OPINION: It could be argued that Ramaphosa succeeds because he fails (to change anything). He is a useful decoy for the perpetuation of white supremacy. He doesn’t have to do much. All he needs to is to perfect the art of double speak and that of obfuscation, writes Professor Sipho Seepe.
The African American historian Carter G Woodson, author of the book, The Mis-Education of the Negro, famously observed that, “When you control a man's thinking you do not have to worry about his actions. You do not have to tell him not to stand here or go yonder. He will find his 'proper place' and will stay in it. You do not need to send him to the back door. He will go without being told. In fact, if there is no back door, he will cut one for his special benefit. His education makes it necessary.”
President Cyril Ramaphosa is routinely criticised for having found his “proper place”. Unlike his detractors, Ramaphosa has been consistent with regard to where his allegiance lies, and whose interests he serves. Concluding a supposedly successful investment summit in Sandton in October 2018, the president argued forcefully that it was about time that businesspeople should be treated like heroes. He went further, “white monopoly capital, and all that … that must end today”.
Although not found culpable for the deaths of workers who were killed in Marikana, there was little doubt as to the side that Ramaphosa took during the ill-fated conflict between the workers and the Lonmin bosses. True to Woodson’s observation, Ramaphosa and his ilk do not need to be sent to the back door, he “will go without being told. In fact, if there is no back door, he will cut one for his special benefit”.
Ramaphosa’s remark that “government does not create jobs – business creates jobs” comes as no surprise. Expectedly Ramaphosa’s remarks were enthusiastically embraced by the DA. The DA went further to suggest that the remarks come directly from their party’s cookbook. His comrades in Cosatu and the SACP, who had catapulted him to the office of the Presidency of the ANC, were not amused.
The SACP quickly distanced itself from Ramaphosa. The party called instead for the building of “a capable developmental state with organic capacity to serve the people diligently and capably”. The party went further to accuse the private sector of having “created and increased unemployment through retrenchments in pursuit of profitability and profit maximisation. It is also one reason inequality, both wealth and income inequality, is systemic under capitalist relations of production”.
Not to be left behind, Cosatu argued that government was surrendering the responsibility of job creation to the private sector. Expressing a sense of outrage, Cosatu’s First Deputy President, Mike Shingange, reportedly noted that for Ramaphosa to declare that “they have no business in creating jobs, in fact, the private sector is the only one that must create jobs, we find that thing very disappointing. In fact, it overshadows some of the things that we thought were good speeches by the president”.
The alliance partners could be forgiven for being mistaken. After all, Ramaphosa had promised that government would create millions of jobs. In 2018, for instance, Ramaphosa committed his government “to find jobs for our youth; to build factories and roads, houses, and clinics; to prepare our children for a world of change and progress; to build cities and towns where families may be safe, productive, and content … our public employment programmes have created more than 3.2 million work opportunities”.
If truth be told, Ramaphosa is not the problem. He has been consistent in his beliefs. The problem lies with those that seek to redefine him. In this regard, both Cosatu and the SACP suffer from self-deception and wilful ignorance. Danish social theorist and philosopher Soren Kierkegaard could not have put it better. He observed that “there are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn't true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true”.
Both Cosatu and the SACP may have chosen to mislead themselves, but big business had no such illusions. Ramaphosa was the best investment big business ever made. He was allowed to amass what would have been regarded as ill-gotten wealth. All he had to do, as Mondli Makhanya explains, is “to lend his name and credibility to companies, conclude deals he didn’t really negotiate for and attend board meetings in which he did not speak much. What he did do very well, though, was invoice timeously and diligently for every little stitch of work he had supposedly done. Just like during his years in business, he didn’t really do much in the deputy presidency” (City Press, February 13, 2022).
In investing in Ramaphosa, big business was investing into the future. The future involved the total collapse of the ANC. This much was evident even before Ramaphosa took over the Presidency of the ANC, and that of the country. His main responsibility in government is to eventually surrender the state to big business. He was entrusted with turning around the fortunes of the State Owned Enterprises as far back as 2015. These institutions collapsed under his watch. They are now ready to be privatised.
Business Day editorial (November 20, 2017), “What is needed to fix economy” got it right when it proclaimed: “Cyril Ramaphosa talks of a ‘new deal’ for jobs and growth to be negotiated by all stakeholders in the economy ... Investor-friendly policies – fiscal discipline, caution over debt ... It is also the language of business.”
The editorial argued that Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma’s thinking sounded “a lot like the policies of the left-leaning parts of the ANC – best expressed by Cosatu policy documents – through the 90s and the 2000s”.
For the likes of former president FW de Klerk, Ramaphosa’s assumption of the Office of the President of South Africa was mission accomplished. “Ramaphosa understands business, he understands the economy, and he is committed to achieving economic growth,” enthused De Klerk.
As we know, the opposite has happened. Instead inequality and poverty have deepened. If anything South Africa has pivoted to what former president Thabo Mbeki described as a country of two nations. One nation, largely white, is “relatively prosperous, regardless of gender or geographic dispersal. It has ready access to a developed economic, physical, educational, communication and other infrastructure … The second and larger nation of South Africa is black and poor, with the worst affected being women in the rural areas, the black rural population in general and the disabled. This nation lives under conditions of a grossly underdeveloped economic, physical, educational, communication and other infrastructure”.
Does this mean that both Cosatu and the SACP are likely to abandon Ramaphosa? The answer is an emphatic no. First, being disappointed is different from jumping ship. Besides, history dictates otherwise. When it comes to business interests, you can count on Ramaphosa. He has been consistent. If both organisations failed to ditch him then, they are unlikely to do so. They have stood with him against his demonstrable failure to take the country forward.
Second, Cosatu and its affiliates are not known for total hostility to business or the private sector. Cosatu has produced many wealthy ex-unionists including Ramaphosa. Perhaps there are many others within Cosatu who await their turn to acquire riches through governmental and other channels of patronage.
It could be argued that Ramaphosa succeeds because he fails (to change anything). He is a useful decoy for the perpetuation of white supremacy. He doesn’t have to do much. All he needs to is to perfect the art of double speak and that of obfuscation.
* Professor Sipho Seepe is Deputy Vice-Chancellor for Institutional Support at the University of Zululand. He writes in his personal capacity.
** The views expressed here are not necessarily those of IOL and Independent Media.
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