When a beleaguered president is a blessing Part IV: Scrutinising treachery

The meme, "Houston, we have a problem" reflects patronage. Choosing Houston for the well-funded mission-control space centre stemmed from both houses of Congress having been led by two arm-twisting Texans.

One would soon occupy the White House and use his most unreserved strong-armed tactics to force through America's historic Civil Rights Act of 1964. Lyndon Johnson was chosen as John Kennedy's running mate not because he was equally cerebral or because they liked each other.

Johnson could deliver his region's electoral support. He became president when Kennedy was assassinated in 1963. Five years later Johnson departed from politics a casualty of university riots and rising political upheaval.

Going to the moon was a passing fad. Soon all who have been there will be dead. Here on earth, patronage remains a universal threat requiring eternal vigilance.

Conversely, treacherous political expediency is sometimes required to manage clashes between factional wants and societal needs. This is particularly true when ethnic factionalism clashes with economic interests amid emotionally charged, moral quagmires.

SA's future hinges on adopting prudent economic policies. This requires a well positioned and motivated political infighter to take on heavy factional resistance within the ruling party.

Anger over Zuma detracts from focusing on opportunities and solutions. The congealed moral, political, and economic issues need to be picked apart.

Morality in 21st century SA

SA has known the same Jacob Zuma for a long time. But no one knows where prosecuting him will leave the country. Social justice, meanwhile, is grounded by Jeremy Bentham's "greatest good for the greatest number" observation alongside John Rawls' focus on how the least advantaged are affected.

The campaign to constrain patronage was joined by previously loyal voters of the ruling party. The August elections heralded the long-delayed arrival of a competitive political landscape amid universal suffrage.

True political legitimacy requires clearing a final hurdle: accessible paths for all who are committed to developing skills and applying themselves. Zuma is singularly best positioned to either block or advance the policy pivots required to sharply improve the nation's economic vibrancy and upliftment paths. Should efforts to hold him accountable help provoke such required policy shifts, justice will have been served.

SA's 17 million social grant recipients is a first approximation of the nation's volume of extreme poverty. Their already tragic prospects are now contracting as the affluent seek psychological recompense through a prosecution path whose pitfalls overshadow its prospects.

Framing ethical issues often begins with asking questions, such as: How does failure to enact vital policy shifts to improve prospects for all South Africans compare to 783 fraud charges?  Who is complicit in the former; the latter? Who is to judge? The electorate in 2019? If the practical, political and moral dynamics differ, which will party leaders prioritise?

Will the factional dominance of Zuma's patronage network within the ANC be marginalised before the 2019 election - or even afterwards? An untainted leader will come from where? When? How?

"Justice delayed is justice denied" takes on vexing significance in SA today. It is quite unlikely that Zuma will be imprisoned, again. The concept of credit for "time served" features in the courts of international and rural public opinion.

Whatever Zuma's crimes might be, delaying policy reforms amounts to life sentences of penury for many guilty of being born in shacks. Economic modeling need not be precise to depict grand injustices.

Which is the smallest number: A) SA's unemployment rate; B) the age when the average South African abandons youthful ambitions C) the percentage chance Zuma will again be imprisoned?

Economics in 21st century SA

If Karl Marx were brought back to engage the tired-minded policymakers who still invoke communist ideals, SA would feature prominently on a short list. He, more than anyone ever, would be animated by the economics and social effects of changing the modes of production from industrial-led growth to embracing digital economics and services-led growth.

Today's top economists, and thus the profession, are unsettled by gathering waves of disruptions and transformations. Digital disruptions comparable to those inflicted upon the telephony space are now emerging in energy and transportation sectors, among others.

SA's leftist policy makers live in a stylised interpretation of the 1960s. They are today's hippy intellectuals who "dropped out" despite the obvious benefits of fitting in within the global economic mainstream.

Resource reliant economies across the globe are under intense pressures to devise startling visions with which to reinvent their economies. SA has the relatively simple option of following the advice of the IMF and credit agencies and adopting the policies which have succeeded at unlocking creativity in so many top performing economies.

SA's economy is far more sophisticated and diverse than the vast majority of resource focused exporters. SA's dismal growth prospects could be sharply improved through overhauling the nation's economic policies thus uncapping fountains of ingenuity.

Politics and economics in 21st century SA

The key blockage to SA achieving broad prosperity and political legitimacy has long been how its politics and economics work at cross purposes. Education outcomes have been meagre for most South Africans whereas the best educated often emigrate from this exceptionally beautiful country whose future hinges on being able to abandon failed policies.

SA's constitutional underpinnings always placed great reliance on competitive elections; in August 2016 they arrived. Will the next chapters focus on courtroom battles or growth?

Concluding

While extreme resource wealth encourages cronyism, such factions should become easier to constrain given the sudden emergence of a competitive political landscape. Arguments for prioritising the removal of Zuma are not persuasive. Without purging his dogmatically leftist policy makers and reconceiving SA's economic policies, the economy will continue to stagnate, the underclass will become larger, and protests will become more extreme.

SA's top priority should be adopting sensible economic policies which will allow the nation's companies and people to flourish. If Zuma can provide the backroom arm-twisting to make this happen, the man will have atoned for his trespasses.

Shawn Hagedorn is an independent strategy adviser @shawnhagedorn