We Should Not Dodge the Tough Questions, We Must Give Tough Answers
Since leaving the Democratic Alliance, Gareth Van Onselen has been rather busy with upping his blogging and journalistic credentials. One imagines that now he has more free time on his hands not working for the DA, Van Onselen can dedicate himself and his enormous intellect to adding to the distinctly liberal commentary that is often missing in South African discourse.
A fine example of this kind of commentary was Van Onselen's recent critique of his one-time colleague, Mmusi Maimane, the DA's national spokesman and caucus leader in the City of Johannesburg. Van Onselen's critique was essentially this: Maimane's construction of what it meant to be African, namely the acceptance of Ubuntu, was at odds with the party's belief in liberalism and that the construction as presented, challenged the very idea of individuals being able to consider themselves being African whilst rejecting certain prescribed ideas of what it meant to be African.
This critique is not unique to this situation nor to Van Onselen. In a new South Africa where the hallmarks of identity, previously static and unchanging, are now forcibly being reformed as democracy and economic progress allows a greater degree of social fluidity and integration, what it means to be black, white, a Christian and even what it means to be a South African is being explored, challenged and changed all the time.
Van Onselen was entirely right to challenge what he saw as an erosion of the DA's liberal beliefs by Maimane's construction. Indeed, having known Van Onselen for a while, I am not surprised that he would be willing to make things politically and socially awkward for his former colleagues by asking the tough and nuanced questions that journalists and other politicians (especially within the ANC) are not sharp enough (or in some cases are not brave enough) to ask. As a die-hard liberal, this is exactly what Van Onselen would do.
And increasingly, I hope that as people like Van Onselen start to pose tough questions to the DA about its future, the DA will rise to the challenge. As one of the many people who constantly complain that the ANC is closed off to the public and is only accessible to cronies, the DA must set an example of a different way of conducting public discourse.