What is mediocrity? Certainly it is a threat. We see it everywhere. Everyday we are faced with examples of mediocrity being endorsed or promoted, where it should be condemned. There is a strong argument to be made that mediocrity is becoming part and parcel of our society’s make-up. If we are to address the problem, we need to understand mediocrity’s nature. This edition of the Real ANC Today attempts to do just that – to identify mediocrity, its form and its influence.

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• Nationalism breeds Mediocrity

THE REAL ANC TODAY
Volume 2; Issue 10

On mediocrity

By: Gareth van Onselen

“The general tendency of things throughout the world is to render mediocrity the ascendant power among mankind.” [John Stuart Mill]

Introduction

There is a disease coursing through our veins and it is mediocrity. Fuelled by apathy, legitimised by nationalism and fostered by indifference, it is a unifying threat which lurks below the surface of every institution and, increasingly, manifests in the thinking that constitutes the public mind.

Mediocrity is a disease because it infects society in the same fashion as sickness ails a person, and because its effects are debilitating and damaging. If it is identified and countered, its symptoms can be reduced or suppressed but, like a virus, it can never be eliminated. If ignored, its spread can be extensive and the result acute; worse still, if denied, its influence can be all-encompassing. And mediocrity’s power resides primarily in two such consequences: it self-replicates, generating and reinforcing the very environment in which it thrives; and, the more it comes to dominate public thought, the harder mediocrity becomes to recognise.

This contradiction is now at its peak: today, mediocrity’s presence is palpable and it manifests everywhere, and yet it is never properly identified nor its effects properly articulated. It is a sickness that evades diagnosis.

Indeed, so well-entrenched is the problem that, for many people, it is no longer possible to imagine a world outside mediocrity’s illusionary borders. It constitutes a very real threat to the form and structure of society, and the principles and values that underpin any democratic state. And, if we are to counter it, it needs to be recognised for what it is and then we need to act to end its influence.

The purpose of this essay is to understand mediocrity, its nature and its consequences. But that purpose too holds within it something of a contradiction; for mediocrity is not a coherent principle, in the sense that it may be advocated by an individual or practically applied to a situation. Certainly it cannot be aspired to. Rather, it is the result of inaction or incompetence. Thus, its influence is insidious and, once established, it has the ability to cover one’s perception like a veil, giving the adequate the appearance of the outstanding or reducing the exceptional to a dull distraction. And, in doing so, it reinforces its own effect: a vicious circle of lowering expectations and the denigration of the distinguished.

So, while mediocrity’s consequences are plain to see, its influence is subtle yet infectious, and this has implications for any account of it: when mediocrity is full blown, its effects are readily identifiable and its symptoms can be described in detail, but its genetic make-up is more complex to map. And, as it is by nature both invasive and pervasive, it is a contagion that remains particularly difficult to define.

It is for this reason that this essay is written generically and not anchored in current affairs. It is designed to elevate the implied above the obvious, as a full and proper understanding of the problem requires, first and foremost, an appreciation of its form. Only by understanding how mediocrity warps our perception can we understand its true nature and only from there is any practical application worthwhile.

Mediocrity’s character

At first glance mediocrity is calm. But that calm exterior belies panic. And it is panicking because it knows it is being dishonest when it suggests that it is calm. And it is ostensibly calm because it does not want anyone to know it is panicking – a vicious circle borne of a deeper understanding that it is out of its depth.

It is ironic that below the surface mediocrity should feel something so intense as panic – any emotion that raises one’s heartbeat is normally too much for mediocrity’s fragile metabolism. One will never see mediocrity appear to be under stress, apprehensive, anxious or exhausted. To the casual observer mediocrity is mono-emotional, and there is nothing more disconcerting than its smile – feigning to assure, but assuring only doubt.

That said, it would be amiss not to describe mediocrity’s true disposition. Its defining traits are as follows: apathy; indifference; doubt; pervasiveness; insecurity; superficiality; vagueness; fear; timidity; denial; compromise; laziness; inertia; arbitrariness; obstinacy; moral indignation; pettiness; jealously; stubbornness and neediness.

How mediocrity is not an ideal

Any ideal is ultimately unattainable. It is a goal towards which one constantly strives; the driving force behind progress. Excellence is such an ideal, because it is always possible to improve on even the truly brilliant. But mediocrity stands in stark contrast to this: it is a practical consequence, a finite point on an infinite spectrum. This has implications for its nature, as it occupies the ambiguous world between two extremes and so, in turn, is ambiguous itself – neither an outright failure nor a triumphant success, but often alluded to by both as an acceptable outcome.

And mediocrity is not ignorant of its own worth. It is self aware. It constantly suggests to those that would judge it that it occupies a position on that spectrum far closer to excellence than any objective consideration would grant it.

This point is critical when one is dealing with values and principles – the cornerstones of democratic philosophy. Each principle or value is underpinned by an ideal and as one moves from the theoretical to the practical so one should constantly aim to hold any outcome up against the ideal which underpins its undertaking. One should relentlessly ask the question: what more can be done to move this particular outcome closer to the ideal that underlies it. Mediocrity circumvents this process by replacing the relevant ideal with the concept of the ‘acceptable’. That is, it constantly tries to reshape excellence in its own image. As such, mediocrity acts to change ones’ values, distorting any ability to evaluate excellence – for one is no longer striving to move towards the unattainable but in search of the real and the practical. And so the fear that defines the pursuit of the possible is replaced by the warm embrace of compromise and continuity.

This emotional appeal is one of mediocrity’s greatest strengths: while the pursuit of an ideal involves risk and, in turn, the possibility of loss, mediocrity offers assurance and the comfort of knowing. In this way it seduces those with bold aspirations to let go of their dreams; indeed, not to dream at all.

How mediocrity complements nationalism

Stripped of its rhetoric nationalism has its core the pursuit of sameness. It is founded on the notion of what one might call ‘negative equality’: “We must all be alike,” writes the author Ray Bradbury, “Not everyone born free and equal, as the Constitution says, but everyone made equal”. This sentiment captures brilliantly the emotional drive that belies those whose purpose it is to promote mediocrity over excellence or, at the very least, those who see independence, difference and competition – the essence of excellence – as a threat, to be stifled or stamped out. “Then all are happy,” Bradbury continues, “for there are no mountains to make them cower, to judge themselves against”. And so it is that the similarity between these two ideas – nationalism and mediocrity – is revealed.

As Bradbury suggests, the desire to enforce continuity is borne of a misunderstanding: for those who resent difference, equality is not an ideal towards which a society should constantly strive, but a practical condition defined by the lowest common denominator, to which everyone should be made to adhere. This misconception is the very motivation behind both nationalist thought and the mediocre impulse.

And so it is that nationalism and mediocrity have found common ground in a single purpose: the creation of an environment in which difference is outlawed as the enemy and uniformity celebrated as the desired outcome. That great essayist William Hazlitt once put it like this: “The way to get on in the world is to be neither more nor less wise, neither better nor worse than your neighbours.” The consequences of that, however, are profound because difference is a catalyst for excellence. If it is suppressed, the possibility of change or progress is reduced and public thought stagnates.

Nationalism revels in this. For the nationalist the status quo is has no reference in time, it is the past, the present and the future. And therein lies the fuel, and rationale, for any culture which embraces sameness over difference and mediocrity over excellence.

How mediocrity promotes the average

Consider this: the word mediocre is the chief beneficiary of its own influence. A great many dictionaries cite mediocrity as an antonym for excellence. Yet there is a common understanding, one which is gaining strength, that to be mediocre is to fall between two worlds – excellence and failure – and that this is no bad thing. In other words, to be mediocre is an indictment but there is room to decline further still, and its relative position to excellence means, to the mediocre, that position is always justifiable.

I believe there is a stronger case to be made: that while the difference between mediocrity and failure is relative it is not substantive, as both fall short of expectation; but the difference between mediocrity and excellence is substantive and thus the same cannot be said in the other direction.

One might well ask: how has it come to pass that the word mediocre has risen through the ranks, closing the gap between itself and excellence in the order of things? The answer is that it has reaped its own reward. Simply put, it has become acceptable to be mediocre.

“Mediocrity is excellent to the eyes of mediocre people” wrote the French essayist Joseph Joubert. Perhaps it has some way to go before it usurps excellence itself but certainly it is fair to say that, in the public mind, mediocrity enjoys equal billing with the adequate, the average and the acceptable, as opposed to their opposites. And that is a direct result of its influence. Through mediocrity’s eyes, the glass is always half-full.

How mediocrity prefers the general to the specific

To be specific, that is, to describe accurately something in detail, is an onerous task. It requires one to be prepared not only for disappointment (because the details of most things reveal them to be less than perfect – inconsistent and, often, random) but dedicated to understanding the subject at hand fully and rigorous in applying that understanding. Being vague or general allows one to gloss over inconsistency and to give randomness and ambiguity the appearance of order, structure and uniformity. Naturally then, the former lends itself to commitment and expertise – two defining characteristics of excellence – while the latter lends itself to mediocrity, which enjoys nothing more than ignoring the particular in favour of the general.

It is easy, then, to understand why mediocrity is a moraliser: because there is no subject more prone to shades of grey than human nature. That fact is too much for mediocrity. Humankind’s diversity, its inconsistency, the wonderful richness of its difference is something mediocrity is unable to understand, let alone appreciate. If anything, it is repulsed by it.

And so mediocrity is a shallow soul. It finds refuge in insincere moral platitudes – such things as ‘appropriateness’ and ‘respectfulness’, ‘politeness’ and ‘civility’ – and it is by nature deferential and obsequious, and places much emphasis on status. These are the things that help it to cope; to bypass proper interrogation and to avoid the possibility of a deeper understanding or greater appreciation of the world around it. And it advocates them vociferously. One begins to see how mediocrity lends itself to nationalism, which has a proclivity for moralising.

How mediocrity resents excellence

Mediocrity is a confused society, even its own members refute their status; but it is also a cruel society which, because its reach is now so far and wide, often tempts those forged in excellence to seek its approval. That is a mistake, because mediocrity will never endorse excellence, just as compromise will never understand principle. If anything, it resents excellence and seeks it out with the purpose of diluting or ending its influence entirely. The greatest judge of excellence is excellence itself. The ability properly to distinguish the one from the other will tell you to which society you belong and, if you are wise as well as excellent, where you should look for approval.

Why does mediocrity resent excellence with such intensity? In many respects these two protagonists are mutually exclusive, so perhaps its animosity is understandable; but that is also to detract from mediocrity’s cunning. Mediocrity lurks within excellence, waiting for an opportunity to manifest. Yet the opposite does not hold true. And here excellence is its own worst enemy, for such is its appetite for progress that what is excellent today will undoubtedly be mediocre tomorrow. Mediocrity, on the other hand, is trapped in time. What is mediocre today will not past muster tomorrow. And so it seeks to extend the bubble in which is thrives, so as to engulf as much possible, slowing down time and making society forget the world that lives outside its reach, as it moves to banish excellence from its sight.

