Key issues were obliterated in the House by scenes that warned parties to beware the forces shaped in youth groups, writes Victor Kgomoeswana.
Johannesburg - Forget the State of the Nation address, worry about how to address the problem of a nation in a state over red overalls, jammed signals and riot police in the National Assembly.
The EFF, led by Julius Malema, former leader of the ANC Youth League, did not care that this address marked the 60th anniversary of the adoption of the Freedom Charter.
That nonchalance is curious, considering that the expulsion of Malema from the ANC can be traced, among other things, to his persistent calls for the nationalisation of mines, in line with the provisions of the Freedom Charter.
The red berets were not interested in President Jacob Zuma’s quoting recent StatsSA figures that 15.3 million people were in employment. They were not there to listen to him share his administration’s nine-point plan to create jobs, including: the beneficiation of mineral wealth and the dedication of 30 percent of the public procurement budget to supplies by SMMEs, co-operatives and township enterprises.
His commitment to giving Eskom R23bn in the next fiscal year, and the expected long-term 15 000 megawatts that could come from the Grand Inga hydropower project, did not strike a chord with the party that has brought more action to Parliament than any other in the history of South Africa.
He could have promised them the world. They would not have believed a word. To them, the president is not “going to come back… but disappear after the State of the Nation address”. In Malema’s words, the “man cannot be trusted… he must resign”.
Lesson? People in power, be careful what sort of youth you raise in your ranks. Condemn their actions when they insult others to make a point while they are among your ranks. If you do not, they will turn on you when they run out of people to affront and, while they are at it, reduce the State of the Nation address to a freak show of water cannon and scuffles.
After all, how long before mining is truly transformed?
The fracas that preceded the address obliterated from memory the biggest mining show to come to town, a few blocks from Parliament. Thousands of delegates spent three days networking, discussing and making deals in mining.
Minister of Mineral Resources Ngoako Ramatlhodi did his best to reassure investors that the mining sector was becoming more attractive.
In his address, Zuma reiterated that the monitoring of compliance by mining companies with the Mining Charter was continuing. Of more interest was his decision to refer the Mineral and Petroleum Resources Development Act back to Parliament because of its perceived constitutional shortcomings.
Among the key criticisms of the act was the concern that its proposed designation of certain minerals as strategic resources might be in violation of South Africa’s obligations to the World Trade Organisation’s stipulations.
A week ago in Addis Ababa, the AU recommended that Africans find sustainable ways to manage the continent’s resources, including beneficiation and adding of value to minerals. Backtracking on the declaration of certain minerals as strategic reflects a lack of the resolve in dealing with an issue that is holding Africa back.
We export raw minerals cheaply and import the same minerals in a processed form.
Investors prefer certainty. They would rather receive the bad news, deal with it and move on, than legislative and policy processes that in the end skirt the issues.
The slump in commodity prices can only mean a rise in private equity deals in mining this year.
While those looking for mining assets to buy are excited by their prospective finds, the interests of the communities affected by African’s mining activities remain pegged to the vagaries of the international prices of resources over which they have no control.
It is time South Africa took a stand on this matter once and for all.
Gold in Namibia, graphite in Mozambique, and what with the South Sudanese prospects?
Events such as the mining indaba this week tend to raise all sorts of unlikely headlines about the industry. Even as South Sudan is making headlines for its attempts to make something out of the power-sharing deal, I read reports that its Minister of Foreign Affairs, Barnaba Marial Benjamin, was at the Cape Town International Convention Centre talking about mining in his country.
A country that is 98 percent dependent on oil has to find alternative sources of revenue, more so when its leadership crisis and squabbles with its northern neighbour make it hard to generate oil revenues.
Apparently, before his fallout with his deputy, President Salva Kiir had been visiting Arab countries to raise investments for the sector. In his position, I would first rush to restore leadership and parliamentary order to Juba before talking about mining in Cape Town, but then maybe that is why Kiir is running South Sudan, and not me.
Two countries that had every reason to be at the indaba to talk about mining were Namibia and Mozambique.
Both have held fairly peaceful elections, their economies are growing at a reasonable pace and they have an impressive record of attracting mining investments.
I had mistakenly associated Namibia with only uranium and diamond mining. The headline that impressed me was about an investment by a Swedish jeweller, Kristallen, in a gold refinery in the country.
This pleased me, but mostly Namibia’s Minister of Trade and Industry, Calle Schlettwein, who expressed a need for his country to have its own gold refinery, although it might not have enough gold to refine.
There are only two gold mines in Namibia, the Navachab Gold Mine in the Erongo region and the Otjikoto B2Gold Mine in Otjozondupa. No wonder the Namibian property market has been in non-stop growth mode for five years.
Tanzania is expecting a slowdown in production and Zimbabwe is continuing to punch below its weight on the mining front, but Mozambique is making new finds in its north.
An Australian company, Mozambi Resources, announced last week the signing of its option to acquire two graphite licences in the northern province of Cabo Delgado.
One of these areas is reportedly near Triton Minerals’ Nicanda Hill – considered the world’s largest-known deposit of graphite and vanadium.
