The ANC as a political party is in a shambles. Its internecine struggles, exemplified by that lawless megalomaniac Julius Malema, bode ill for the future of this country. And the more the ANC creates disgruntled masses, the more it thinks the Constitution is the problem. It is not the Constitution, stupid. It is the failure to provide public services effectively, create jobs and reduce poverty. It is this helplessness that lies behind the ANC's proposed social transformation agenda.

President's Zuma's point man, Minister Radebe, actually said: "...our first transition embodied a framework and a national consensus that may have been appropriate for political emancipation, a political transition, but has proven inadequate and inappropriate for our social and economic transformation phase."  This is a wonderful admission of failure.

He is saying, in effect, yes we have the vote and some basic civil and political rights, but we have failed to provide jobs, to diminish poverty, to provide better education, health-care and housing, and to reverse crime. And for this we must change the constitution and launch into the National Democratic Revolution, the second phase of transformation, a belief shared by all Marxists who are now dead or moribund.

National Democratic Revolutions (NDR) the world over, have failed and except for our partially successful economic policy, this country is ailing because every other aspect of governance is in the mould of the NDR.

The ANC occupies all the levers of power; it has centralised control in the presidency; it has smashed almost all the independent institutions appointed to hold the executive accountable; the judiciary under the Judicial Services Commission has become a caricature of its former self; corruption is endemic; black economic empowerment and affirmative action has led to incompetence at the highest levels of governance; crime is rampant and the police, intelligence, justice, and defence are the most frightening cluster virtually using state resources to spy on each other.

More seriously the ANC's policy proposals threaten to tamper with:

• The role and power of the provinces;
• The freedom of the courts
• Agricultural and Land Reform;
• The right of access to information and media freedom;
• Language rights and the right to education in the language of one's choice.

These are serious encroachments and the public should read these documents and oppose them because the devil lies in the detail. Constitutional amendments will not deal with the actual reasons why the ANC is failing; but what they will do is tighten the grip of the state on the rights of the individual, property rights, freedom of expression, and it will extract more revenue in order to be more corrupt and to use the economy for its own enrichment.

The solutions to the country's challenges do not require 12 obfuscating policy documents, but government can do the following:

• Reform the electoral system to get rid of the cadre deployment pandemic;
• Criminalise corruption and subject the tender process to rigorous scrutiny by appointing independent agencies to grant tenders;
• Depoliticise the civil service and employ competent and qualified public officials especially at local government level;
• Parliament should hold the executive accountable and all MPs should lower their standards of living and buy their own cars, reduce their perks and have fewer holidays;
• Transform SA's rigid labour regime so that small businesses can flourish and so create jobs;
• Municipal Managers should be apolitical and financial management and transparent budget processes should be the sine qua non and central to good governance;
• Transform the Information and Technology sector to become part of the global technological revolution and empower ICASA to do exactly that.

I have just returned from the USA after staying with my daughter for a month. She gave birth to her baby in a public hospital. The services were spectacular, from providing ‘lactation consultants', to complete layettes and medication for the baby, to exceptional obstetric and paediatric care. Bedding was changed regularly and all kinds of food were on offer. Grant it, the USA is a first world country but the care that I have witnessed there beats even our best private hospitals here.

The USA knows what public service is; more importantly, Americans demand it. They are used to good to excellent public services and demand them because they pay taxes. Care is not a first world commodity and every country can provide it. Here our taxes are squandered from Parliamentary to local government level and we get very little in return. Worse, as citizens we do not know what it is to demand our rights and services for the taxes we pay.

Maladministration and corruption is the scourge, Mr President! Not the Constitution.

This article first appeared in Die Burger.

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