There is another source for that resentment. And it is deeply ironic. Mediocrity’s curse is that it is self aware. Inherent in the idea of resentment is the requirement that one understands what it is that one dislikes. Mediocrity understands full well what excellence is and the chasm that separates the two. And mediocrity resents it. It resents it because it knows that its own nature is apathetic, that the abyss between it and excellence will never be crossed and that even to contemplate doing so would require mediocrity to leave its comfort zone and venture out into the unknown. And with a glance in excellence’s direction mediocrity articulates all these constraints in an instant, and then it acts to remove the threat from its view.

How mediocrity is insidious and pervasive

The Sorites paradox poses the following question: if one has a single grain of sand and to it one adds another and another, and so on and so forth, at what point do you have a heap of sand? Basic logic dictates that if you have a single grain of sand, you do not have a heap. By the same logic, if you have two grains of sand, you do not have a heap; nor do three grains constitute a heap; nor four. Yet, at some point, if you keep adding a single grain of sand at a time, you will indeed have a heap. And the question then becomes, at what point does your initial premise – that a single grain of sand does not constitute a heap – become false?

The paradox is also known as the ‘little-by-little argument’ and it describes very well the nature of mediocrity and how it subtly strengthens its grip around society’s throat. It does so little-by-little.

A mediocre outcome does not comprise a threat. It can be easily excused or explained away; certainly that is mediocrity’s own intent. Rather it is that attitude – one fostered and encouraged by mediocrity itself – that manufactures an environment in which mediocrity multiplies. Put another way: it is not the mediocre outcome which is problematic – failure is an inherent risk in any endeavour – but the attitude that accompanies it. It is that attitude which determines whether or not that outcome will proliferate or be isolated. And as an attitude, mediocrity has many guises: apathy, indifference, idleness, denial – each of which insidiously infects public thought and serves as the source for mediocrity’s strength and growth.

It becomes apparent, then, how mediocrity is pervasive, because it is rare for any attitudinal change to be marked or dramatic; more likely it is subtle and takes shape over time. Mediocrity is nothing more than a nudge in a certain direction. As such it can be easily resisted but, if ignored, sooner or later you will find yourself standing within its domain, unable to account for how you got there.

How mediocrity elevates process and compromise over outcomes

An outcome requires effort to achieve. So it is by nature mediocrity’s enemy. And mediocrity will act to prevent its achievement or reduce its impact. It does this by shifting emphasis away from the outcome and towards the process designed to achieve it. This trend is bolstered by mediocrity’s great love of bureaucracy. Indeed, when mediocrity is firmly established in an organisation, the nature of any given process is elevated even to the point where the outcome is no longer relevant at all. The form of that process, its structure, its composition, its timelines, its parameters, its procedural correctness become all-important and every effort is poured into ensuring that these requirements are all indulged and fully interrogated.

Here mediocrity is the enemy of legitimate decisions. Under the pretence that it speaks on behalf of the majority, mediocrity allows one voice of dissent to be used as a pseudo-moral veto, negating any democratic outcome by elevating discontent above consensus.

In this way mediocrity reverses best practice: instead of the outcome determining the process needed to achieve it, the outcome is warped to comply with the process. Mediocrity takes all that is noble about compromise and turns it in on itself, bringing its ability to dilute excellence to the fore and emphasising form over substance. In doing so it drains resources and redirects effort to those things that detract from progress and stifle development.

There are key phrases and words which mediocrity relies on to shore up its cause – all distorted for the purpose of interrogating process and redirecting one’s focus away from outcomes: ‘inclusive’ (as in, was the process inclusive?), ‘fair’ (was it fair?), ‘consultation’ (was everyone consulted?) and ‘thorough’ (was it thorough enough?) among many others. Any outcome is held hostage to such questions. To those who would strive for excellence, these are watchwords, to be approached with caution; to those caught in mediocrity’s embrace, they are weasel words, used to mask one’s true intent. Significantly, each one of them is subjective and, as such, opens the door to debate and a discussion with no readily identifiable end. Everything is negotiable. All of this works in mediocrity’s favour – it is enervating, ensuring that time and effort are consumed on those things which detract from the hard decisions which necessitate any outcome.

How mediocrity hollows language

Mediocrity’s relationship with language swings violently between antagonism and celebration. There is no greater source of satisfaction for the mediocre than being able to manipulate language to reduce expectation and numb the anxiety that accompanies the prospect of application or exertion. When it is antagonistic, it will fight or deny the meaning of words; when it is celebratory, it relishes in its own contrived interpretation of key words and phrases. Always its purpose it to reduce expectation, lower the bar and ease the workload. And once again, if mediocrity is firmly entrenched in a society, the latter of these two emotional states has some serious consequences for the nature of public discourse and the language that defines it. Mediocrity eats away at the meaning of words, leaving behind a hollow shell. The more pronounced the problem, the more acute the effect.

The first to fall are those words related to principles and values – ideas like ‘accountability’ and ‘transparency’, ‘good governance’ and ‘tolerance’. Special attention is given to ‘excellence’. Each of these words is steadily denuded of its connotations and denotation, until it is nothing more than an empty reference to an idea which no one can define, but everyone is willing to debate. A mediocre society will spend much time pondering the nature of accountability and what constitutes good governance, but precious little time actually holding people to account or practising good governance.

There are some words that are immune to mediocrity’s influence, but only because they are themselves ambiguous by nature: ‘adequate’, ‘average’, ‘sufficient’, ‘satisfactory’, ‘appropriate’, and ‘acceptable’. It is no surprise, then, that because of their ambiguity mediocrity has claimed these words as its own, and uses them under the pretence that all is well and real progress, just around the next corner.

Because mediocrity has such an affinity for vagueness and generalisation, it is also a good friend of the cliché. Most clichés do not hold up to close examination, but they do serve another purpose: to the uneducated they are an allusion to wisdom, and so mediocrity uses them to impress those who can only be impressed and bolster its own sense of self worth.

How mediocrity focuses on the existent at the expense of the possible

The downside of reducing expectation and celebrating the lowest common denominator is that it is not possible to celebrate that purpose itself. Even mediocrity knows its own limits, and for it to expressly state its intent would be to reveal itself for what it really is. So instead it concerns itself with defining what is already plain to see. This focus on the existent has the effect of diverting attention away from the possible; for, if the parameters of a debate are predefined, it is impossible to analyse any matter within its broader context: its own nature determines its strengths and weaknesses. And if the subject is intrinsically mediocre, within that limited frame of reference, even its best attributes are hard to cherish. Not so for mediocrity. It presents each attribute as a grand achievement by reference to those things below it, simultaneously enforcing an artificial amnesia about the possibilities that might exist above it.

How mediocrity undermines accountability

Mediocrity detests having to explain its own actions and thus accountability is a principle for which it reserves exceptional hostility. In order to properly account for one’s actions, it is necessary not only to explain what happened, but why. Mediocrity has no problem with the what. Indeed, it enjoys nothing more than initiating an in-depth discussion about the exact nature of those things right before its eyes; but beyond that it is not willing to look. And that is the very place where a person’s intent can be found. This refusal to engage in any discussion about motive is perfectly understandable; after all, mediocrity’s motive is self-serving and its intent callous. One can always tell someone drunk on mediocrity, they are unable to talk about abstract concepts and obsess about describing the practical world around them. Asking mediocrity to account for its inability to predict failure or to plan ahead, even for its unwillingness to change the status quo, is thus a futile exercise. In its most virulent form, mediocrity’s deliberate short-sightedness advances past denial and the excuse becomes reality: intent is outsourced entirely to someone else; there is only action, and who can be held to account for doing nothing more than what they were told?

This last point is important because it has implications for personal responsibility. The last thing mediocrity wants is responsibility, and when it is thrust upon it, it froths and bubbles – a violent allergic reaction, akin to salt being poured on a snail. It will look anywhere but in the mirror, and blame and misdirection are the tools it trades in when it is put under pressure.

How mediocrity distorts reason

Mediocrity is fickle, fluctuating between anger and apathy. When it is angry the cause is resentment – it recognises excellence and understands it will never be able to achieve it, and this is the source of intense distress. But that is a truth mediocrity can never express and so the anger swells within it. It never manifests in rage, rather passive aggression. And one can almost taste the bitterness.

When mediocrity is apathetic the cause is fear. On the horizon it recognises excellence and the thought of the arduous journey necessary to meet up with it in the far distance is simply too much to bear. And so it shuts down and retreats, arguing that the undertaking is simply too difficult or dangerous to merit any serious consideration; and besides, what’s wrong with where it is?

And this is to mediocrity’s own detriment; for, in being able to recognise excellence, it reveals some small amount of appreciation for it. With regard to lazy writers, the famed literary critic Cyril Connolly puts it like this: “Sloth in writers is always a symptom of an acute inner conflict, especially that laziness which renders them incapable of doing the thing which they are most looking forward to.” So mediocrity is able to experience some small regret, and it has only its own fear to blame.

The common consequence of both these moods is the damage inflicted on reason. If it is angry, mediocrity’s judgment is warped by malice and, if it is apathetic, its façade of reasonableness is designed to mask the way in which it manipulates logic in justifying its failure to act. And so it is that mediocrity often renders rational thought redundant. Its own emotional state means it is simply unable to appreciate the power that resides in a carefully reasoned argument.

How mediocrity is intuitive

Excellence is counter-intuitive. Not entirely, but substantially. Perhaps Aristotle put it best when he said excellence “is not an act but a habit”. Nevertheless, it does involve risk, the possibility of failure and a venture into the unknown. All of these things require one’s intellect to override an emotional pull in the other direction. For mediocrity, however, there is no such choice. Intuitively it chooses the path of least emotional resistance, bypassing hard decisions by avoiding them in the first place.

Mediocrity is unthinking. Its business is not to stimulate thought but to soothe away anxiety. Mistakenly it thinks the best way to do this is to pretend conflict doesn’t exist. So mediocrity never actually calms its inner fears but denies them, as it does the need for introspection or self appraisal. This stands in stark contrast to excellence, which is self-calibrating: it gratefully assimilates any shortcoming as knowledge necessary to reset its own processes and advance forward.

How mediocrity is unapologetic

Because excellence realises that any error or poor outcome on its part stands in the way of progress it is able to apologise. It does so because, in the first place, it has the ability to identify an error in judgment (indeed, it cannot ignore it) and, in the second place, because it wants to improve. Mediocrity, however, cannot apologise. It cannot because, on both counts, its nature is intrinsically different to that of excellence: not only does it not possess the ability to identify mistakes, but it has absolutely no desire to apologise for them.

The first of these two points concerns its aptitude – mediocrity lacks the requisite skills, knowledge and expertise to recognise properly any shortcoming; the second concerns its obstinate nature – mediocrity is unwilling to apologise because it understands that it is unable to improve and so any defeat is not a stepping stone, as it is for excellence, but a ceiling. That is, it represents a point beyond which mediocrity cannot pass. And so it refuses to recognise it; for to do so would be to reveal its own limits.

