Have The ‘Wounds Been Healed?’ Divisive Issues in a Democratic South Africa
p. 23-51
Résumé
‘Healing the wounds of the past’: an apt metaphor used to describe the process which was to lead to a necessary reconciliation between the former enemies (see Alex Boraine: ‘wounds that are still full of poison will inevitably affect the whole body and the body politic in SA has been very sick’). The TRC, as a symbolical locus of reconciliation, was instrumental in bringing about a peaceful transition to democracy and defusing racial antagonism. But thirteen years on into democracy have significantly shifted the focus as to what should be regarded as major social and political divisive issues in South Africa today. If the now familiar formula ‘healing the wounds of the past’ means anything today its semantic range should be broadened beyond its now restrictive racial acception to include the current social and political ‘unhealed wounds’ which to a large extent still constitute a backlog of the apartheid era. There are today outstanding social problems especially in terms of poverty, housing, crime, unemployment, drug addiction, and political sleaze which have created new grounds of contention and conflict. In other words South Africa still remains a divided society but the lines of division have shifted and the long-lasting legacy of the past requires new approaches and solutions. The article seeks to identify what these issues are, why they have persisted, how they have been compounded by new developments, and how people at grass root level or at institutional and political levels seek to address and redress them today.
Texte intégral
1‘Healing the wounds of the past’: an apt metaphor used to describe the process that was meant to negotiate a necessary reconciliation between whites and blacks in South Africa. As Alex Boraine, deputy chairman of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) puts it: ‘Wounds that are still full of poison will inevitably affect the whole body and the body politic in South Africa has been very sick and we need to deal with this condition if we are to be healthy and renewed.’1 The TRC, as a symbolical locus of reconciliation, was instrumental in bringing about a peaceful transition to democracy and defusing racial antagonism. But thirteen years on into democracy have significantly shifted the focus as to what should be regarded as major social and political divisive issues in today’s South Africa. If the now familiar formula ‘healing the wounds of the past’ means anything its semantic range should be extended beyond its racial content to include the current social and political ‘unhealed wounds’ which to a large extent still constitute a backlog of the apartheid era. There are today outstanding social problems especially in terms of poverty, housing, crime, unemployment, health, HIV/Aids, and political sleaze which have created new grounds of contention and conflict. In other words South Africa still remains a divided society but the lines of division have shifted and the lasting legacy of the past requires new approaches and solutions. The article will seek to identify what these issues are, why they have persisted, how they have been compounded by new developments, and what solutions are put forward to bring solutions.
2The Memorandum on the Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Bill of 1995 which set up the Truth and Reconciliation Commission spells out the aim of the bill: ‘it is based on the principle that reconciliation depends on forgiveness and that forgiveness can only take place if gross violations of human rights are fully disclosed. What is therefore envisaged is reconciliation through a process of national healing.’2 Whatever the criticisms that have been levelled at the work of the TRC and its limits it seems however that it has to a large extent fulfilled its role as a facilitator of reconciliation, not that all people are reconciled, but it has a least put an end to a period of transition which had as a low-key civil war. If anything it has introduced within the political context of South Africa the concept of civil contract upon which the relative political stability of the country still largely rests. The TRC was a necessary compromise in the transition to democracy which succeeded in appeasing the tensions that accompanied the period of political negotiations. As George Bizos, Nelson Mandela’s former lawyer, recently explained in an interview:
It was a situation where something had to be offered to those willing to give up power. Otherwise they would continue to cling to power. They threatened that unless they were covered by amnesties, they would fight on. We knew they had the means to control elections and to prevent any settlement... It was regrettable that the victims might not be able to pursue prosecutions, but their need for justice had to be weighed against the need for reconciliation and political transition and the need to uncover the truth.3
3The idea of setting up a reconciliation commission was the outcome of a political compromise between the Nationalist Party and the ANC, and the terms of reference, structure and procedures of the TRC reflected this compromise. One of its most salient features was that the TRC could grant immediate amnesty if the former perpetrators fulfilled the conditions imposed by the commission,4 whereas the decision to offer reparations for the victims rested with the President and could not be given until after the end of the Commission’s existence. This is why the promoters of the TRC repeatedly underlined its importance for the country as a whole pointing to the necessity of coming to terms with the past: ‘it is this history with which we have to come to terms. We could not pretend it did not happen. Everyone agrees that South Africans must deal with that history and its legacy.’5 The work and final report of the TRC were inscribed in a discourse which prioritised moral and even religious concerns probably because they offered a common ground of understanding for the majority of the South African population and appealed to overarching values and representations which could be understood by all. One of these key moral issues was the telling of the truth. As Archbishop Desmond Tutu pointed out in the foreword to the final report of the TRC: ‘However painful the experience has been, we remain convinced that there can be no healing without truth’ (Tutu 1998: 1). One of the dominant interpretations of reconciliation which the TRC conveyed through an extensive TV and radio coverage of the confessions and testimonies given by victims and perpetrators during the hearings was, as Richard Wilson points out, that of a ‘religious redemptive vision’ in the sense that it provided ‘meaning for suffering through a narrative of sacrifice for liberation.’6
4The creation of the TRC was frequently criticized on the grounds that it did not serve the aims of justice, or that it sacrificed justice to truth. Desmond Tutu contends that the aim was not to deliver a retributive justice but a restorative justice ‘which is not so much concerned with punishment as with correcting imbalances, restoring broken relationships with healing, harmony and reconciliation’ (Tutu 1998: 4). Post-apartheid South Africa could not afford a Nuremberg-type trial because there were no victors and no vanquished and it also refused the overall injustice and amnesia of the blanket amnesty that was practised in South American countries because it would have further victimised the victims by denying their painful experiences. As Desmond Tutu puts it: ‘The wounds of the past must not be allowed to fester’ (Tutu 1998: 3). It remains however that the reception to the work of the TRC was not unmitigated.
