having defended him against black people calling him a racist in a radio programme. Did I really have to wait for the blatant racism of Bullard’s latest column to get out of my own comfort zone?

It's well worth a read, whether you're white or not...

Confusing Law with Sentiment
There seems to be a crisis of conscience in South Africa at the moment, where people are incredibly loose with their interpretations of the law, using it or discounting it, depending on which argument they're trying to make. The current situation with this Chinese vessel on its way to deliver an arms shipment to Zimbabwe is a case in point.

There is no arms embargo against Zimbabwe, there are no laws against shipping arms in legal arms procurement deals between sovereign nations. As a nation, South Africa holds no right to essentially kidnap private property (the vessel) and legal product (the arms destined for Zimbabwe) because of their potential use. There is a moral issue yes, but is it ours to make?

We can unfortunately not pick and choose which laws we respect and adhere to. Trade and prosperity internationally depend on the adherence to basics of legal due process and property rights. If we don't respect Zimbabwe's property rights, how can we effectively hold a moral high ground on Mugabe's lack of respect for the property rights of his people?

Zuma to get a new public face
It would be an understatement to say that Jacob is in desperate need of better publicity, and in the lead-up to his August trial date, the ANC is concerned about how well-equipped his current communication staff are. Suffice to say, they will join the ranks of the unemployed fairly soon, replaced by a sparkling new cadre of spokesperson and communications specialists.

Good news for Zuma? Definitely. Chances of them being able to reign in Zuma's penchant for ridiculous statements? Nil.

A Few Notes....
Just a few quick notes today:

Firstly, have a read of an interesting op-ed piece in today's Cape Times by Bennie Bunsee, exploring whether black people have the right to exclusivity. Bunsee argues that just as there are societies (and insurace companies!) for women, black people should have the right to form their own societies too.

Secondly, on a more humourous note, the fact that the ANC is still regarded as a "terrorist organisation" by the US Government, and ANC delegates, including Nelson Mandela, have to get a special State Department waiver to enter the US. How long ago was 1994?