Thus, should a situation arise in which excellence is obliged to apologise to mediocrity, the scene is set for much resentment and animosity. Instead of that apology being received as an appropriate response to the desire to develop or advance, mediocrity will turn it into an indictment – an opportunity to berate excellence, to blame and moralise. Excellence knows this and it is a bitter pill to swallow. It makes sense, then, that when excellence is bolstered by maturity and the perspective inherent to it, even in error it rises above mediocrity and holds the high ground. Mediocrity is ageless, it lurks in perpetual adolescence.

But mediocrity’s duplicity does not stop with moral indignation. In an act of complete self indulgence, mediocrity will not hesitate for a moment to bask in excellence’s success, or to claim its’ victories as its own. Despite every effort to sabotage it, regardless of a stubborn refusal to celebrate it and notwithstanding a deep-seated resentment toward championing it, mediocrity will seamlessly appropriate any excellent outcome as if that achievement was its very intention from the beginning.

How mediocrity creates a false sense of comfort

Mediocrity denies its own existence. One might ask how this assertion fairly sits next to the contention that mediocrity it is self aware. The answer is obvious: its denial is a consequence of it being self aware.

More often than not mediocrity’s fear – and the resentment that accompanies it – is a powerful reaction to a subliminal awareness, a suggestion at the very edge of its consciousness that it is inadequate. But it is there none-the-less and the implications for mediocrity’s behaviour, profound. On a day-to-day basis, however, mediocrity drifts through the world seemingly oblivious to its own nature and, were one to confront it, any acknowledgment of its form or character would amount to nothing more than a superficial smile and a nod, only for it to revert to type the very next morning. To meet head-on its own deficiencies would be for mediocrity to relinquish its purpose; like a wildfire realising its authority is determined by the very things it destroys and willingly sacrificing its ambition. So instead it embraces denial, happy to pretend it doesn’t exist and easily offended when it sees its own shadow.

Mediocrity constantly strives to extend this false sense of comfort to the world around it. But even that world is no bigger than its imagination. And it has no imagination; for imagination is aspirational and mediocrity cannot dream. For mediocrity, the world is restricted to only those things right before its eyes. As a general rule, the further something is from mediocrity, the less likely it is to give it its attention; and those things out of sight get no attention at all.

How mediocrity is blindly optimistic or pessimistic

For mediocrity there is no difference between optimism and pessimism: both are useful excuses to explain away failure. And the more optimistic or pessimistic mediocrity is, the bigger the failure it is able to explain. In this sense it uses both as a distraction, not only from its own intent but from its particular role in any endeavour. It employs exaggeration and hyperbole to achieve its ends and is willing even to resort to emotional blackmail, if raw enthusiasm does not serve its purpose.

When it is blindly optimistic, it plays on political correctness and constantly suggests that even a bold undertaking is not bold enough. When it is blindly pessimistic, it plays on fear and uses bureaucracy as mirror to deflect passion and commitment. Both those attitudes are then consistently applied, whether expressed at an idea’s conception or its collapse.

If mediocrity is optimistic in response to failure, it is so because that is all it has to offer; if it is pessimistic, it is so because, by default – as opposed to design – it managed to make the right judgment and is thus presented with a rare opportunity to champion its own ignorance, which it does with glee.

How mediocrity self-replicates and reduces expectation

By its very existence mediocrity has achieved a large part of its objective. As excellence is a relative concept – in the sense that it can be improved upon – it requires a benchmark against which it can be measured; and mediocrity happily obliges. In doing so it once again acts to reverse best practice. Excellence should never gauge its worth against what is acceptable. Its inherent value sets it apart from the common and the average. Rather it should aspire to what has not yet been achieved. It should constantly aim to raise the bar, to fuel expectation and to drive progress. The moment it stops doing this, the instant excellence relaxes and suggests it has run its course, mediocrity has its foot in the door. From there it systematically draws excellence towards it, until the two are indistinguishable. And it does this over and over again, until society has forgotten what excellence looks like.

Obviously this has implications for expectation. If the average is acceptable – worse still, if the average is supposedly excellent – society’s expectations are lowered. And, instead of celebrating any development as an indication of what might follow, it is championed as yet another shining example of what has already been achieved.

How mediocrity can never be eliminated

Mediocrity cannot ever be destroyed. What can be addressed is one’s attitude toward it. It is true that, where that attitude is borne of mediocrity itself, this might appear something of a contradiction but in practice the two are easily distinguishable. And the differentiation is important, for the one is a consequence of the other and, if the source can be extinguished, its effects will be quelled in turn.

The case is sometimes made that a mediocre attitude is the consequence of a poor outcome (an excuse which serves the interests of the mediocre themselves, for it suggests they are a victim of something over which they have no control). But this is wrong. A mediocre outcome can easily be the unintended result of an endeavour undertaken in the pursuit of excellence. It happens all the time. An endeavour pursued under the influence of mediocrity’s spell, however, will only ever be mediocre itself; if not, worse. It is one’s attitude to mediocrity that determines its strength and, if it is to be countered, it is to this cause that one must pay particular attention.

It is worth saying something about the nature of excellence here, because it serves to illuminate not only the difference between it and mediocrity, but the nature of mediocrity itself. Excellence is resilient, it is determined, it feeds on aspiration and hope and its strength lies in a powerful instinct which relentlessly drives it not only to compete with brilliance, but to surpass it. Starved of hope and aspiration though, it will waste away. Excellence needs excellence in order to survive. But this is not true of mediocrity. It can survive anywhere. Feeding off insecurity and fear and able to regenerate at a speed excellence simply cannot match. Even when mediocrity is weak and frail, it needs only the smallest amount of sustenance to regenerate and infect those around it.

In order to suppress mediocrity’s influence, then, one has to be permanently vigilant and ruthlessly focused on starving it of those things that would give it life.

Conclusion

“Democracy shouldn’t aim to reduce people and their achievements to a common denominator; it should aim to raise them, ambitiously and dramatically, as close as possible to an ideal.” [A.C. Grayling]

“The tendency of democracies is, in all things, to mediocrity.” [James Fenimore Cooper]

I have tried in this essay to set out the nature of mediocrity, in order that it may be more easily identified and its influence countered.

If we are to begin to move away from a culture of mediocrity and towards a society that champions and cherishes excellence, we need to ask some simple questions: Do we aspire to something excellent, or do we aim only to achieve that which is easily within our reach? Can we properly recognise excellence? Have our expectations been lowered to the point where the average is acceptable? And these questions should be asked not only of ourselves but of those who would represent us in government.

To make this move is to overcome a massive inertia. It requires absolute commitment and a relentless drive to lift expectations, to demand excellence from others, to deliver excellence ourselves and to measure our performance against the highest standards. A failure to do so runs the risk of cultivating a society with collective amnesia, no longer able to recognise excellence or to appreciate its worth.

Expelling this enemy that has crept into our house and made itself comfortable requires a monumental effort. But it is by no means a lost cause; to suggest as much would be to grant mediocrity the victory it so dearly desires.

Each of us has a duty in this regard and the potential reward is great. For to be outstanding, to strive for excellence and to celebrate it, is a feeling many of us have forgotten and it is a wondrous thing: a glorious feeling defined by pride, a fulfillment enriched by a sense of accomplishment and the joy of knowing that one has risen above the usual and reserved a special place among the exceptional.

That alone is something worth fighting for.

This full essay can be downloaded from the Resources page, or here.

President Jacob Zuma’s decision to nominate Justice Sandile Ngcobo for the position of Chief Justice violated the Constitutional provision that he consult before appointing. This edition of the Real ANC Today attempts to cut through the rhetoric surrounding the President’s decision and reveal his true intent: which was never to consult; indeed, even if a completely disorganised Presidency intended to ‘consult’, it would have been nothing more than a superficial exercise, which was ignored even before it happened.

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THE REAL ANC TODAY
Volume 2; Issue 9

HOW TECHNICALITIES ARE USED TO MASK INTENT

By: Gareth van Onselen

Introduction

Logic is a double-edged sword: its simplicity is often the consequence of much hard work and the power that resides in its application a reward one can only ever reap by being entirely consistent and absolutely thorough. Like the chain that is only as strong as its weakest link, so any logical analysis fails by the smallest indiscretion.

That said, if properly applied to a situation, there is no sweeter satisfaction than exposing those hidden assumptions that lurk below the surface of a poorly reasoned argument. They are the toxic half-thoughts that pollute clear thinking. To eradicate them and to then examine the nature of what remains should be the central purpose behind public scrutiny and the considered opinion of the fourth estate.

Too often, however, that requirement falls by the wayside. The reasons for this are many and complex but suffice to say that the lure of the irrational (most often in the form of political correctness), coupled with the various habits that mark lazy thinking, are the defining characteristics of much public debate today. It is an unfortunate state of affairs, for it means that logic itself is often rendered impotent – its very purpose warped and turned on itself to produce an aberration of its true form.

Indeed, so widespread is the problem, that even the most important issues of the day – those events that concern the fundamental nature of our democracy – are regularly hijacked by poor reasoning and their true implications hidden behind a veil of distractions that range from the superficial to the profoundly disingenuous. Nowhere is this more true than with regard to the ANC government and the manner in which it explains itself to the South African public.

By way of illustration, I wish to set out the events surrounding President Jacob Zuma’s nomination of Justice Sandile Ngcobo for the position of Chief Justice. For a proper interrogation of that process reveals much about the President, his attitude towards the Constitution and the democratic procedures it advocates – a great deal of which has been lost in the insubstantial (and often unsubstantive) analysis concerning it.

By way of background

Much of the relevant information – the facts of the matter – have already been set out in two documents, both written in response to those events: a joint press statement by Helen Zille, Patricia de Lille and Mosiuoa Lekota and a joint letter to President Zuma by Helen Zille, Patricia de Lille, Mvume Dandala and Mangosuthu Buthelezi. Nevertheless, the most important of these are worth repeating here, as it is only on the basis of those facts that a full and proper analysis reveals the President’s true intent and the implications it holds.

By way of background, the South African Constitution requires that the President consults with various people and institutions before making an appointment to the position of Chief Justice. The relevant section of the Constitution in this regard is found in Chapter 8, Section 174 (3), and reads as follows:

“The President as head of the national executive, after consulting the Judicial Service Commission and the leaders of parties represented in the National Assembly, appoints the Chief Justice and the Deputy Chief Justice and, after consulting the Judicial Service Commission, appoints the President and Deputy President of the Supreme Court of Appeal.”

I wish here to focus on the requirement that the President consult with leaders of the political parties represented in the National Assembly. This is not to dismiss the requirement that he also consults with the Judicial Service Commission – only that, as the requirement to consult with party leaders directly concerns the Democratic Alliance, I am able to speak on that particular provision with more authority.

There are two critical elements to that provision: the first is that the President consults; the second that he does so before he makes his appointment. Let us look at both of those in more detail, for they are not unrelated.