5In a survey conducted in 2000 by the Institute for Justice and Reconciliation the responses which it obtained gave a fairly contrasted perception of the role of the TRC. Thus the TRC initiative was regarded as important for building a united South African nation by 77 % of the black population whereas only 29 % of the white population gave a positive answer.7 To the question whether it was the responsibility of each citizen to contribute to the process of national reconciliation, blacks are more positive (77 %) than whites (50 %) (‘2000 Pilot Reconciliation survey’). Discrepancies are even more marked when it comes to the question of reparations. While 70 % of the black population believes that material compensation is necessary for victims of apartheid, only 20 % of the white population agrees (‘2000 Pilot Reconciliation survey’). As to the question of whether national reconciliation requires the healing of memories, although the gap between black and white responses is not as big as in the previous responses, whites are certainly more hesitant to answer favourably to the question with 56 % giving a positive answer compared to 73 % of the black people who deem it necessary for the sake of reconciliation (‘2000 Pilot Reconciliation survey’).
6One should not forget however that the TRC served a double agenda. Given the shortness of its term of office and the limited number of people involved in its activities the TRC could not simply serve a legal or quasi-legal role; it was also meant to pave the way for the essential task of nation-building as a symbolic gesture meant to deal with the past so as ‘to look toward the future’ (Tutu 1998). But it also appears, as the ‘2000 Pilot Reconciliation Survey’ shows that even in this respect South Africans are not unanimous. White South Africans appear less enthusiastic as to their contribution to the process of national reconciliation in stark contrast with black and coloured attitudes, the latter seeming more willing to ‘embrace the notion and responsibility of reconciliation’ (‘2000 Pilot Reconciliation Survey). But at the same time the work of the TRC is perceived by blacks as being unfinished: the question of reparation is still a sore issue, and victims of apartheid still nurse a deep-seated anger at ‘the lack of progress towards final reparations’ (‘Pilot Reconciliation Survey’).
7In order to better understand the difficulties with which the setting up of the South African TRC was confronted, one should replace it within a broader context. The decision to create a truth and reconciliation commission was part of a process of transition towards democratic institutions which was premised on the prevailing discourse of human rights which had developed from the mid-and late 1980s in the wake of crumbling authoritarian regimes in Latin America and Eastern Europe. As Richard Wilson remarks, the discourse of human rights had an important impact on the shaping of democracy in countries where human rights institutions were the result of a compromise where neither side had won an outright military victory (Wilson 2001: xiv). The contradictions and the tensions that have emerged in the wake of the creation of the TRC, during its existence and after the publication of its final report in 1998, can be understood as a result of the political compromise which led to its creation. The creation of a TRC was meant to introduce a culture of human rights in South Africa ‘in the context of a sea-change in global politics, and the rise of human rights as the archetypal language of democratic transition’ (Wilson 2001: 1). This ‘sea-change’ fostered the establishment of constitutionalist states based upon the rule of law and a ‘community of equal, rights-bearing citizens’ (Wilson 2001: 1). A culture based on human rights is supposed to have a universal relevance and thus transcend the divisions and idiosyncrasies rooted in ethnicity and cultural nationalism. The upshot of both the TRC’s mode of operation and the discourse of human rights which underpins it was the foundation of reconciliation on the democratic notion of citizenship. Individual rights, and the creation of national institutions meant to entrench them, constitute the basis upon which the ‘rainbow nation’ was founded. However in the context of a divided and unequal society like that of South Africa, the notion of individual rights and autonomous institutions as opposed to group rights raises contradictions. As Mahmood Mamdani points out: ‘An affluent minority needs the guarantee of individual rights and institutional autonomy–not of group rights–to defend privilege.’8 The discourse of human rights serves to legitimate new institutions and a central state in a context of cultural and racial plurality in which the individual and not the group is supposed to be the bearer of inalienable rights. It is in this context that the traditional notion of ‘ubuntu’ becomes so important. It is of course a traditional African concept whereby one is a human being because of other human beings as it seeks to perpetuate harmony among men. For Desmond Tutu ‘ubuntu’ is the expression of African jurisprudence which is ‘restorative rather than retributive’ (Tutu 1998). But the ideal of harmony implied in the notion of ‘ubuntu’ is also an ideal which rests on a culture of human rights and serves to promote constitutionalism in South Africa (Wilson 2001: 231). Constitutionalism is broadly defined as a political doctrine that claims that political authority should be bound by institutions that restrict the exercise of power. Such institutions offer rules that bind both the persons in authority as well as the organs or bodies that exercise political power. Human rights constitute one central component of constitutionalism; another essential element is the separation of powers in government.9
8There was a twofold aspect to the transition to democracy in South Africa: the symbolical and moral aspect which immediately attracted world attention, narrowly bound up with the political wisdom of Nelson Mandela and the breadth of his vision along with his personal charisma, without forgetting the political pragmatism of F.W. de Klerk and his supposed ‘spiritual leap’ (Mamdani 1997: 32). Both worked with their task teams to avoid a bloodshed in the country and they justly deserved to be rewarded with the Nobel Prize for peace for their joint efforts.
9 The other aspect is political and economic. The ANC acceded to power with a political programme–the Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP)–which was largely, but not uniquely, inspired by a policy of redistribution in favour of those who had borne the brunt of segregation. A large majority of the black population was poor and the aim of the RDP was clearly to relieve poverty in South Africa. The RDP programme implied that the political empowerment of black people through the setting up of a black-dominated Government of National Unity (GNU) would bring about a break from the capitalistic and neo-liberal policies of previous apartheid governments.
10This is not what happened since two years had hardly elapsed when the ANC-led government changed tack and adopted a new macro-economic programme: Growth, Employment and Redistribution (GEAR) inspired by neo-liberal policies. The adoption of GEAR, prolonging the political compromise, was in fact a bid to attract more investments into the country so as to boost an ailing economy. At the same time the demands made on the productive forces of the country especially those who were already economically disempowered produced dismal results as it did not allow the promised policies of redistribution to be implemented to the extent that had been expected. To justify this important economic shift the ANC, in a recent policy discussion document, claims that ‘a large and unplanned exchange-rate depreciation threw macro-economic into the spotlight.’10 GEAR is supposed to aim ‘at giving effect to the realisation of the RDP through the maintenance of macro balances’ and elaborating ‘a set of mutually reinforcing policy instruments’ (ibid.). It further contends that ‘GEAR provides a basis for achieving economic stability’ (ibid.). But the rift that has gradually developed between the government, the political black elite, and a burgeoning black middle-class on the one hand and a large majority of the back population on the other is still accounted for in terms of ‘non-delivery’–i.e. the government has failed to deliver and people are getting impatient but, surprisingly, not to the point of bringing about a disruption of the Alliance between the ANC, the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) and the South African Communist Party (SACP) which still represent the majority of black workers. Willie Madisha, President of COSATU explains that, while remaining critical of the ANC over his overall economic policy, he does not want to break away from the alliance for the simple reason that there is no alternative, no other party to vote for: ‘If we don’t vote for the ANC, who do we vote for? If we don’t vote for the ANC we have to vote either for apartheid parties or other small and ineffectual parties.’11 Another reason invoked is that a break-away would mean further isolation and the risk of entirely losing the possibility of influencing legislation and policy at governmental level however limited this may be (Madisha 2005: 24).
