DOCUMENTS

Functional collapse and its consequences

Stanley Uys discusses Jan du Plessis' prediction that angry people rather than parties are the new resistance

Since it came into office in 1994, the ANC Government has lost a significant amount of its "human capital" - skills, governmental experience, and more. The further it practices "cadre deployment," affirmative action, etc., the more it loses human capital, which it is incapable of replacing.

This is the warning in Intersearch, a monthly bulletin by Dr. Jan du Plessis of Pretoria, described as "a briefing "aimed at the top echelon of a company".

When this happens, says Dr du Plessis, the "society" outside government, falling back on its resilience, itself starts to meets the needs that the state can no longer deliver.

This has led to a "dualism" in the inner working of the ANC.

It becomes a ruling party with substantial political support, "but decreasing capabilities in terms of service delivery." It has the voting power, but not the doing power. The result is "internal erosion of the political system."

By 2014, says Dr. du Plessis, "there is reason to assume that the ANC as a ruling party has reached the end of its political shelf life. It can still be expected that the ANC will win the next election in 2014, but as it maintains political support in parliament it will shed governing power in the multiple systems of government.

"The result has been a dangerous dualism right in the centre of the political system. What may evolve here is a completely new situation which will create a new context of interacting forces in society for the phase up to 2020...

Dr. du Plessis focuses on a growing imbalance between government and governed (population). "From 2014 onwards this imbalance in society will have to be closely monitored. If there is going to be any serious conflict on the political, social and economic level in society, this will be the point of origin."

When the present government has to reach out to the population to effect service delivery, the interaction comes under enormous strain and in many cases just collapses. "This is when violence, potholes and open sewage appear on street level"

The government's problem, says Dr du Plessis, is that it has spent its past 20 years in office seeking to redress the legacy of apartheid. The 1994 election was not about the future, but a celebration of the struggle against apartheid. By the end of 2013, the whole process will have become stagnant and stymied...

"The "destruction of the last remnants of apartheid" demanded a "fundamental transformation of society", which in turn, caused the mass expulsion of white skills from the public service. What followed immediately after 1994 was a massive brain drain, from which the South African society has never recovered". The appointment of more than 44,000 public servants in the first quarter of 2013 brought the number of public servants to 3.07 million or 22.6 of the total labour force.

Dr du Plessis believes that what collapsed in Eastern Europe "due to stale ideological and political thinking and policy has been re-introduced in South Africa under the banner of the struggle against apartheid and liberation". The year after Thabo Mbeki assumed office (1999), government was already in a state iof functional decay". Collapse in SA was on national, provincial and municipal levels.

Dr du Plessis focuses on the grip of the SA Communist Party on the ANC and its ideological influence. "The SACP members moved into cabinet and have stayed there ever since...the fact is that the SACP never abandoned their Marxist doctrine - it has only been incorporated into the new political dispensation. Twenty years later, the country has started paying the price - functional collapse!

A further ideological bridge was crossed. " One has to grasp the difference between the National Democratic Revolution and the Constitution... The Constitution finds its place in parliament; the NDR finds its home at the Party Conference. This provides for two separate institutions, with two different documents - and two different agenda's". 

The first objective would be a democratic society, and then the ANC "would respect the right and duty of our ally, the SACP, to lead the struggle for the victory of the socialist revolution. (ANC: The Evolution of a New Society. Thabo Mbeki. June 2007)."

"It is the responsibility of the NDR to take society from the current democracy to a socialist revolution. In this, it goes far beyond the present Constitution. For this transition of society, special guidance is necessary and this is where 'cadre deployment' has been introduced in an attempt to secure the process of transition".

Dr du Plessis expects the ANC to muddle along, but for a new kind of resistance to appear: "No parties, just people who have become angry".

Discussing land nationalisation (EFF -let us take it all without payment), Dr Du Plessis says most farmers use banking facilities, and "one farmer will not make a difference. but hundreds upon hundreds refusing to repay will take the banks down overnight...

"Nobody will invest in tractors, irrigation systems, trucks, seeds and fertiliser. These systems will cease to function overnight. The immediate job losses will be in the tens of thousands. The countryside will implode, small towns will close down and mass migration may start to the urban areas...In the cities many people will not be able to afford food on the table"...The regions will go hungry".

Talking about the Arab Spring, Dr. du Plessis writes: " The Arab Spring is now altering the nature of the political process. It implies a shift from the political party to concerned civilian groups on the 'pavement of society'. It becomes ordinary people convening in the street, not in support of party and ideological doctrine, but protesting against the lack of 'services' and the way they are being treated by government.

"In South Africa, Government timely warned that the Arab Spring has no relevance to the situation in the country. Fact is, the Arab Spring has already started outside the reach of parliament, far out in the countryside and squatter camps. The new enemy is not a "terrorist group", but a "lack of services...

"Suffice to state that the process an Arab Spring instigates is already at work in South Africa".

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