The purpose of consultation is straightforward but it is necessary to define it here because this issue turns on that definition. Consultation is a process which must involve at least two parties. It is designed to ensure that the advice, insights and opinions of one party are elicited by the other with the purpose of informing its thinking.

In other words, it is an exercise the point of which is to gather knowledge to better shape one’s judgement.

There are those who might suggest that consultation is a reference to nothing more than etiquette, a courtesy undertaken with the intention of simply informing the other party of one’s decision, but that would be wrong and to misrepresent both its connotations and denotation. It is also to defeat the very purpose of the idea, because it would require one party deliberately to ignore the advice of the other at the expense of the subject at hand. That is not consultation.

Were that the intention behind Section 174 (3), the Constitution would require the President merely to “inform” the leaders of those parties. But the Constitution was not designed to establish etiquette and good manners, rather, best democratic practice. Thus, it requires the President to seek out their advice – to consult – the purpose of which is to better inform his decision.

Reinforcing this, even at the risk of redundancy, is the requirement that the President do so before he makes his appointment. Obviously one cannot consult after the fact, to do so would be to render that consultation meaningless. It is common cause that if consultation is designed to increase one’s knowledge, in order to arrive at a more considered opinion, that process must be carried out prior to arriving at a position.

In much the same fashion – and this is a critical point – one can only properly consult with an open mind – for if the purpose of consultation is to properly arrive at the best opinion, one cannot do that if the outcome is preconceived. The particular importance of this point will become apparent.

How then, do President Zuma’s actions hold up against this requirement?

The Press Club address

The key fact in this regard is his address to the South African Press Club on 6 August, in which he made the following statement:

“I have decided to nominate Justice Sandile Ngcobo as the next Chief Justice since Chief Justice Pius Langa is due to retire. I have requested advice from the Judicial Services Commission and leaders of political parties represented in the National Assembly in this regard.”

Subsequent to his address, but also on 6 August, the South African Press Association (SAPA) reported that, in explaining his choice, President Zuma stated that he had taken the decision “properly” and “objectively”. Importantly, it also reports the President as saying: “The fact of the matter is that I have appointed a judge that I believe is capable.” (The Star, independent of SAPA, also reported the President as saying this.)

There are three significant facts about the statement made in this speech:

First, the date: it was made on 6 August. More about that later.

Second, it constituted a public announcement of his intention to appoint Justice Ngcobo to the position of Chief Justice.

Third, it clearly states that, in making that announcement, President Zuma had followed the required Constitutional procedure – he had consulted the leaders of political parties and, having sought out their advice, had arrived at the conclusion that Justice Ngcobo was the best candidate.

This third point is critical and worth elaborating on. In and of itself, the excerpt quoted above unequivocally states that the President had followed the proper procedure in arriving at his decision. This is reinforced by his comments that he had taken the decision “properly” and “objectively”. His intent is crystal clear. One might fairly paraphrase it as follows:

In order to make this appointment the Constitution requires that I consult various parties. I have done this properly and dispassionately. I have sought out their advice and, after hearing it, have arrived at a conclusion. That conclusion is that Justice Ngcobo is the best candidate for the position of Chief Justice.

As will soon become apparent, however, that statement was palpably untrue.

President Zuma’s address and the announcement it contained was made on 6 August. However, the communication from his office, requesting the advice of the requisite political leaders, was only sent on 7 August – a facsimile backdated to 5 August (see the joint letter for more details in this regard). Put plainly, on 6 August, President Zuma had absolutely not “requested advice” from the leaders of political parties represented in the National Assembly.

Working backwards

On face value, there would appear to be two possible reasons for this. The first is that President Zuma has complete contempt for the requirements set out in the Constitution and simply stated a bold untruth, because whether or not he consulted was of no concern to him or the conclusion he would inevitably arrive at. The second is that his office is entirely incompetent and forgot to seek out the appropriate advice ahead of his announcement.

But the fact that the announcement was contained in a written speech suggests that these two options are not, in fact, mutually exclusive. Indeed, most likely, they are both true.

Let us work backwards: a written speech of this kind is produced some time before the President actually speaks. In other words, someone at the Presidency, charged with formulating the President’s address to the Press Club, possibly the President himself, constructed that statement long before the President actually spoke. In order to do that, a conscious decision would have had to be taken that this opportunity constituted the right occasion to announce Justice Ngcobo’s nomination. In order to do that, one would have had to ask the question as to whether the right procedure had been followed in order to make that announcement. And in order to do that, it would have had to be confirmed that the appropriate leaders had been consulted.

At this point, things fall apart.

Because the appropriate leaders had not been consulted – their advice would only be sought a day later. Nevertheless, that statement was inserted into the speech regardless.

This tells us two further things – that even if the President had sought out their advice prior to his announcement, he would have ignored it; and that (and the backdated facsimile is testament to this) the Presidency forgot to seek out the advice in time. And, ironically, each option rests on the other to hold true: if it was incompetence, and the Presidency thought the relevant request had indeed been made when the speech was written, then he certainly was entirely unconcerned by what that advice was; and, if it was a disregard for the Constitution, and he had little regard for that advice in the first place, then the Presidency has made a mockery of his intention by sending a back-dated facsimile.

It’s a bit like a slaughterhouse trying to sew the head back onto a chicken.

There is an important point that must be made at this juncture. The notion of a ‘nomination’ – the idea that Justice Ngcobo is the President’s ‘nominee’ – is a complete misnomer, and only serves to confuse matters. The Constitution makes no reference to nominees, it is an invention of the Presidency. The President need only consult ahead of his appointment to that position. If anything, the fact that he nominated a single candidate is a further indictment of his approach to the Constitutional requirement that he consults. Why consult on only one candidate? If one is truly interested in arriving at the best possible decision, why not ask for a wider set of opinions? Certainly there was more than one person who qualified.

This idea of a nominee has detracted from the key point: which is that the President claimed to have consulted before arriving at his decision when, in fact, he had not. The form that decision took is irrelevant. It is the process leading up to it which is flawed. And it was flawed because the President failed to consult and all the available evidence suggests he would have had no regard for such consultation even if it had taken place.

This last part is evidenced by the Presidency’s response to the joint statement issued by the DA, ID and COPE. In responding to it, Presidency spokesman Vincent Magwenya defended the President’s Press Club statement as illustrative of his “transparent and consultative” leadership style (a bizarre response if ever there was one) and, importantly, that: “We cannot withdraw (the nomination). The (opposition) parties should advise… and engage the president on the nominee.”

This statement gives the game away and confirms the thesis of this article.

If the President is unwilling to withdraw his nomination, it means whatever advice he receives, and whether he is willing to absorb it or not, is irrelevant. In the President’s mind, his nomination is final and any advice is sought out simply to confirm his decision, not to inform it. It cannot be altered. And that tells you everything you need to know. For if consultation is a serious exercise, as envisioned by the Constitution, then it must be entered into with an open mind; not to do so, as alluded to above, is to enter into the process with a preconceived outcome, which defeats its very purpose.

The President’s later statement, that he had already “appointed” Justice Ngcobo to the position might have been technically inaccurate, but with regard to intent, it couldn’t have been more precise.

Conclusion

So what does this all mean?

The joint letter from the DA, ID, IFP and COPE contains the following paragraph:

“The reason why the South African Constitution requires the President to consult the leaders of all political parties in the National Assembly is clear: The National Assembly consists of 400 public representatives, democratically elected to represent the interests of all South Africans. As the judiciary is an independent body – an independence epitomised by the position of Chief Justice – it is appropriate that those Members of Parliament be consulted before such an appointment is made. In much the same fashion, it is necessary to consult the JSC, a representative body both of the National Assembly and the justice system more broadly. Not to consult the members of these institutions would result in the appointment being made entirely at the discretion of the head of the executive; a situation which lends itself to the abuse of power, undermines the Constitutional principle that there be a separation of power between the executive and judiciary and, in practical terms, runs the risk that the Chief Justice and those candidates eligible for the position of Chief Justice might act in a manner designed to find favour with the President.”

Having sifted out the double-talk, the President and the Presidency’s attitude on this matter are perfectly apparent: both have absolutely no regard for the Constitutional requirement that they consult. Not only did the President fail to consult ahead of his decision; but subsequent to it, his office has indicated that his decision is beyond reproach. He has effectively denuded Section 174 (3) of its meaning and purpose and in plain and simple language made it quite apparent that the Chief Justice will be appointed entirely at the President’s discretion. His excuses are couched in technicalities, but his intent is plain to see. There cannot be a bigger indictment of a President.

There is one final point worth making. The statement made by President Zuma was done before the South African Press Club – before the core of South Africa’s political journalists. That statement was untrue. One is forced to ask what the President’s attitude to the South African media is, that he can stand before them and make such a fundamentally problematic and disingenuous statement with next to no repercussions – no outrage on the press’s part. No indignation at being so profoundly misled. But perhaps it is not Jacob Zuma that need answer that question; perhaps it is better addressed to the members of the South African Press Club.

The latest edition of Focus Magazine – the flagship publication of the Helen Suzman Foundation (HSF) – contains within it five speeches by President Jacob Zuma, all of them printed in full. Is this really the kind of thinking the HSF, a liberal institution, should be promoting? There is a strong case to be made that the magazine is in an advance state of decline, and this edition of The Real ANC Today sets out that case in more detail.

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THE REAL ANC TODAY
Volume 2; Issue 8.

LOSING FOCUS

By Gareth van Onselen

Introduction

What is the purpose of the Helen Suzman Foundation (HSF)?

The preamble to the Helen Suzman Inaugural Lecture Series states that its objective lies, among other things, in “advocating measures designed to promote the ideals of liberal constitutional democracy in South Africa”.

That would seem like a fairly straightforward exercise; and an invaluable one at that. Outside of the Democratic Alliance, liberal values and principles are in short supply in South African civil society. There are only a handful of high quality research institutes and non-governmental organisations; fewer still dedicated to upholding “the ideals of liberal constitutional democracy”.

But is that really what the HSF does?

There is a strong case to be made that it does not; rather, that under the directorship of Raenette Taljaard, the Foundation has lost its direction – seduced by the ruling party’s omnipresent political paradigm and the temptation to indulge an executive with an agenda that stands in stark contrast to that of a liberal constitutional democracy.

Losing Focus

Consider the July edition of the HSF’s quarterly flagship publication, Focus Magazine (Issue 54), by way of illustration.