As if the coal and gas were not enough for the land of Eduardo Mondlane and Samora Machel, investors keep on streaming in. Watch out for this future hub of southern Africa!
IMF on Ecobank: are we cool?
South Africa has two main investors in the pan-African bank, Africa’s largest by footprint, the Ecobank Transnational Incorporated or simply Ecobank. These are the 20 percent shareholder, Nedbank, which paid R5bn for its stake in the Togolese-registered bank in October. The other is the Public Investment Corporation (PIC), with an 18 percent stake.
A week or so ago, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) raised the concern that the aggressive growth by the bank posed governance risks. Subsequent reports even extended the story of the risk to the entire continent.
I found that rather alarmist. Ecobank had tackled the corporate governance issue, including the dismissal of its then-group chief executive officer, Thierry Tanoh, who sued for defamation and unfair dismissal.
To equate whatever governance issues there have been at Ecobank to a continent-wide crisis is a tad dramatic. The problem is that institutions like the IMF have a huge following and influence.
A lot can go wrong before appropriate public relations’ interventions can restore the confidence of the investing public in the company or country concerned.
Since the publishing of the report “Pan-African Banks – Opportunities and Challenges for Cross-Border Oversight”, Ecobank has maintained that it has addressed the issues raised by the IMF, including the introduction of processes and corporate governance structures or reforms.
The report, it turned out, was dealing with matters between mid-2013 and early last year.
The IMF admitted to this timing disjuncture and noted the steps taken by Ecobank to strengthen governance and avert risks to financial stability.
The Ecobank has assets of more than $23bn (about R270bn). It raised about $1bn in combined equity and debt capital for its parent company and its business in Nigeria.
This proves how easy it is to get facts mixed up in the rush of our desktop analysis, which would lead to undue destruction to the value of the assets of others. It also demonstrates how vigilant we must be as Africans to counter glaring media stereotypes.
Toast of the week – caution beats bravado in Nigeria
It is not what I would normally toast, but the decision by the Independent National Electoral Commission to postpone the elections in Nigeria from Saturday to March 28 was commendable in the circumstances.
After the military had conceded that it would not be able to provide adequate security at polling stations, what other option was there?
Following the spate of Boko Haram attacks across the country, the most dramatic might have been the attack by a woman suicide-bomber outside a stadium at which the incumbent president, Goodluck Jonathan, had just addressed an election rally.
The woman detonated a car bomb, killing one other person and injuring eight.
With seven days to to the original election date, the chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission had expressed confidence that “our level of preparedness, despite a few challenges, is sufficient to conduct free, fair and credible elections as scheduled on February 14 and February 28”.
He even referred to the previous occasion, in 2011, that an election date had been postponed in Nigeria.
Although the postponement has been called many names, including “democracy deferred”, I find it rather prudent in the face of what Boko Haram has been doing and threatening.
Since kidnapping schoolgirls from Chibok last year, the group has carried out attacks that have created an environment in which one would not feel comfortable to live, let alone do business.
President Jonathan, unlike his opponent, Muhammadu Buhari, has supported the elections delay, while denying that he influenced the decision.
This decision is my toast of the week, although I do not know if it will lead to the release of the Chibok girls before March 28 or the neutralisation of Boko Haram in Nigeria, parts of Chad, Cameroon and Niger.
It is better to delay a process such as this one than to forge ahead with chutzpah when the military is pleading helplessness in the face of insurgence.
May March 28 come and go swiftly, so that Africa can get its largest economy entirely back in action.
Lest we forget: a focus on snippets of African history and icons for inspiration
Liberia and Cameroon both celebrated important holidays on February 11.
Liberia celebrated Armed Forces’ Day on this date.
The country was founded in the early 1800s, mainly by freed slaves, modelling itself much on the US. This is why its capital, Monrovia, is named after the fifth president of the US, James Monroe.
This year, the day marked the 57th Armed Forces Day and 106th year of existence of the Armed Forces of Liberia, with the theme for celebrations being “Enhancing the capacities of the Armed Forces of Liberia to meet contemporary challenges”.
Liberia is continuing to deal with the aftermath of a long civil war, although it has progressed a lot under the leadership of Africa’s first elected woman head of state, President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf.
You may also know Liberia for its football star-turned-politician, the only African to have won the African, European and World Footballer of the Year awards. George Weah is a senator, having lost his bid for the presidency in 2005.
In Cameroon, February 11 was celebrated as a national holiday called Youth Day to persuade the country’s youth to embrace education, sports and other cultural and creative activities, instead of violence.
One of the greatest icons of Cameroon is saxophonist Manu Dibango, 81, whose music style and song Makossa influenced the refrain ‘Mama-se, mama-sa, mama-co-sa’ in Michael Jackson’s hit Wanna Be Starting Something.
* Kgomoeswana is author of Africa is Open for Business, anchor of CNBC Africa’s weekly show Africa Business News, and anchor of the daily show Power Hour on PowerFM. He writes in his personal capacity.
** The views expressed here are not necessarily those of Independent Media.
The Sunday Independent