A turning point in S Africa

Jonathan Power :

South Africans of all races know how to behave at election time – responsible as voters and honest in their ballot procedures. This is part of the legacy of Nelson Mandela who, as his funeral last year made clear, was the most honoured and respected leader in the world.
The country that has tripled its income in the years since the end of apartheid has achieved a lot more – much of it totally unexpected by white opinion. The Financial Times recently wrote, “What was in 1994 a divided country and a broken polity is now an unrecognisable, modern investment-grade economy”.
Inflation has been tamed and support for the poor expanded with weekly cash grants to 16 million people. Every year one million people join the middle class. There has been a dramatic widening of the tax base and the civil service is no longer staffed by a white elite. The government has appointed first class people to the top positions in managing the economy.
One should also mention the football World Cup held four years ago. Despite the vast numbers who came, the many stadiums that were built and the difficulty of transporting big crowds, it went off without a hitch. Crime was low. Foreigners travelled into Johannesburg from the airport on a new, high-speed train. One cannot help compare it with the greatly flawed preparations now afoot in Brazil, a far richer country, for this year’s World Cup.
True there is a revolution of rising expectations. The striking platinum mine workers demanding a large pay increase is one manifestation of this. (If mine owners had met them half way at the beginning, the strike would have been long settled.) Generally, despite social progress, poorer people want more. It is understandable given the most skewed income distribution in the world.
Nevertheless, one should look at the government’s achievements with a non-jaundiced eye. In 2002, 30 per cent of households reported they had experienced hunger. Now it is down to 12 per cent. Over 90 per cent have access to running water. Around four-fifths have a television, an electric stove and access to a mobile phone. More than half live in their own home and only 14 per cent in state-subsidised housing.
School enrolment is now almost 95 per cent, although the teaching is often of poor quality. The number of black engineering students at university is now the same as whites. The government has set up the world’s biggest anti-retroviral treatment program for HIV/AIDS.
As for middle class whites they continue to do well. Indeed, whites who fled to the UK or Australia are trickling back. Among the young professional class lots of inter-racial friendships have been formed and there are inter-racial marriages. The cabinet has four white members and whites can sit on the executive committee of the ruling party, the African National Congress (ANC).
Crime frightens most people. The country is listed among the world’s worst 10 countries for crime. Nevertheless, it has cut its murder rate by half (statistics that have been checked for accuracy by outsiders). Nevertheless, over 2000 white farmers and their families have been murdered.
Prosperous white-owned farms are a sore issue among the African rural population whose land was stolen by Afrikaner and European immigrants. On taking office the ANC promised that 30 per cent of white-owned land would become black-owned.
But under the “willing seller, willing buyer” programme (no shades of land grabbing, as in Zimbabwe) only five per cent of farmland has been re-distributed, despite a great willingness to sell.
Unemployment remains high. Some say it is the highest in the world. Half the young black men don’t have jobs. Shantytowns are still growing on the edge of big towns. Growth will have to double to at least five per cent to make an indent in these figures. Mining needs to be resuscitated, power shortages dealt with and African education and health services sharply improved.
South Africa’s competitor for being the continent’s largest economy, Nigeria, has had sustained growth the last decade at between 6 and 7 per cent and is aiming for 10 per cent.
Mandela left a great legacy. But it has to be continuously built on.

(Jonathan Power is a veteran foreign affairs analyst)