Here is a breakdown of its contents:

• Page 1: Editorial (By Raenette Taljaard)
• Page 4: Analysis (By Sipho Seepe)
• Page 8: Analysis (By Aubrey Matshiqi)
• Page 12: Interview with Helen Zille (By Raenette Taljaard)
• Page 16: Interview with Athol Trollip (By Raenette Taljaard)
• Page 20: Interview with Mosiuoa Lekota (By Raenette Taljaard)
• Page 24: Interview with Mvume Dandala (By Raenette Taljaard)
• Page 28: Speech (By Jacob Zuma)
• Page 30: Speech (By Jacob Zuma)
• Page 34: Speech (By Jacob Zuma)
• Page 36: Analysis (By Patrick Laurence)
• Page 38: Analysis (By Mac Maharaj)
• Page 42: Debate between David Unterhalter and Paul Ngobeni
• Page 46: Analysis (By Raenette Taljaard)
• Page 50: Speech (By Jacob Zuma)
• Page 62: Speech (By Athol Trollip)
• Page 66: Speech (By Mvume Dandalala)
• Page 70: Speech (By Pravin Gordhan)
• Page 74: Speech (By Trevor Manuel)
• Page 78: Speech (By Jacob Zuma)
• Page 82: Analysis (By Tony Leon)
• Page 86: Analysis (By Pierre de Vos)
• Page 90: Analysis (By Yvonne Muthien)
• Page 94: Summary of M&G Critical Thinking Forum
• Page 104: Focus Book Corner
• Page 108: Book Review: ‘Fool’s Gold’ (By Raenette Taljaard)
• Page 110: Book Review: ‘Zumanomics’ (By Raenette Taljaard)
• Page 112: Book Review: ‘Dead Aid’ (By Kate Francis)

It contains no less than five speeches by President Jacob Zuma, each one printed in full.

They include: his speech on his election as President-elect; his inauguration address; his speech to the World Economic Forum; his state of the nation address (which runs to 12 pages) and his closing speech at the end of the debate on the state of the nation address.

This is a fairly remarkable fact; even more so when one considers they are published by an organisation dedicated to promoting liberalism, as opposed to the racial African nationalism that defines the African National Congress and its programme of action, both inside and outside of government.

Quantitative analysis doesn’t always give you the full picture, but it certainly tells you something: all in all, Zuma’s speeches take up 24 pages. The combined number of pages dedicated to Helen Zille, Athol Trollip and Tony Leon amount to just 16. And that is before you include the speeches by Pravin Gordhan and Trevor Manuel, which takes the ANC government’s total page count to 32. Add Mac Maharaj (not in government but certainly ANC) and you are up to 36.

I would be so bold as to suggest the ANC itself has never produced a publication with five full speeches by the President, not even under the leadership of Thabo Mbeki (a visit to the ANC’s homepage for some of its journals, Umrabulo or Sepadi, reveals even they do not indulge the President to that extent). The GCIS too, would be stretched to justify that sort of promotional extravagance. Indeed, the entire endeavour is difficult to explain.

(Remember also, these things are hardly difficult to come by. The HSF would do well to visit HANSARD’s website, home to the parliamentary transcript unit dedicated to providing “a substantially verbatim report” of what happens in Parliament; or even the government’s website, where every one of those speeches is readily available.)

But perhaps that is to downplay the extent of the problem. Five speeches? That really is pretty spectacular.

Of course HANSARD doesn’t have pictures. Supplementing the speeches are a wide range of colour photos of Zuma – I counted no less than 13 – a number of which are full page. Admittedly there are glossy photos of all the main protagonists throughout the publication, but they are not there to illustrate a point, merely promotional, and as Zuma occupies the most space when it comes to the written word, in turn, he occupies the most pictorial space too.

It says much about the quality of the publication that it is so overly reliant on speeches, simply lifted off a publicly accessible website – a sign of weak journalism and an editorial staff unable to generate original ideas of its own. But even if one were willing to overlook the speeches, there are a number of other qualitative problems with the edition as well.

Consider some of the contributors: both Sipho Seepe and Paul Ngobeni are intimately linked to Jacob Zuma – part of his inner circle of advisors.

Seepe (who also serves as an HSF trustee) has vehemently defended Zuma in the press and derided the ‘campaign’ against him as devoid of substance (see this defence of Zuma by Seepe for example). His current position represents a marked shift away from the liberal values he flirted with a few years ago. He told the M&G his advice to the ANC President was for the benefit of the ANC and he has been cited as a key part of Zuma’s political brains trust. And so it is with his Focus article, Seepe tells us there is “no need for alarm”, with regard to a Zuma presidency – a good opportunity to champion his man, and berate Mbeki.

Ngobeni too, has repeatedly put up a strong public defence of Zuma and is a close ally of the President. Significantly, he has a number of substantive legal questions hanging over his own head, which he has yet to properly answer; indeed, Ngobeni is a wanted man in the United States (this point is important, because Focus presents his debate with David Unterhalter as if both men occupy the same moral ground, only that their views differ). The M&G has reported that he joined the Zuma campaign in April 2008, when he wrote a litigation ‘cookbook’ in defence of the ANC president. Much like Seepe, he uses the space in Focus to defend Zuma and criticise the case against him.

One shouldn’t be too quick to dismiss the prominent coverage given to COPE either. Remember this is a party borne of a defence of Thabo Mbeki; it may still have to earn its credentials but its leadership served for decades in a nationalist movement and African nationalism, not liberalism, runs through its veins.

The speeches aren’t the only thing lifted into the magazine. At the end of the article by Yvonne Muthien – a former advisor to President Mbeki, on the Advisory Council on National Orders (she was subsequently awarded The Order of the Grand Counsellor of the Baobab in Silver) – the magazine states: “This article first appeared in The Thinker magazine. Volume 3/2009. Many thanks to Dr Essop Pahad for allowing us to reprint it.”

Essop Pahad, together with the ever-present shadow that follows him round – one Ronald Suresh Roberts – have spent much time over the past decade trying to promote Thabo Mbeki’s agenda in the mainstream media. When the media has not delivered the desired result, he and Roberts have turned to other avenues. There was the failed magazine ‘Molotov Cocktail’, a government sponsored biography of Mbeki by Roberts and, more recently, ‘The Thinker’. How pleased they must be that Focus is picking up its copy. Mission accomplished.

The legal ‘analyst’ Professor Pierre de Vos is no fan of liberalism, or liberal politics. He sees it as a cold and detached philosophy, which protects minority interests at the expense of the majority. He detests Tony Leon and has used his blog to attack Helen Zille on numerous occasions; often badly overextending himself in the process.

The obsession with all things presidential extends even to the book review section, with Raymond Parsons’s ‘Zumanomics’ getting a substantial write-up. Nothing wrong with that in and of itself, but in a publication with five full presidential speeches in it, you have to ask the question, why this book?

And what of Taljaard herself?

Her main article is an analysis of the new ministries in the Presidency; in particular, the National Planning Commission. The DA has criticised this development as further evidence of the ANC’s obsessive drive to centralise power in the executive. Taljaard’s take on things differs, certainly she is not critical of the development but rather offers what is best described as a promotional splash piece for the whole idea, centred around a series of proposals to make the Presidency work better and for the Minister in the Presidency, Trevor Manuel, to consider.

Quite where the liberal principle of small state features in her analysis is hard to tell.

But perhaps the most revealing thing about the publication is not what’s there, but what’s not: where is the analysis of the ANC’s developmental state and how it stands in stark contrast to a liberal democratic government; what about the SABC and its meltdown; our public entities are collapsing – what’s the liberal take on that; a burgeoning central administration suggests the state, and not the market, is creating the most jobs in South Africa, what is liberalism’s response to that issue; the DA just won the Western Cape (the one province outside of the ANC’s hegemonic grip), why not generate some liberal policy proposals for the province; and so on and so forth.

There are hundreds of debates, central to promoting and understanding liberal values, ideals and principles in South Africa. Why is Taljaard discussing how to make the National Planning Commission work? Why is she using Foundation money to print government speeches instead?

How is it that Focus Magazine has come to this?

The ruling party’s warm embrace

The answer, perhaps, lies in Taljaard’s deferential attitude to the ANC; and with her understanding of liberalism and the HSF’s mandate.

For example, Taljaard has always had a soft spot for Trevor Manuel – her opposite number when she served as a DA Member of Parliament and spokesperson on Finance – to the extent that her profile on the HSF website revolves in large part around a glowing tribute to her by Manuel – “I think that her role in the committee and in this House has defined what I would consider responsible opposition,” he writes.

I wonder if Manuel and Suzman would agree on what exactly constitutes a ‘responsible opposition’? Or the ANC and the DA, for that matter?

At any rate, hardly the kind of liberal endorsement one might expect of an HSF Director.

This penchant for all things executive has had some practical consequences for the HSF.

Subsequent to her appointment, in May 2006, and just after Taljaard had acted to remove Patrick Laurence as the editor of the Focus (February 2007, to be replaced by Taljaard herself), I wrote an article titled ‘Where have all the liberals gone’. In it I argued that, after a few months in charge, a survey of the various round-table debates the HSF had convened suggested that Taljaard was “going out of her way to accommodate the most virulent critics of liberalism and liberal discourse”.

As evidence in support of my argument, I pointed to the way in which the Foundation was increasingly making space for people hostile to liberalism (like Kader Asmal – a person with a well documented history of attacks on liberalism and liberal democratic practice) and, indeed, the noticeable absence of any liberal intellectuals from a number of its discussion panels.

I have reproduced that article below, for ease of reference. I would recommend reading it in full.

At the time, the Mail & Guardian – always on the lookout for a bit of sensation – suggested the article was evidence of a ‘war’ between the DA and Taljaard; and reported Taljaard as saying in response:

“…that liberalism tends to be defined in a narrowly economic way in South Africa, that there was a “myopia” within the DA on the matter, and that people tended to appropriate the term to serve their own agendas. The foundation, by contrast, was trying to promote a broad discussion of the liberal values entrenched in the Bill of Rights and the Constitution, such as tolerance and respect for different views.” [That is not a direct quote, the newspaper paraphrased her position.]

Compare that response to the HSF objective I outlined at the beginning of this piece: “advocating measures designed to promote the ideals of liberal constitutional democracy in South Africa”. The difference is subtle, but profound. Taljaard sees the HSF’s purpose as providing a platform for the exchange of ideals, as opposed to promoting the liberal cause. It is true that those two ideas are related but they are by no means the same thing.

If one is dedicated to promoting liberalism, one has to have a clear idea of what defines liberalism. In other words, one’s internal analysis must be coherent and consistent and one must be able to apply that analysis to the world at large. And, obviously, one must then set about applying it. It is perfectly possible, at the same time, to facilitate debate. But facilitating debate, in and of itself, is not promoting liberalism. In fact, it is only of use if that debate is placed in the proper context, in this case, within a liberal analysis. Simply reprinting speeches, five of them, won’t achieve that.

Nor does a greater quantity of debate translate into a greater commitment to or a more effective means of promoting liberalism. The conflation of those two ideas is misleading. Taken to its extreme, one could argue that by providing a platform for the Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging one is facilitating debate and, therefore, promoting liberalism. And the more opportunities one gives them, the greater the service one is doing the liberal cause. Well, hardly.

In that sense, and if Focus is anything to go by, Taljaard’s response was as revealing as it was a concession. It masked a misguided purpose: the creation of a public platform for the biggest enemies of the liberal cause, primarily the ANC, to strengthen their hegemonic grip on civil society and occupy a space that might otherwise have belonged to liberal thought.