11But the reasons alleged in the ANC policy discussion document were not the only ones behind the choice of GEAR. Neville Alexander contends that in the wake of the fall of communism, global institutions (the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organisation) had a free rein to dictate their terms on the countries of the south if they wanted to develop. Among the ‘recipes’ which were imposed one finds a set of restraints, always the same, which had to be implemented irrespective of the idiosyncracies of each country: privatisation of state assets and means of production, reduction of budget deficit which considerably reduced public spending in social sectors of health, education, and welfare, a policy of wage restraint, the opening up of the market to world trade, goods and investment capital of the North (with alleged reciprocity) and finally the introduction of a multi-party system and constitutionalism.12 Neville Alexander further argues that there is a strategy at work behind this choice which is to weave together a network of alliances with countries of the South (India, Brazil) and of the North (the European Community) so as to ‘negotiate a better position for themselves in the global pecking order’ (Alexander 2002: 151). The idea is also to make sure South Africa adapts to the demands of the world economic order so that it might have a better chance of profiting from it. In this perspective South Africa has tried to rally the entire continent in a bid to negotiate a better deal with the industrialised powers of the north. This is the logic which underpins the much vaunted policy of African Renaissance, the revamping of the OUA as the African Union and the creation of the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (Nepad) (Alexander 2002: 152).
12Of course for the majority of the black population in South Africa the expectations were so high that they could not figure out the difficulties which actually faced the government to satisfy in the very short term what people had for so long waited for–not only political freedom but also a more decent life in terms of housing, health and education. The billions of rand necessary to reach this aim show the measure of the disastrous legacy of apartheid for the majority of black people in urban and rural areas. The paradox of the situation was while the politics of reconciliation initiated by Nelson Mandela along with the TRC succeeded to assuage to a large extent the misgivings of the whites, the economic choices of the government did not entirely allow the new political dispensation to fully implement the measures that would have been necessary to reduce the inequalities induced by apartheid. Gradually new fault lines appeared which were no longer perceived as political but as economic especially with the promotion of a wealthy black middle-class elite through affirmative action and Black Economic Empowerment (BEE).13 By opting for GEAR the ANC has introduced an economic model which satisfies the needs of the private sector still largely dominated by whites, without entirely abandoning its policy of redistribution but it finds itself in a quandary: while the neo-liberal model seeks to break free from state-intervention its policy of redistribution demands it. On a global scale the results are so far encouraging. The economy is now growing steadily at a rate of almost 5 % in 2006, inflation has been contained, investment on the increase, trade has been liberalised, and the public debt has been cut by half since 1999.14 Trevor Manuel, in his budget speech in February 2007, announced a surplus for the first time in history. Another is expected in the coming year.15
13But the good economic performance of the past few years has failed to make much difference to the lives of millions of South Africans. According to a recent survey conducted by the British Department for International Development (DFID), 35 % of South Africans are very poor, almost 28 % of South Africans in the formal sector are unemployed with as much as 40 % of people in the informal sector unemployed.16 Another survey conducted by the Southern African Regional Poverty Network in collaboration with South Africa’s Human Science Research Council (HSRC) shows that while the proportion of people living in poverty has not significantly increased between 1996 and 2001, the households living in poverty have sunk deeper into poverty and the gap between rich and poor has widened. Approximately 57 % of individuals in South Africa were living below the poverty income line in 2001–a figure unchanged from 1996–with the highest proportion of poor in Limpopo and the Eastern Cape.17 A more precise measure used by the Human Sciences Research Council called the poverty gap shows the extent to which poverty has increased. The poverty gap measures the required annual income transfer to all poor households to bring them out of poverty. The study shows that the poverty gap has grown from R56-billion in 1996 to R81-billion in 2001.18 Poverty is further compounded by the incidence of HIV/Aids. The mishandling of the HIV/Aids pandemic owing to failure to see the disaster coming in the 1990s and a stubborn denial by both President Thabo Mbeki and Minister of Health Manto Tshabalala-Msimang of the fact that HIV caused Aids led to disastrous results. South Africa has about 5,4 million people living with HIV and suffers from 1,000 new HIV infections and 900 Aids-related deaths every day.19 However under much pressure from home and abroad the government has now made antiretroviral drugs available to around 250,000 people and more will be available in the future. The government and civil society groups are now also preparing a new five-year prevention and treatment strategy which aims to have 600,000 people on antiretroviral drugs by 2011 (‘World Aids Day’: 1).
14However it would be inappropriate to say categorically that the ANC-led government has gone back on its commitment to serve the people and help the poor. Two trillion rand will be spent in the next three years on infrastructure and a social security system will be set up by 2010 (‘World Aids Day’: 1) and if the perception that the government did not deliver enough or fast enough still remains today it would be untrue to say that it entirely failed to do so. Recent figures released by Amos Masondo, Chairperson of the South African Local Government Association (SALGA) at its conference in April 2007 show an overall trend which is in keeping with promises made under the RDP. Thus 1,8 million houses had been achieved by September 2006 and 2 million housing opportunities created; households with access to clean water now stand at about 90 %, up from 60 % in 1994 while those with sanitation are up from 49 % to an estimated 65 % in 2006. The supply of electricity now reaches more than 70 % when it was accessible to less than 40 % in 1994. It is true however that the backlog of households with access to water still stands at 2,502,340 households by June 2006. Another sore point is the bucket sanitation system: it still stood at 252,254 as of February 2005 but a total of 110,648 had been eradicated by November 2006.20 It remains true however that if the South African economy is efficiently run by its Finance Minister Trevor Manuel the imbalances of the country are still stark. The South African wage gap is still the largest in the world and, what is paradoxical, as one observer notes, is that ‘rather than questioning the overpayment at the top that typified apartheid, the current regime has taken it wholesale.’21 There is above all the risk of an interaction between economic interest and ethnic consciousness since the poor are largely identified as blacks whereas the rich are identified with a white minority even though more and more black people have been successfully empowered to reach middle-class status. It is not the least paradox that in a country which theoretically claims to achieve a universal ideal expressed in terms of human rights in order to unify the country, the persistence of social and economic inequalities inherited from apartheid are perceived as incompetence or sheer betrayal and fuels latent ethnic tendencies since the culturally-defined communities are still perceived as the ideal locus of protection and solidarity. In other words in a pluralistic country such as South Africa social and economic inequalities remain wounds which are still festering and which threaten to spread to the whole body politic.
