Campaign Diary - Week 2: Why the ANC was bad for the Western Cape

Note to editors: In the run-up to municipal elections, I will be releasing a once-weekly campaign diary. This week's campaign diary focuses on the DA and ANC's differing visions, and how these have practically manifested in disparate ways in the Western Cape.

The DA's vision is of an open, opportunity society for all. This vision, and the implementation of it, is the key to our success in winning elections and delivering in government. The opposite is the closed, patronage society for some - the ANC's model. It lies at the heart of the ANC's failure to govern the Western Cape effectively when it was in office.

It's worthwhile interrogating why that is, in a little more detail.

Corruption is endemic because institutional mechanisms designed to counter it are not respected - the system of governance, in other words, is "closed".

Service delivery failures are inevitable because projects are conceived to make money for comrades, not to deliver for the people. Hence, "patronage".

Finally, internal divisions - often along racial lines - are unavoidable because factions in the governing party compete for the spoils of office. Thus the political system only works for some.

All these problems are inter-related: Corruption causes divisions as rival factions fight over the spoils of office. When a party is divided, it focuses more on internal battles than service delivery. Corruption is a further impediment to service delivery because there is less money available for services.

In the open opportunity society for all, government is no longer beset by these problems. And as voters contemplate their choices ahead of the upcoming local elections, these differing visions for South Africa become increasingly relevant.

The differences are best exemplified in administrations such as Cape Town, which the DA turned into a star performer after years of ANC mismanagement, and the Western Cape, where the DA earned the province an unprecedented clean sweep of audits after only one year at the helm, and has been steadily turning around departmental performance and service delivery. Such case studies are useful, because they illustrate how the ANC's performance in government is characterised by precisely what we might expect from a party that believes in the closed patronage society for the few: internal division, corruption and service delivery failure:

Division

The Western Cape ANC is currently fractured by a bitter dispute between two factions headed by Mcebisi Skwatsha and Marius Fransman. Though Mr Fransman was elected the ANC provincial chairman, Mr Skwatsha's supporters have challenged the outcome and will likely disrupt future party activities. This dysfunction has not escaped the notice of President Zuma, who recently said that the ANC had "failed" in the Western Cape, because "we are dealing with one another" rather than serving the people.

The party's divisions are likely to intensify due to the controversial draft labour legislation that aims to impose national demographic quotas onto the provinces, and which could threaten hundreds of thousands of jobs in the province.

Corruption

Just as importantly, the Western Cape ANC has been weak at dealing with corruption. Consider four examples:

• It is alleged that Ebrahim Rasool, while he was Premier, paid Cape Argus journalist Ashley Smith to write favourable newspaper articles about him. Marius Fransman was allegedly involved in the plot. Premier Helen Zille has ordered a forensic investigation into this ‘brown envelope journalism'. Gwede Mantashe subsequently acknowledged that Mr Rasool was removed as Premier as a result of this allegation.
• Mr Rasool and Mr Fransman awarded a R44.5 million contract to Hip Hop Media (owned by their friends Ashley Smith and Zain Orrie). The province was charged exorbitant monies for work never done. This is currently the subject of a probe by the Hawks and the Provincial Government of the Western Cape's forensic investigation unit.
• When he was Premier, Mr Rasool established the Erasmus Commission to investigate the City of Cape Town. The High Court subsequently found that the Commission was an illegal political witch hunt designed to smear the DA and to boost Mr Rasool's standing in his own party. The Commission cost the taxpayer in the region of R7 million.
• In 2006, Mr Rasool went on an official visit to Dubai. It is alleged that he improperly pitched the sale of the Somerset Hospital site, worth R1 billion, to representatives of Dubai World, who owned the V&A Waterfront at the time. The public procurement rules state that no discussion can take place before the public tender process is published. This matter has never been investigated.

Delivery

Consider the ANC's record, and the DA's comparative record, on the following three areas of delivery performance in government in the Western Cape and Cape Town:

• On financial management, the DA's Western Cape administration received a clean sweep of unqualified audits in all 25 department and public entities - the only province to do so in the country. In contrast, every provincial department received either a qualified report or an audit with other matters the previous year, under the ANC.
• On education, the ANC presided over a long decline of matric pass results - which dropped from 87.1% (2003) to 75.7% (2009), while the DA reversed that six-year trend in 2010.
• Finally, in basic service delivery, the Universal Household Access to Basic Services report for 2010 ranked the City of Cape Town the number one metro in the country across four areas of basic service delivery - water, refuse removal, sanitation and electricity.

These are just some of the ways in which the DA's vision of an open society with opportunity for all is practically manifest in the places where we govern. The DA is a party that actually delivers a better life for all, regardless of political loyalty; a party that is accountable to all and not only to its own political factions; and a party that believes that the government has a duty to serve its citizens, not itself.

Statement issued by Lindiwe Mazibuko MP, DA National Spokesperson, February 24 2011

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