There is one final point worth making. A review of the original copy in the latest edition of Focus (i.e. those articles which are not simply lifted from the internet) suggests that the HSR is mismanaging its resources. In 2007, explaining the decision to remove Laurence as editor, HSF trustee Richard Steyn said the decision was made for financial reasons, as the foundation had to downsize.

But compare the look and feel of an edition of a Focus produced by Laurence (see here) with the latest edition (see here). The former runs to just 32 pages; is produced in black and white, on modest paper; contains just 12 photographs; comprises nine articles, each one by a different author (including liberal thinkers like Patrick Laurence, Peter Leon, Lawrence Schlemmer and Raymond Louw) and it covers issues like the state of education, service delivery at local government level, the relationship between the state and the fourth estate and judicial independence.

The latter runs to 112 pages, is produced on high gloss paper, in colour; contains an extraordinary number of colour photographs (63 in total, including four full page photos and 37 half page photos); contains 28 articles, eight produced by Taljaard herself, 10 which are simply reproduced verbatim and eight of which are straight from the ANC government.

Put another way, if Laurence was removed to save costs, the lavish (but rather vacuous) current version of Focus suggests that any money saved was ploughed into securing the rights for glossy photos, rather than commissioning quality analysis by liberal thinkers.

Conclusion

The Foundation recently announced that Taljaard would be stepping down as Director in mid July, to be replaced by Francis Antonie. The statement announcing her resignation does not set out her reasons for doing so, or her future plans.

One is led, almost inevitably, to ask the question, where exactly is Raenette Taljaard headed, now that’s she is finished with the HSF? If the latest edition of Focus – the last under her editorship – is any indication of where the ideological path she is currently lost on seems to be headed, one could make a strong argument that she will resurface in the Presidency, or thereabouts.

One way or the other, you can be sure about one thing: there is every indication that, as it stands, Focus Magazine in particular and the HSF’s programme of action more broadly, do not reflect Helen Suzman’s vision for that institution. It was never supposed to be a platform for government policy.

There is a very real possibility that, as a consequence of trying to be all things to all people, it has become increasingly difficult to identify exactly what the HSF is. Indeed, as its ideological underpinnings have become infused with African nationalism and the ruling party’s particular paradigm, it could well be argued that the HSF has surrendered rather than promoted its readily identifiable character, as a bastion of liberal principles.

If the last edition of Focus is anything to go by, Francis Antonie has his work cut out.

WHERE HAVE ALL THE LIBERALS GONE?

By Gareth van Onselen

(This article originally appeared on the DA weblog InsidePolitics, on 28 February 2007.)

According to a recent press alert, the Helen Suzman Foundation (HSF) is soon to be hosting its first Quarterly Roundtable for 2007.

Essentially the HSF’s aim is to promote and support liberal democratic policies and ideals “in the South African political situation”. The opening line of its mission statement describes the HSF as “inspired by the courageous opposition to apartheid of its patron-in-chief and guided by liberal democratic principles”.

The press alert says, “The Quarterly Roundtable Series was launched in 2006 to create alternative arenas for dialogue on matters that affect constitutional liberal democracy and human rights”.

The topic this quarter will be “Chapter 9s – Review, Reform or Reduction?” and one of the panel of four will be none other than Kader Asmal, the former education minister and the current chair of the ad hoc committee set up by parliament to review South Africa’s Chapter 9 institutions.

(The other panellists are: Judith February from the Institute for Democratic Alternatives for South Africa; Mcebisi Ndletyana from the Human Sciences Research Council and Jody Kollapen, from the South African Human Rights Commission.)

In her inaugural speech as the new director of the HSF, on 29 May last year, Raenette Taljaard spelt out her vision for the organisation. In it, she said the following:

“It can never be in the interests of the liberal discourse to engage in a localised version of a binary Bush-like doctrine of being ‘with us’ or ‘against us’ in aiming to further this dialogue of values. Indeed one can argue that it would be the exact antithesis of liberal tolerance to do so.

“The challenge for the liberal cause is to capture the imagination of current and future leaders with solid contributions to contemporary policy challenges in South Africa’s national discourse and not merely to identify ‘enemies’ or ‘inherently illiberal’ opponents. This is an unhelpful and self-defeating labelling process that does little to further a dialogue of values and societal discourse about where we are in consolidating liberal democracy in South Africa.”

Basically she was saying that liberalism has a name-recognition problem in South Africa, that the HSF needs to be at the forefront of debate and that, in order to do that, it needs to engage all sectors of the political spectrum. Fair enough.

But if the Quarterly Roundtable panel is anything to go by, Taljaard is certainly going out of her way to accommodate the most virulent critics of liberalism and liberal discourse.

And, oddly, there don’t seem to be any liberals on the panel?

Take Kader Asmal, for example. He has a long and well documented history of attacking liberalism, something he has described as “South Africa’s last credible instrument of privilege”.

A good example is to be found in a book published by the Friedrich-Naumann Stiftung (the president of its board of directors – Dr Otto Graf Lambsdorff – is one of the patrons of the HSF) called “Watchdogs or Hypocrites? The amazing debate on South African liberals and liberalism”. It contains an article by Kader Asmal and Ronald Suresh Roberts, titled “Liberalism’s hollow core”.

The article was originally published in the Sunday Times in October 1995, in response to a piece by then-editor Ken Owen. Among other things, Asmal and Roberts said the following:

“In the 1980s leading liberals (including Owen) muffled our calls for sanctions. Like parents protecting children from fire, they cautioned that we would only hurt ourselves”.

And,

“…liberalism, worn down over the years, has sadly become South Africa’s last credible instrument of privilege.”

And so far as Helen Suzman goes,

“At the core of liberalism is echoing space. Within the anti-apartheid alliance, liberalism’s only unique content was in demonising its opponents and romanticising itself.”

And the liberal press?

“Liberal journalism also blurred into apartheid propaganda in the liberal press’s anti-communist hysteria and in the craven self censorship and accommodation of the NP that enabled so many senior media personalities to prosper…”

All-in-all the article was a damning assault on liberalism, in all its forms. It concluded with the assertion that, “If liberalism once had something to offer, it was steadily eroded under the blandishments of racial privilege.”

Asmal’s attitude wasn’t just a pre-1994 reaction to liberalism under apartheid. His animosity towards liberalism and liberals continued unabated.

In May 1999, again in the Sunday Times, Asmal penned an article “Is liberalism dead or alive?” – an attack on the Democratic Party in general, and its leader Tony Leon in particular.

In it, he stated:

“…liberalism [once] had a better self, a self theoretically committed to social justice and equity, the self it has abandoned”.

It also included another attack on liberals under apartheid:

“..it is no surprise that, beginning under apartheid and blossoming so spectacularly today, apartheid also bred the loudest liberals who ever weren’t.”

(Asmal’s earlier writing partner – Ronald Suresh Roberts – has also been scathing about liberalism over the last decade. And the ANC, the party to which Asmal belongs, even more so.)

And so it goes. Over time Asmal has focused his underlying animosity for liberals in general onto Tony Leon and the Democratic Alliance. One way or the other he is outspoken about what he sees as liberalism’s fundamental failings – both under apartheid and in South Africa’s new democracy.

It is admirable indeed that Taljaard and the Helen Suzman Foundation are willing to play host to such an outspoken critic of liberalism and, indeed, of the official opposition. Of course, one would have thought, in the interests of fair and balanced debate, that it might be an idea to have someone from the Democratic Alliance on the panel as a counterweight? Dene Smuts for example, who sits on Asmal’s review committee (she was also part of the constitutional negotiations).

Or not even from the Democratic Alliance – any liberal would do.

After all, the organisation is supposed to be guided by liberal democratic principles.

Certainly Judith February’s sympathies lie with the ANC and Jody Kollapen is firmly in the African nationalist camp. Mcebisi Ndletyana too, concerns himself largely with black consciousness and history.

Inarguably, none of them are liberals, nor would they publicly claim to be.

The last HSF Roundtable – which took place in December 2006 – had the following members on its panel: Richard Calland (IDASA) – an outspoken critic of the Democratic Alliance; Aubrey Matshiqi – a former ANC government spokesperson and now ‘independent analyst’; Xolela Mangcu – Director of the Steve Biko Foundation; Professor Sipho Seepe; and Steven Friedman – another critic of the official opposition.

Of those, Sipho Seepe might describe himself as a liberal – but he would qualify that, and call himself an ‘African liberal’ – but none of the others would describe themselves as liberals in the traditional sense of the word – the sense described by the HSF in its mission statement.

The last edition of Focus – the official journal of the HSF – contained articles by Jody Kollpen, Patrick Craven – spokesperson for the Congress of South African Trade Unions – and Jeremy Cronin, the Deputy Secretary-General of the South African Communist Party.

The editorial in that edition – by Raenette Taljaard – was titled “Debating ANC policy preferences”.

No doubt, the omission of any readily identifiable liberal from the last Roundtable was just an oversight.

One would hate to think that the HSF, like just about every other NGO in the country, is slowly but steadily buying into the ANC’s ideological paradigm.

POSTSCRIPT

InsidePolitics understands that long time servant, staunch liberal and editor of Focus – the Helen Suzman Foundation journal – Patrick Laurence has been removed from his position by the HSF’s new director Raenette Taljaard, who has taken over as editor. The particular circumstances of his departure are not yet known.

The recent letter by Trevor Manuel to the Business Day, defending Peter de Villiers, is defined by two things: first, it is constructed around a logical fallacy and, second, it is entirely hypocritical – while Manuel might now advocate winning, he never used to. The letter’s particular nature is reminiscent of the kind of attacks Thabo Mbeki used to launch against his opponents and worth interrogating.

THE REAL ANC TODAY
Volume 2; Issue 7.

THE GHOST BETWEEN THE LINES

By: Gareth van Onselen

Building a straw man

In his book on critical reasoning, ‘Thinking from A-Z’, Nigel Warburton describes the straw man fallacy as follows: “A caricature of your opponents view set up simply so that you can knock it down.”

He continues, “Sometimes it is a deliberate ploy; in which case it is a disreputable form of rhetoric. More often it involves a degree of wishful thinking stemming from widespread reluctance to attribute great intelligence or subtlety to someone with whom you strongly disagree. Over-confidence in your own views may lead you to treat dissenting views as easy targets when in fact they may be more complex and resistant to simple attacks.”

The straw man fallacy is a favourite form of sophistry routinely employed by the ANC. Perhaps its biggest proponent was Thabo Mbeki, who revelled in falsely ascribing a series of pejorative generalisations to his enemies (racism often being the subtle or explicit accusation) and then setting about damning them by reference to those generalisations, rather than the actual argument they had put forward.

It is, of course, an entirely disingenuous way of arguing, borne either of an awareness that one’s counter-argument is weak or an inability to separate personal prejudice from one’s line of reasoning; or both.

Trevor Manuel is no stranger to the straw man, or the kind of intellectual dishonesty that underlies it, and his recent letter to the Business Day is a case in point.