15Over the past few years, especially since 1996, there has been a growing popular discontent on account of slow delivery manifested by strikes, boycotts and occasional outbursts of violence along with strong representations made by the two other partners in the tripartite alliance: COSATU and the SACP. As a result it gradually dawned on the government and the ANC that the oft-repeated mantra that the positive effects of the global economy will eventually seep down and benefit the lower classes in South Africa was a non-starter. They had to rethink their overall economic strategy and focus on basic issues (decent wages, housing, education, and health) at a much faster pace than they had done so far if they wanted to avoid a social upheaval. That is why the ANC discussion document alluded to above, ‘Economic Transformation for a National Democratic Society’, issued in view of the forthcoming 52nd National Conference of the ANC to be held in Polokwane in December 2007, apparently pledges a return to ANC economic fundamentals as couched in the 1955 Freedom Charter.
16The discussion document claims that the achievement of democracy in 1994 provided South Africa with the opportunity to pursue economic growth, development and redistribution and realise ‘the Freedom Charter’s vision of a society in which the People Shall Share in the Country’s Wealth!’ (‘Economic Transformation for a National Democratic Society’ 2007). According to the paper the aim of the economic transformation is to achieve a national democratic revolution through a mixed economy combining social ownership and private capital in connection with the world economy. The aim is to break free from economic subjugation and exclusion, which is the essence of the apartheid system. It further warns that if this order is allowed to prevail social stability will be threatened: ‘Without a fundamental transformation of economic relations the very democracy for which so many sacrificed could be placed in jeopardy’ (‘Economic Transformation for a National Democratic Society’ 2007). The solutions which the document proffers boil down to a policy of redistribution initiated and controlled by the state in order to meet the basic needs of the people ‘giving priority to basic services (such as water and electricity), access to land, affordable housing and other social infrastructure and health, education and basic social security, and redirecting government expenditure towards meeting these needs’ (‘Economic Transformation for a National Democratic Society’ 2007). The state thus becomes instrumental to lead economic development–hence the notion of developmental state–for economic liberation.
17However under close scrutiny one notes that the document deftly irons out obvious contradictions and some of its statements are pure wishful thinking. Thus it sees nothing wrong with capitalism ‘as long as capitalists are encouraged to behave ethically’ and do not seek ‘selfish advantages.’22 It further points out that the apartheid growth system could not be wished away overnight and that, given the global conjuncture, it can only be gradually phased out so as not to impair the present economic improvement. It finally acknowledges that the developmental state, as an instrument of economic liberation, will aim to build a national democratic society which
requires a market that is as efficient as possible; a market that is shorn of the racial and gender exclusions that characterised apartheid colonialism and freed from the barriers to entry and competition that the economy endured under colonial capitalism. (‘Economic Transformation for a National Democratic Society’ 2007).
18 The ANC’s claim that its concern is still to meet the needs of the poor cannot be questioned but it will do so on the understanding that in the National Democratic Society, while the state plays a decisive role, the private sector will be the main motive-force of investment, growth and employment.
19It does not come as surprise if this document has been criticised from analysts on the left of the ANC and inside the Alliance. Thus Jeremy Cronin, the deputy secretary of the SACP, contends that this project does not eradicate the dangers of a two-faced development. He notes that in the late 1980s there was a ‘partial congruence of interests between the ANC and big capital’ as the latter considered that apartheid had become a ‘market constraint.’23 The demise of apartheid did not put an end to this ‘congruence of interests’: as Jeremy Cronin claims, post-apartheid economics was about ‘ “freeing up the market” through liberalisation, labour market flexibility and an opening up to global markets’ (Cronin 2007: 27). Since apartheid was belatedly interpreted as a series of unbearable constraints on the free working of the economy it ensues that the political liberation which put an end to it should tally with a liberal economy and, in the final analysis, ‘ “moving beyond apartheid” has not meant the abolition of the apartheid-accumulation path, but rather its perpetuation in new circumstances’ (Cronin 2007: 27). If it is true, as we have seen above, that there is now a marked shift towards a more interventionist policy the risk is real that the ANC’s National Democratic Society will not be in a position to avoid a two-faced developmental state. There will be on the one hand a ‘first world’ state whose principle aim is to linerate the economy in order to boost business and a ‘third world’, ‘under-resourced, focused on delivery to the poor’ (Cronin 2007: 27). As Jeremy Cronin aptly sums up: ‘these are not two economies but radical inequality reproduced by a single accumulation process’ (Cronin 2007: 27).
20It is this inequality which today still constitutes a challenge for the ANC and the government, but it is above all the persistent ambivalence of South Africa’s economic policy which seriously undermines attempts at reconciliation and nation-building and has fuelled corruption and crime.
