Motsoaledi is taking the country backwards with NHI and race

3 September 2024

Solidarity condemns the dangerous statements of Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi in which he uses race to try to gain support for the government’s unworkable National Health Insurance (NHI).

Among his statements to an international audience of pharmacists in Cape Town, Motsoaledi compared justified criticism of the NHI to the apartheid era’s scaremongering about the “swart gevaar (black peril)”.

He added that it is similar to the time when white people stocked up on groceries and candles for when black people came into power – and how afterwards they were “shocked to see that Nelson Mandela was a human being like them; perhaps even more human than them”.

According to Theuns du Buisson, economic researcher at the Solidarity Research Institute (SRI), these words are irresponsible and dishonest attempts to appease an international audience about the NHI.

He believes that Motsoaledi conveniently omits the fact that the majority of South Africans who belong to medical aid funds, and who are opposed to the NHI, are indeed black people.

“Without realising it, the minister is the one taking us straight back to the 1980s. That was when PW Botha used the expression ‘swart gevaar’ to implement policies that no one agreed with.

“Now Minister Motsoaledi is using it precisely to threaten people about legislation that South Africans simply do not want, and which will cause great harm to all of us,” Du Buisson said.

According to Du Buisson, Minister Motsoaledi also shows a lack of respect for the Government of National Unity (GNU), and it is clear how such reckless NHI advertising can jeopardise this unity.

“Now is the time for the country to unite on progress. To classify on the basis of race again, or to accept that rich and poor are equal to white and black, only sows division.

“Many of the groups that spoke out against the NHI are in no way representative of white communities,” Du Buisson said.

Solidarity also asks why the simplest questions regarding the NHI are not answered by the minister. 

“We want to know where the evidence or the studies are that show the NHI actually is workable. Where is the evidence that it is affordable? The right steps were not followed in the drafting of the legislation.

“It is not a ‘swart gevaar’. Everyone in the country will become impoverished and doctors will leave the country in droves. And in saying this we are talking about people and doctors of all racial groups in South Africa.

“It is in everyone’s interest that Solidarity stops the NHI with its litigation,” Du Buisson said.

Issued by Theuns du Buisson, Spokesperson, Economic Research: SRI, 3 September 2024