Responding to a comment by Business Day editor Peter Bruce, about the shortcomings of Springbok coach Peter de Villiers, he wrote:

“What matters in sport is the result. Surely what matters in respect of the Springbok coach in this instance is that, unlike so many of his predecessors, he [Peter de Villiers] scored a series victory against the British and Irish Lions? Perhaps more importantly, I would invite the editor, who’s not the sports writer, to compare De Villiers’s results with that of his predecessors and only then arrive at a studied conclusion about his fitness for the job.”

In and of itself, that contention seems entirely rational. Of course any conclusion about de Villiers’ ability can only be arrived at after a full interrogation of his record, who would argue with that?

But Bruce’s comment was a bit more sophisticated than Manuel implies.

Bruce had ended off his Thick End of the Wedge column with the following aside:

“What’s there to say about the rugby on Saturday? Peter de Villiers got to pick a team of his own for pretty much the first time since he became coach and we lost to a second-string side. Prepare for more of the same. All other things aside, he just isn’t up to the job.”

Bruce specifically states that his assumption – that de Villiers is not up to the job – is based on the contention that this was the first time he alone had decided the team selection, thus the Springbok’s most recent result is significant and telling. Put another way: one can only really judge de Villiers’ ability as a coach by the last test match, as it was in that match that his influence was most acute – the other games do not allow for a proper assessment.

Now, one may or may not agree with that contention but, if you don’t agree, the logical point to debate is the idea that this was the first time he got to pick his own team. To suggest Bruce is some sort of recalcitrant for overlooking the fact that de Villiers won a series victory against the Lions deliberately misses the point; indeed, it is a straw man.

Bruce deliberately distinguished de Villiers’ most recent test from the rest of his record; but Manuel bases his response on conflating de Villiers’ most recent test with his entire record. In doing so, he treats Bruce’s point as an “easy target” when in fact it is “more complex and resistant to simple attacks”.

Having set up the straw man, Manuel then proceeds to knock it down, with the requisite moral indignation with which he saturates all his rhetoric. Later on in his letter, and rather ironically, Manuel implores “sane people” to “battle against such intellectual laziness” – a reference to those who would arrive at conclusions without examining the facts; but, given that Manuel’s entire argument is designed to set up a straw man, a closer examination of facts would, in fact, be a good place for the Minister in the Presidency to start, not the Business Day’s editor.

(Looking past that straw man for a minute, there is a second, even more obvious red herring. Manuel introduces the criticisms leveled against de Villiers for his myriad outrageous remarks and, again, says one should look at his results before judging him. He implies Bruce, along with many others, have failed to do as much. But Bruce did no such thing; never mentioned de Villiers’ various comments.)

Double standards

That said, there is another, more fundamental bit of hypocrisy underlying Manuel’s letter that is worth interrogating; and it is best illustrated by examining his statement that: “What matters in sport is the result”.

That sentiment is a noble one indeed. Any professional sportsperson will tell you the purpose that underlies their every endeavor is the pursuit of excellence and a drive to be the best, by beating the best. But that is not a position Trevor Manuel is too familiar with, nor one he has espoused in the past.

If anything, Manuel has been fairly adamant that transformation and the imposition of racial quotas should be the overriding consideration when it comes to professional sport. For Manuel, winning has always been secondary to achieving demographic representivity, and there is plenty of evidence to this effect.

Perhaps the best example is an exchange of letters between the Democratic Alliance’s shadow minister for sport, Donald Lee, and Manuel, in 2005.

Manuel initiated the exchange by responding to a speech by Lee during the State of the Nation debate. Lee had argued that the ANC’s obsession with imposing racial quotas on our national teams was not only to the detriment of South African sport and sportspeople but stood in stark contrast to the values promoted by the ANC in opposition to apartheid.

In support of his argument Lee cited a speech by ANC stalwart Abdul Minty who, in 1971, had stood before the United Nations and called for South African sport to be boycotted by arguing that “Human beings should not be willing partners in perpetuating a system of racial discrimination. Sportsmen have a special duty in this regard in that they should be first to insist that merit, and merit alone, be the criterion for selecting teams for representative sport”.

As is his wont, Manuel’s response was fairly personal and scathing. He accused Lee of “distorting history” and argued that we have a duty to “effect some corrections to ‘level the playing field’” and that “determined action” was necessary “to attain the Constitutional imperative of representivity”.

Space does not allow for all the details of the full exchange to be set out here (you can read Lee’s response to Manuel here, Manuel’s response here and the final response from Lee here) but it can be fairly summerised as follows: Donald Lee argued that quotas are damaging, perpetuate an apartheid ideology (that your race determines your prospects) and that professional sportspeople want to win, not be demographically representative; Manuel argued that demographic representivity and the imposition of racial quotas is the overriding concern that should define South Africa’s approach to professional sport.

Nor was Manuel’s position in any way exceptional, it reflects the general attitude of the ANC and the particular view of Thabo Mbeki who, in 2002, told journalists at the South African Sports Awards, “For two to three years let’s not mind losing international competitions because we are bringing our people into these teams.”

Understandably then, and against that background, Manuel’s more recent remark – that “what matters in sport is the result” – jars somewhat. Since when was Trevor Manuel concerned with winning? Remember this is the same person who declared in 1996 that he supported the All Blacks and would continue to do so until there was “real development” in rugby.

The ghost between the lines

There are two options:

First, Manuel suffers from the same sort of delusion that defines the ANC’s approach towards racial quotas – that a single-minded focus on transformation can co-exist with the pursuit of excellence. In other words, Manuel feels obliged to defend Peter de Villiers, who was selected for reasons other than his ability to coach rugby (“…the appointment did not take into account only rugby reasons… we took into account the issue of transformation in rugby very, very seriously when we took the decision”, to quote Oregan Hoskins), as an example of excellence because to concede that he is not, would be to admit that those other “reasons” meant the wrong guy got the job.

Of course, anyone who suggests otherwise is a racist, or harbours some sort of discriminatory impulse.

Or, second, his letter was the kind of opportunistic moral posturing Manuel seems unable to resist, and its inherent contradictions regarded as the kind of petty annoyance that is easily overlooked in favour of a cheap shot. Consider, for example, the snide remarks he addresses to Bruce for daring to comment on sport – the same question could well be asked of Manuel. Who is he to comment on sport? And why does he sign his letter ‘Minister in Presidency: National Planning’? Does that title somehow qualify him as an expert on rugby? The evidence suggests there is a rather inflated ego at work here.

So intrinsically linked is sport to ideas of identity and nation building that no nationalist can resist its allure: a compulsion to bask in its success compels the fervent nationalist to attend important events and embrace the pomp and ceremony; and yet without any seeming contradiction, an ideological desire to impose uniformity, to dilute excellence and denigrate one’s detractors will mean the nationalist cannot resist proffering their opinion on the subject, regardless of their standing or its merits.

In this case, no doubt, both those options played their part – that unique combination of intellectual dishonesty and intellectual thuggary Manuel specializes in, with the subtle implication of racism ever-present, just below the surface.

In his seminal book ‘Straight and Crooked Thinking’, Robert H. Thouless has the following to say about the kind of argument Manuel puts forward: “It is a useful argument for the dishonest debater because it is adaptable to a large number of situations. It can be used as an argument against action for the abolition of any evil, for there is no evil so bad that a worse one cannot be found to compare it with.”

In racism the ANC has found the ultimate evil. South Africa’s history ensures nothing compares to it. In that sense it has the ability to also serve as the ultimate straw man. And, when it is misused in the manner outlined above, it only ever warps public debate and undermines a full and proper exchange of ideas, on their merits. Thabo Mbeki was a past master at it. His ghost lurks between the lines of Manuel’s letter.

How did the Sunday Times decide to cut this story? R1 million of taxpayers’ money siphoned off to the ANC? It certainly seems newsworthy. Their decision not to publish is all the more bizarre when you consider they were given the story as an exclusive. Could it be the Sunday Times has lost is ability to tell the real news from the superficial and mundane?

Related Stories:

• How the Sunday Times Manufactures the News
• A Numbing of the Public Mind
• Strengthening South Africa’s Public Debate
• Understanding Poor Journalism

THE REAL ANC TODAY
Volume 2; Issue 6.

HOW THE SUNDAY TIMES HAS LOST THE ABILITY TO IDENTIFY THE NEWS

By Gareth van Onselen

Introduction

It is the principal function of any newspaper to report the news. Intrinsic to that requirement is the ability to identify which stories constitute news and then to report those stories in a manner that is both accurate and objective. Much of the debate surrounding news reporting in South Africa concerns the latter part of that ability – the nature of reportage – and perhaps not enough attention is given to the former – the content of those stories. How often do newspapers fail to report issues that are newsworthy?

The answer, of course, is all the time. There is no real limit to the number of news stories that exist at any given time. Indeed, almost every current affairs issue is news, in the strict sense of the word. There is, however, a filter that newspapers rely on to distil those myriad stories down to a set of key issues that are of interest to their readership and reflect the most important matters of the day.

That process requires some skill and, on the margins, it is possible to argue most stories one way or the other. But at the extremes there is little argument; and the best way to distinguish those stories from more debatable issues is retrospectively. This is perhaps a cruel test for a journalist, because they rarely have the luxury of being able to survey the response of other media to an issue before making a decision. But it is an indisputably good test none the less, and one I wish to apply to the Sunday Times.

The news

Last week Tuesday the Democratic Alliance gave an exclusive story to the Sunday Times. We did so for two reasons: first, because the Sunday Times, being a newspaper with a substantial readership and, thus, considerable impact in the country, is a powerful platform from which to break a story we felt to be of some significance; and, second, because the Sunday Times is a weekly newspaper, by giving the story to them early in the week they would have some time to research it, to supplement it and to investigate it in a manner the DA could not. At the eleventh hour the newspaper declined to publish; at which point the DA put the story out nationally and to all media, the vast majority of which gave the story great prominence and extensive coverage the following day.

The story in question was the following: On 19 January 2009 senior officials of the Msunduzi Municipality (Pietermaritzburg) retrospectively authorised payment of just over R1 million for an event called ‘The Nkosi Mlaba Cultural Day’. The actual event supposedly took place on 18 January. However, as far as the DA could ascertain, there was no evidence it ever took place at all. Instead, the only event to take place on 18 January was an ANC election rally at the Qokololo Stadium, attended by some 50 000 supporters. In other words, it appeared that the ANC had misappropriated R1 million worth of public money for a party political purpose.

In support of its case, the DA gave the Sunday Times a series of documents. They included:

• A payment approval form, signed by various senior members of the municipality’s administration;
• Two approved quotes; and
• A copy of the booking sheet for the oval where the event was supposed to take place (it showed that, on 18 January, the oval was booked for a cricket match).

The DA also gave the Sunday Times a statement from our national spokesperson on the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, Mark Steele MP, who had been leaked the story in the first place. In summary then, the Sunday Times had the requisite hard evidence, a statement from the official opposition and a series of powerful leads which suggested something serious had gone wrong.