21In an article published recently in the Mail and Guardian Archbishop Desmond Tutu addresses the issue of crime in South Africa and looks for its causes. He clearly points a finger at the legacy of apartheid to account for the current level of violence: ‘it was a policy that dehumanised both the victim and perpetrator. Black life was cheap but, in dehumanising others, our former rulers were in the process themselves dehumanised.’24
22Crime and violence take on many forms today but essentially violent crime (car hijackings, cash-in-transit heists etc.) and sexual crime (rape on women and children). However in order to have a clearer picture of the question of crime it is essential to look in detail at the evolution of figures over the years. Figures for violent crime show a steady downtrend over the period 1994/95 to 2003/2004 with the cases of murder decreasing from 25,965 to 19,284, those of bank robbery decreasing from 561 in 1996/1997 to 54 in 2003/2004 and even the number of robberies of cash in transit (decreasing from 359 to 192 over the same period).25 However all the other categories of crime (rape, attempted murder, assault, robbery with aggravating circumstances, car jacking, house robbery, malicious damage to property, burglary at residential premises, illegal possession of firearms and ammunition) have increased. In a report published in 2006 the Human Science Research Council revealed that ‘in three out of five child rapes, the mother is aware of the abuse. Everyday an estimated 150 children are raped in South Africa.’26
23What Desmond Tutu perceives in the occurrence of such crimes is the loss of humanity which threatens the ideal of ‘ubuntu’ which as he says ‘declared that our humanity was bound up with one another’s; for a person was a person only through other persons; for we existed only in a delicate network of interdependence’ (Tutu 2007: 1). These crimes severely undermine the humanistic ideal which the new South Africa was supposed to embody: ‘What has happened to us that an adult can callously rape a baby?... What has seemed to strip us of our very humanity so that we jettison our traditional values that made us respect the elderly and care for the vulnerable in our communities?’ (Tutu 2007: 1)
24The incidence of crime has not simply tainted the image of the country but it certainly constitutes a constraint on its economic growth especially as far as foreign investments are concerned. It has increased security costs, decreased productivity and motivation and impaired business confidence with a significant loss of customers.27 Although violent crime has been the focus of attention one should not forger white-collar crime as another deterrent to do business in South Africa. Corruption in South Africa is widespread and although its incidence is difficult to assess it is the second most common crime after housebreaking (Newmarch 2007: 1).
25Government officials, members of the ANC who have taken bribes or use their official position to further personal interests in companies have frequently struck the headlines since 1994. Such scandals as ‘Travelgate’,28 ‘Oilgate’29 and more particularly the ‘Arms deal scandal’ have revealed that sleaze has spread to all the echelons of political life, at local or national levels, in the legislature as well as in the executive, inside and outside the ruling party.
26The arms deal scandal is instructive in this respect on account of its multiple political connections. In 1998 a massive arms deal was negotiated in order to re-equip the South African military forces involving the purchase of equipment from companies in France, Britain, Italy, Germany and Sweden. The soaring cost of the deal raised doubts as to the regularity of the way the deal was handled. One of the main actors involved in the scandal was Shabir Shaik, who was at the time a director of Thomson CSF, the French arms manufacturer, which was awarded a contract to supply management technology for the South African Navy. He was also the director of African Defence System (ADS), a Thomson CSF auxiliary involved in the same deal, and the head of a black empowerment company, Nkobi Holdings, also a shareholder in ADS. Shabir Shaik was also a staunch supporter of the ANC and has close connections with the vice-president Jacob Zuma. Also involved in the deal was Shabir’s brother, Chippie, the Chief Director Procurement of the South African Defence Department. The scandal was finally exposed after a long and arduous enquiry initiated by a parliamentary committee in spite of ANC pressure exercised on some of its members to squash it.30 Shabir Shaik was put on trial and the Durban High Court sentenced him to an effective 15 years in jail for fraud and corruption on June 7 2005.
27 Over the years a regular pattern emerged whereby whenever a case of corruption came to light some members of the ANC tried to cover it up or deal with it internally while others, on the contrary, tried to allow the law to follow its course and eventually prevail. But in the case of the arms deal what makes matters worse is that this scandal has had a dramatic impact on the political life of the country whose consequences for the future are still difficult to gauge. During the Shaik trial Judge Hilary Squires had also found that all the charges involved illicit financial dealings with Jacob Zuma, the then deputy President, who was the most likely candidate to succeed Thabo Mbeki at the end of his term of office. His case is now pending but he was forced to resign from his position as vice-president. He is now involved in a fierce succession battle within the ANC proclaiming himself the candidate of the left, the only champion of the interests of all those who have been forgotten by the government. He has rallied popular support, especially during his rape trial (for which he was acquitted) and the initial phases of his trial for his implication in the arms deal scandal, along with many members of the SAPC and COSATU.
28Rampant corruption has not only distorted the perception people have of both the ANC and the government, it has also generated diffidence and resentment as they realise that many politicians or civil servants close to power enrich themselves while their standard of living has not improved or even sometimes become worse.
29But what is perhaps more worrying is that the Zuma candidacy may re-ignite ethnic tensions in Kwa-Zulu Natal as his eviction from power and his future trial are seen among Zulus as a political move by Mbeki’s supporters to stymie his presidential ambitions because he is a Zulu and is regarded as an able leader ‘deeply rooted in Zulu traditionalism to maintain KwaZulu-Natal’s influence in the national discourse.’31
30 The upshot of corruption is also that all blacks in position of responsibility may be tarred with the same brush of sleaze and unaccountability. What is a stake therefore is not simply a question of justice but a question of unity. To allow crime and corruption to go rampant jeopardises the ideal of a united South Africa and even of a South African identity since in the context of a pluralist society like South Africa social discontent and economic deprivation and insecurity have been shown to lead to forms of ethnic withdrawal whereby people believe they will find solace, comfort and protection within the confines of their own communities whether ethnic, religious or both.
31In a conference she gave to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the TRC and the life of Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Mamphela Ramphele32 declared ‘We need to pay attention to the unfinished business of the TRC.’ She goes on to remark:
But knowing what we knew, having worked with poor people all over the country, leaving the crimes that were perpetrated in socioeconomic terms in our country was a great mistake because the majority of people in this country continue to bleed. Their wounds go completely unrecognised. Their pain is totally unacknowledged. But interestingly and sadly, the majority of people who were part of the offering of themselves so that we could be healed also happen to be people who were deliberately impoverished... because of the circumstances in the country, which was an active impoverishment process for the majority of black people... Society is divided between those who have opportunities and those who don’t.33
32Her statement sharply contrasts with Desmond Tutu’s who declared at the swearing in of the new assembly of South Africa in 1994: ‘We of many cultures, languages and races have become one nation. We are the rainbow people of God’ (quoted in Alexander 2002: 81). His and Mamphela Ramphele’s statements bring to the fore the question of a common South African identity.
33The question of national unity and a common South African identity is a crucial and still strongly debated issue. Unlike Desmond Tutu, a sociologist like Simon Bekker contends that the project of a national identity in South Africa stands little chance of success and that the notion of ethnicity should be considered in a more positive light.34 To understand the diffidence attached to the notion of ethnicity in the context of a pluralist society one should remember how ethnicity was intrumentalised under apartheid to justify racial segregation. The distinction established between race and ethnicity by apartheid is essential to understand how the white minority entrenched its racial supremacy, as Mahmood Mamdani explains:
Just like colonialism to the north, apartheid too produced a dual identity: racial solidarity amongst its beneficiaries, and an ethnic particularism amongst its victims. Each was reproduced by a set of institutions. If the racial identity was anchored in a racial electorate, racially-exclusive civil laws, and a race-bound civil society, privileges defines as so many ’rights’ protected by a racialized power, ethnic identity was anchored in an ethnically defined ’customary law’, enforced by an ethnically-defined Native Authority. The race/ethnic divide occurred at several levels: race meant to be the identity of the privileged, and ethnicity the identity of the oppressed; at the same time, race was urban, and ethnicity rural. The dilemma for apartheid was where the two crossed, signified by the growing pool of urbanised black people. This meeting point was fruitful soil for the growth of an urban ’African’ nationalism, an ideology born of a racial identity, but this time begotten, not of racial privilege, but of racial oppression.35
34The drive towards the instauration of a national identity can thus be best understood as a bid to do away with the negative effects of apartheid’s social engineering premised on the fostering of ethnicity among oppressed people. The question is: should ethnicity be entirely eradicated in the present context of South Africa?
35According to Neville Alexander it would be counterproductive to oppose the eradication of ethnicity to its vindication because there exists the possibility of bridging the two positions: it is the concept of a plural society, ‘a nation of “many cultures”’ (Alexander 2002: 81). He believes that this concept is predicated upon the defence of the multilingualism of South Africa claiming that in modern societies ‘the nation was conceived in language, not in blood’ (Alexander 2002: 86). He further explains that in order to promote national unity it is not essential that they should speak the same language but that ‘they should be able to communicate with one another’ (ibid.).
36Identities being socially constructed, the state creates the conditions in which one or several identities are created. With its constitution, its political and legal institutions and its language policy South Africa has respected the reality of its multicultural composition and created the conditions that guarantee that subnational identities–whatever the basis of affiliation (language, religion, region)–‘constitute part and parcel of the patchwork which is framed by the national identity’ (Alexander 2002: 88). But this ideal of unity in diversity is jeopardized by disrupting forces if people are convinced that the new political dispensation only benefits one section of the population and, above all, if they perceive an interaction between economic interest and ethnic belonging. This why the sleaze and corruption which today is seen to have benefited only one narrow fringe of the black elite are potentially dangerous for the unity of the country as they will create lines of division which are likely to be both social and ethnic. The risk is great, as Neville Alexander warns, that if the country as a whole does not manage to develop a culture based on core common values, practices and national projects it will ‘fall apart into warring ethnic groups, each with a more or less separatist agenda’ (Alexander 2002: 91).
37A recent survey conducted by the Human Science Research Council and an inquiry conducted by the Mail and Guardian36 through a series of interviews show that although attitudes to the question of identity vary and are sometimes touchy–as the recent ‘De la Rey’ song controversy has shown37–the sense of nationhood is still problematic.
38The Mail and Guardian interviews offer a sample–however limited it may be–of the variegated way in which ordinary people define their identities, use them and perceive their position in the social fabric of South Africa. Thus concerning the obstacles to unity, one of the interviewees invokes economic, cultural and religious factors: ‘South Africans are not yet unified because of the economic inequalities and a lack of cultural and religious acceptance’ (Twalo 2007). Another complains: ‘Most people see themselves either as blacks or Muslims or coloureds or whites–most people describe themselves in terms of their religion and their ethnicity.’ Still another blames the lasting legacy of the colonial past: ‘Colonial influences were historically imposed on people and that makes it difficult for them to turn against them. In terms of establishing a national identity South Africa has still has a long way to go... [It] is still to achieve a new national culture that represents its multiculturalism’. Another element which enters into the definition of identify is gender associated with ethnicity: one interviewee says she feels she is an African woman first and then ‘a South African Pedi’, another defines herself as a ‘black, Venda woman’ while a third sees herself ‘only as a South African Indian’ and believes ‘that her nationality and culture are intertwined.’ What also surfaces from some of these interviews is that colour is seen as the biggest divide and that segregation still prevails.
39A 2005 Human Science Research Council survey on South African social attitudes has raised the question of whether an overarching national identity matters for the formation of a united non-racist society. Thus answering the question ‘would the world be a better place if countries were more like SA?’ 58 % of the South Africans surveyed agreed. The strongest agreement was found among blacks (64 %) while whites showed the weakest agreement (33 %). A large majority of respondents (83 %) agreed that they would ‘rather be a citizen of South Africa than of any other country’38 with more than two-thirds of whites and four-fifths of blacks agreeing with this statement. The same survey indicates however that national identity does not ‘preclude a powerful racial identity.’ Race identity was stronger among blacks and the trend is the same with other race groups. Marlene Roefs, who conducted the survey, notes: ‘we found that the different race groups tend to think that people from other race groups are racist... Especially among black and white South Africans racist is reciprocal, with blacks thinking that whites are racist and whites thinking blacks are racist... Whites were most negatively perceived, especially among blacks.’ Coloureds and Indians were generally regarded as less racist by all other groups (Dawes 2005).
40But if the threat of ethnic division still pervades South African society it is still largely due to the brutal racial engineering of apartheid. Right from the outset the political programme of the ANC clearly indicated that it eschewed an ethnic agenda and, on the contrary, was committed to national unity. That is why, when he was first elected, President Nelson Mandela was bent on implementing a bold of reconciliation for the sake of unity. The TRC in spite of its shortcomings symbolically initiated a new myth of reconciliation propounding values with which few could disagree. It is an essential move in the sense that this myth has primed a new interest for the rewriting of history in South Africa and restored the memories and dignity of the former disadvantaged peoples of South Africa. However if the actual conditions of life of a majority of the people are not more seriously and speedily addressed, the ideals of the TRC with its discourse on truth, reconciliation and atonement runs the risk of being overwhelmed by other discourses articulating more divisive issues relating to class, racial or ethnic priorities. South Africa’s leadership must show its ability ‘to ensure that antagonistic contradictions are not generated between these multiple identities through sectarian mobilisation in the interest of self-seeking class agenda’ (Alexander 2002: 99).
41If Nelson Mandela and the ANC have committed themselves to implementing a fairly successful scenario of peaceful transition to democracy and reconciliation in a deeply divided society it seems that in the context of globalisation another parallel scenario is being written which bids fair to steal the show. The strategy which has consisted in trying to impose South Africa’s position in the world economy has not entirely worked out as planned and it has slowed down the pace of internal development which would have been needed to countercheck the devastating effects of apartheid. The leadership is now realising that it has only belatedly addressed both the causes and consequences of the former regime. However it is essential in order to assess the successes and failures of the ANC to replace its action within the history of the last thirteen years. Not only has the ANC avoided a major human disaster but it has fostered the conditions under which the political and economic challenges in today’s South Africa are in many respects comparable to those of other democratic countries in the world. If the TRC has encouraged people to deal squarely with the past and engage with it at different levels, in popular forums as well as in academe, in the media and in museums or heritage sites, it could not possibly deal with the entire legacy of apartheid. The ANC was the main motive-force which has brought the country out of a political dead-end and turned it into ‘an ordinary country’, and, whether willingly or unwillingly, it has triggered off a dynamic which, hopefully, will lead South Africans to come to terms with a controversial past and an ambivalent present and eventually help them integrate their past into a new society.
Bibliographie
Des DOI sont automatiquement ajoutés aux références bibliographiques par Bilbo, l’outil d’annotation bibliographique d’OpenEdition. Ces références bibliographiques peuvent être téléchargées dans les formats APA, Chicago et MLA.
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Works Cited
African National Congress.‘Economic Transformation for a National Democratic Society.’ May 2007. www.anc.org.za/ancdocs/discussion/building.html.
Alexander, Neville. An Ordinary Country. Issues in the Transition from Apartheid to Democracy in South Africa. Pietermaritzburg: University of Natal Press, 2002.
Bizos, George, interviewed by Gugulethu Moyo. ‘The Scales of Amnesty.’ Mail and Guardian. April 26 to May 3 2007.
Bekker, Simon, ed. Shifting African Identities. Pretoria: Human Science Research Council, 2001.
Boraine, Alex. ‘The TRC and Human Rights Journalism in South Africa.’ October 3, 1997. www.truth.org.za/reading/alex0310.htm (July 10 1998).
Crime Information Analysis Centre–South African Police Force. ‘Crimes in the RSA for the period April to March 1994/1995 to 2003/2004.’ www.capegateway.gov.za/eng/pubs/public_info/C/86878/1 (June 6 2007).
Cronin, Jeremy. ‘The Dangers of Two-Faced Development.’ Mail and Guardian June 1 to 7 2007.
Dawes, Nic. ‘United in Our Divisions.’ Mail and Guardian March 11 to 17 2005.
Department For International Development (DFID). ‘Country Profiles: Africa.’ www.dfid.gov.uk/countries/africa/southafrica.asp (June 7 2007).
Joubert, Pearlie. ‘Baby Rape: the Family Connection.’ Mail and Guardian April 13 to 19 2007.
Madisha, Willie, interviewed by Ebrahim Harvey. ‘The Alliance has Failed Us.’ Mail and Guardian April 22 to 28 2005.
Mamdani, Mahmood. ‘Now Who Will Bell the Fat Black Cat?’ Mail and Guardian October 17 to 23 1997.
10.1515/9781503617933 :Mamdani, Mahmood. ‘Reconciliation Without Justice.’ South African Review of Books November/December 1996.
Majova, Zukile. ‘Now Zuma vs Buthelezi.’ Mail and Guardian April 20 to 25 2007.
Masondo, Amos. ‘Defining Development: Chairperson’s Address to Congress, ’ Mail and Guardian April 20 to 25 2007.
Newmarch, Jocelyn. ‘Crime’s Cost to Business.’ Call Against Crime. Mail and Guardian, April 13 to 19 2007.
Pardesi, Shireen. ‘Why We Are Ready to Strike?’ Mail and Guardian May 18 to 24 2007)
Ramphele, Mamphela. ‘Reconciliation is Not Enough.’ Mail and Guardian (December 1 to 7 2006.
Slaughter, Barbara. ‘Arms corruption scandal erupts in South Africa.’ March 20 2001. www.wsws.org/articles/2001/mar2001/arms-m20. shtml (June 16 2007).
Southern African Regional Poverty Network (SARPN). ‘Fact Sheet: Poverty in South Africa.’ Human Science Research Council. 26 July 2004. sarpn.org.za/documents/d000990 (June 7 2007).
The Economist. ‘South Africa: The Long Journey of a Young Democracy.’ March 1 2007. www.economist.com/displayStory.cfm?story_id= 8776404 (June 6 2007).
Truth and Reconciliation Commission. ‘Explanatory Memorandum to the Parliamentary Bill.’ www.truth.org.za.
Tutu, Desmond. Report of the Truth Commission. ‘Foreword by Chairperson.’ 1998. www.org.za/final/chap1.htm (November 9 1998).
Tutu, Desmond. ‘What Has Happened to Us?’ Call against Crime. Mail and Guardian April 13 to 19 2007.
Twalo, Zweli. ‘Do South Africans Really Exist?’ Mail and Guardian April 26 to May 3 2007.
‘2000 Pilot Reconciliation Survey.’ www.ijr.org.za/publications/publ/pilreconsur (June 6 2007).
Vavi, Zwelinzima. ‘A Retreat from the Historic ANC Programme.’ Mail and Guardian April 26 to May 3 2007: 21.
10.1017/CBO9780511522291 :Wilson, Richard A. The Politics of Truth and Reconciliation in South Africa. Legitimizing the Post-Apartheid State. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.
‘World Aids Day’. Mail and Guardian December 1 to 7, 2006.
Notes de bas de page
1 Boraine, Alex, ‘The TRC and Human Rights Journalism in South Africa, ’ October 3, 1997 www.truth.org.za/reading/alex0310.htm (July 10 1998): 2.
2 Truth and Reconciliation Commission, ‘Explanatory Memorandum to the Parliamentary Bill, ’ www.truth.org.za.
3 Bizos, George interviewed by Gugulethu Moyo, ‘The Scales of Amnesty, ’ Mail and Guardian (April 26 to May 3 2007): 5.
4 Amnesty was granted to persons who made full disclosure of all relevant facts relating to acts associated with a political objective committed in the course of the conflict of the past during the period from March 1960 to May 1994.
5 Tutu, Desmond, Report of the Truth Commission, ‘Foreword by Chairperson, ’ vol. 1, 1998, www.org.za/final/chap1.htm (November 9 1998): 1.
6 Wilson, Richard A. The Politics of Truth and Reconciliation in South Africa. Legitimizing the Post-Apartheid State (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001): xix.
7 ‘2000 Pilot Reconciliation survey, ’ www.ijr.org.za/publications/publ/ pilreconsur (June 6 2007).
8 Mamdani, Mahmood, ‘Now Who Will Bell the Fat Black Cat?’ Mail and Guardian (October 17 to 23 1997): 32-33.
9 Lane, Jan-Erik, Constitution and Political Theory (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1996): 19, quoted in Richard Wilson The Politics of Truth and Reconciliation in South Africa. Legitimizing the Past-Apartheid State: n. 1, 231.
10 African National Congress, ‘Economic Transformation for a National Democratic Society, ’ May 2007, www.anc.org.za/ancdocs/discussion/building.html.
11 Madisha, Willie, interviewed by Ebrahim Harvey, ‘The Alliance Has Failed Us, ’ Mail and Guardian (April 22 to 28 2005): 24
12 Alexander, Neville, An Ordinary Country. Issues in the Transition from Apartheid to Democracy in South Africa (Pietermaritzburg: University of Natal Press, 2002): 151.
13 Under Black Economic Empowerment all the companies are legally constrained to recruit black cadres at different echelons, and joint ventures between white corporations and black ones are strongly encouraged so as to compensate for the disadvantages under which educated blacks suffered in the past.
14 The Economist, ‘South Africa: The Long Journey of a Young Democracy, ’ March 1 2007, www.economist.com/displayStory.cfm?story_id=8776404 (June 6 2007).
15 Ibid.
16 Department for International Development (DFID), ‘Country Profiles: Africa, ’ www.dfid.gov.uk/countries/africa/southafrica.asp (June 7 2007).
17 Southern African Regional Poverty Network (ARPN), ‘Fact Sheet: Poverty in South Africa, ’ Human Science Research Council, 26 July 2004, http://sarpn.org. za/documents/d000990 (June 7 2007).
18 Ibid. One Rand trades at approximately 0,10 Euros at the current rate of exchange.
19 ‘World Aids Day, ’ Mail and Guardian (December 1 to 7 2006): 1.
20 Masondo, Amos, ‘Defining Development: Chairperson’s Address to Congress, ’ Mail and Guardian (April 20 to 25 2007): 2.
21 Pardesi, Shireen, ‘Why We Are Ready to Strike?’ Mail and Guardian (May 18 to 24 2007): 25.
22 Vavi, Zwelinzima, ‘A Retreat from the Historic ANC Programme, ’ Mail and Guardian (April 26 to May 3 2007): 21.
23 Cronin, Jeremy, ‘The dangers of Two-Faced Development, ’ Mail and Guardian (June 1 to 7 2007): 27.
24 Tutu, Desmond, ‘What Has Happened to Us?’ Call against Crime, Mail and Guardian (April 13 to 19 2007): 1.
25 Crime Information Analysis Centre–South African Police Force. ‘Crimes in the RSA for the period April to March 1994/1995 to 2003/2004,’ www.capegateway. gov.za/eng/pubs/public_info/C/86878/1 (June 6 2007).
26 Joubert, Pearlie, ‘Baby Rape: the Family Connection, ’ Mail and Guardian (April 13 to 19 2007): 4.
27 Newmarch, Jocelyn, ‘Crime’s Cost to Busines, ’ Call Against Crime, Mail and Guardian, (April 13 to 19 2007): 1.
28 ‘Travelgate’ was a scam in which several MPs, a minister and a deputy minister were involved. They were accused of defrauding Parliament of millions of rand for the abuse of their parliamentary travel vouchers.
29 The ‘Oilgate’ scandal was a premeditated scheme to channel public funds to the ANC from the state oil company PetroSA through a front company Imvume.
30 This summary is based on the article by Slaughter, Barbara, ‘Arms corruption scandal erupts in South Africa, ’ March 20 2001, www.wsws.org/articles/ 2001/mar2001/arms-m20.shtml (June 16 2007).
31 Majova, Zukile, ‘Now Zuma vs Buthelezi, ’ Mail and Guardian (April 20 to 25 2007): 2.
32 Mamphela Ramphele is former MD of the World Bank and former vice-chancellor of the University of Cape Town. She is the widow of Black Consciousness leader Steve Biko who died in police custody in September 1977.
33 Ramphele, Mamphela, ‘Reconciliation is Not Enough, ’ Mail and Guardian (December 1 to 7, 2006): 27.
34 Bekker, Simon, ed., Shifting African Identities (Pretoria: Human Science Research Council, 2001): 3.
35 Mamdani, Mahmood, ‘Reconciliation Without Justice, ’ South African Review of Books, 46 (November/December 1996): 4.
36 Twalo, Zweli, ‘Do South Africans Really Exist?’ Mail and Guardian (April 26 to May 3 2007): 10-11.
37 Koos de la Rey was a famous Boer general during the Anglo-Boer War (1899- 1902) and one of the leading figures of Afrikaner nationalism. The song entitled ‘De La Rey’ by Afrikaans folk singer Bok van Blerk, featuring a Boer soldier calling for De la Rey to lead the Afrikaner Volk to victory, has raised a fierce controversy as it has been interpreted as a subversive call for unity among present-day Afrikaners.
38 Dawes, Nic, ‘United in Our Divisions, ’ Mail and Guardian (March 11 to 17, 2005): 6.
Auteur
-
Richard Samin
University of Nancy 2
Is Professor of English and Commonwealth Literature at the University of Nancy 2. He obtained a Doctorat d’État on the works of Alex La Guma and Es’kia Mphahlele. His research interests include South African Literature in English, South African History, and Postcolonial Studies. As a member of several research groups, his articles have been published in numerous journals in France and abroad.
Le texte seul est utilisable sous licence Licence OpenEdition Books. Les autres éléments (illustrations, fichiers annexes importés) sont « Tous droits réservés », sauf mention contraire.
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