We gave the story to the Sunday Times on the condition that, when it was written up, the DA would be given due credit for breaking the story and that the paper would, of course, run the story in the coming Sunday edition. Significantly, we made it clear that the paper was under no obligation to run the story – that decision was at its own discretion – but if it did want to run the story, that it should give us that assurance and, in turn, we would not give the story to other media.

After talking to Mark Steele and looking at the available evidence, the Sunday Times agreed to all these provisions, convinced that it was indeed an important story and well worth being covered by the newspaper.

How the Sunday Times shot itself in the foot

It is difficult to ascertain exactly how the Sunday Times decides which stories should make its final edition and which stories should not but, if the recently commissioned report into how its various malfunctioning reporting lines work is anything to go by, it is something like this: A potential story is flagged with a conference of the great and the wise on Tuesday morning; that story is either approved in principle or vetoed; if it is approved, it is then written up and, once again, put before that conference later in the week, where a final decision is made.

The members of that conference might also suggest a rewrite, or emphasize a certain news angle over another; they might also intervene at a late stage to determine the final make-up of the Sunday paper.

That conference is also obviously deeply problematic. I have set out before the way in which it manufactures news. The Sunday Times’ internal report (referred to above and the full version of which has yet to be made public) routinely cites it as the cause of many problems, including the “top heavy” influence of a “proliferation of senior managers” and the sidelining of weekly diary meetings in its favour, all of which manifests in “rewriting by senior editors”, who would effectively manipulate average stories into front page “splashes”.

Read between the lines and you have a conference loaded with people who do not possess the requisite skills to make good news judgements, determining the content of the paper. No doubt this is what happened in this case. And, once again, they made the wrong call.

The Sunday Times spent the whole week working on the DA’s story. After an initial buy-in from the conference, the paper’s hard news journalists (who are clearly not to blame) did sterling work investigating the story, phoning the various parties and regularly consulting with the DA to check the facts, to get to the bottom of the matter. At 11am on Saturday, as a courtesy, a final version of the story was read to Mark Steele. Judging by that story, it was clear there was indeed an issue worthy of the public’s attention – the evidence held up and there was certainly something amiss in the Msunduzi Municipality.

On top of what the DA had provided, the newspaper had uncovered that the person after whom the ghost event was supposedly named – Nkosi Mlaba (a chief from KwaXimba, near Cato Ridge) – was entirely unaware of any event to be held in his honour. It had managed to confirm that no event took place at the venue identified in the documents, and that a cricket match had indeed taken place instead. It had also managed to obtain from the Msunduzi Mayor, Zanele Hlatshwayo, an admission that there was “something suspicious” about the matter and an undertaking to investigate. Significantly, it had also had a denial from the municipal manager about the event or payment for it, despite his signature appearing on the payment approval form.

Here was a news story.

At 9.30 pm on Saturday, however, the DA received an SMS to say that the story would not be carried on Sunday because “the Sunday Times was too tight”. Instead, it would be carried in the daily Times, on Monday.

Someone at the Sunday Times had decided at the last minute, for whatever reason, the story in question was not newsworthy enough for the newspaper.

That decision, as we shall see, was a spectacularly bad piece of judgement.

The DA’s response

Having reneged on its agreement (a cause for some concern in and of itself) the newspaper now wanted the best of both worlds. Not only did it deem the story not worthy of its flagship publication, it wanted the right to run it exclusively in the Times (a publication with a substantially smaller readership and far less influence). That sort of arrogance has unfortunately come to define the paper’s attitude over the past few years.

The DA, of course, was having none of it and proceeded to release the story – in the form of a Sunday press statement – along with the accompanying documentation, to the entire national media core. The Sunday Times had failed to properly identify a big news story and, in the DA’s opinion, no longer had a right to break that story.

The media’s response

The media’s response to the DA’s statement was overwhelming. Various internet news sites picked up on it immediately. Virtually every national and regional radio station ran the story on Sunday and Monday morning. SABC news covered it on television and various national and regional newspapers (including the Natal Witness, which ran it as a front page banner headline) carried the story prominently on their current affairs news pages.

Here is a brief – and by no means conclusive – summary of that coverage:

Radio News (all these bulletins are from 6 July, there were also numerous stories on 5 July):

• Algoa FM (5:31 am), (6:01 am) and (6:29 am)
• Gigasi FM (11:02 am)
• 5FM (6:00 am), (7:01 am)
• Radio 2000 (6:00 am)
• Lotus FM (6:00 am) and (8:01 am)
• RSG (5:03 am), (6:04 am) (6:21 am) and (6:10 am)
• Motsweding FM (6:00 am) and (7:02 am)
• Phalaphala FM (6:01 am); (7:01 am) and (8:03 am)
• Thobela FM (7:02 am) and (8:03 am)
• Kaya FM (12:02 pm)
• Ligwalagwala FM (5:59 am)
• Lesedi FM (7:02 am)
• Umhlobo Wenene (7:01 am)
• Ukhozi FM (6:02 am)
• SAfm (5:30 am), (6:01 am), (6:30 am), (7:01 am) and (7:33 am)
• Metro FM (6:01 am) and (7:01 am)
• Fine Music Radio (8:00 am)
• OFM (6:02 am)

Television News:

• SABC 2 Morning Live News (6:06 am) and (7:03 am)

Newspapers:

• The Mercury (6 July 2009): ‘Taxes funded KZN rally’ – Pg 2.
• The Witness (6 July 2009) ‘R1mln council fund ‘hijack’ – Pg 1.
• Cape Times (6 July 2009) ‘DA calls for probe into ‘council cash used for rally’ – Pg 5.
• Citizen (6 July 2009) ‘ANC ‘used R1 million on rally’’ – Pg 4.
• The Star (6 July 2009) ‘Funding of ANC rally queried’ – Pg 6.
• The Daily News (6 July 2009) ‘DA cries foul over R1 million ‘cultural event’’ – Pg 2.
• Ilanga (6 July 2009) ‘Uvelephi u-R1m we-ANC?’ – Pg 1.
• The Times (6 July 2009) ‘Rates spent on ANC’ – Pg 3.
• The Sowetan (7 July 2009) ‘Ratepayers’ money spent on rally’ – Pg 3.

There can be little doubt then, using the retrospective test I identified in my introduction, that the DA’s story was unquestionably newsworthy. And not on the margins either, it was big news, that generated significant coverage across the board. Even those hard news journalists who wrote the story up for the Sunday Times knew it was newsworthy, because they called the DA on Sunday to express their dismay at the party having put the story out nationally (indeed, The Times story, the story that would have run in the Sunday Times, is testament to this).

Given that fact – and the extent of the coverage the story generated in the media – the question is: why did the Sunday Times choose not to run the story?

An inability to identify the news

The short answer is, who knows?

But you can be sure it has everything to do with a dysfunctional newsroom and a series of senior editors who cannot properly identify a news story; and whose intervention cost the Sunday Times a big story that would have made a significant impact.

Certainly it had nothing to do with the other stories run by the paper this past Sunday. Its front page lead – an innocuous story about how South Africa’s ’super’ rich are getting poorer – was distinctly underwhelming. It had nothing exceptional to report on its politics pages; indeed, the biggest item on the page was a photo of Jacob Zuma (see here).

There is no plausible reason why it chose not to run the story about the Msunduzi Municipality. It had everything going for it: breaking news, a substantial amount of evidence and, at its heart, a scandal where the South African public – its own readers – had apparently been fleeced of R1 million worth of their hard earned money. More to the point, it had the story as an exclusive. No one else had any idea it even existed.

One is led inevitably to the conclusion that one of South Africa’s great publications – a newspaper which once boasted ‘its not news until it appears in the Sunday Times’ – has lost the very ability to properly identify the news in the first place. This, along with a number of other problems, has seen it slide steadily downhill over the past few years and it is now teetering on the brink.

That shortcoming hurts no one but the Sunday Times itself – all the more so in the current economic climate when advertisers and readers alike are scrutinising the value they get for the money they spend.

The competitive nature of professional journalism means South Africa’s mainstream media will never let a good news story slip past unnoticed. Unless the paper begins to put the news at the top of its agenda, as opposed to the many other factors which seem to influence its decision making, its transition from considered read to vacuous tabloid fanfare is as good as complete.

A look at the way in which the Sunday Times recasts old news in a fashion that suggests it is both new and exclusive to the paper, using the paper’s front page story from 14 June 2009 by way of illustration.

Related Stories:

• Analysing the Analysts
• A Numbing of the Public Mind
• Strengthening South Africa’s Public Debate
• Understanding Poor Journalism

THE REAL ANC TODAY
Volume 2; Issue 5.

HOW THE SUNDAY TIMES MANUFACTURES THE NEWS

By Gareth van Onselen

This past weekend (14 June 2009) the Sunday Times ran a front page story about the manipulation of government tenders for personal gain by some 2 000 members of the public service. It was written by Wisani Wa Ka Ngobeni and based on a relatively old report from the office of the auditor-general.

The opening two paragraphs of the story read:

“South Africa’s civil servants have scored more than half-a-billion rand in government tenders, which were irregularly awarded to their spouses and relatives.

“An investigation by auditor-general Terence Nombembe into government officials who moonlight as business executives, found that more than 2 000 were involved in tender-rigging and corruption worth more than R610-million.”

The newspaper gave it the rather sensational headline: “You dirty, rotten SCOUNDRELS!”

The content of the A-G’s report is unquestionably newsworthy – 2 000 public servants, half-a-billion Rand, that is no trifling matter – and yet, on reading it thoroughly, something about the story seems out place; one need only read a bit further on to identify exactly what it is. It is the following sentence:

“The report was presented to parliament in April this year but was never formally discussed because parliament was winding up its business ahead of the general election.”

In an accompanying editorial, the paper pontificated:

“It is against the background of the government’s commitment to fighting corruption with renewed vigour that the Sunday Times today publishes a disturbing report by the auditor-general which reveals how corruption is rampant in almost all national and provincial government departments.

“The auditor-general’s report has gone almost unnoticed, tabled as it was when the previous administration was winding up its business. It is the first clear indication of the extent of the looting of state resources and the abuse of power by government employees.”

How could it be that a report this explosive, despite being tabled (and thus available to the public) in April, had slipped past the entire parliamentary press gallery unnoticed? Not to mention the attention of the various political parties represented in the National Assembly?

More to the point, if the report was tabled in Parliament in April, why is the Sunday Times only reporting on it now?

There are two possible explanations: first, the entire media contingent (including the Sunday Times) did indeed ‘overlook’ the report in April and the newspaper, being diligent and thorough, worked this out and, recognising its importance, ran it as a front page story this past weekend; Or, second, the report wasn’t overlooked, was indeed reported on, and the Sunday Times – unable to produce anything new or interesting – simply rehashed the whole thing (couched in the appropriate sensationalism), giving the impression they had stumbled onto something fresh and dramatic.

One would hope the former rather than the latter explanation held true but, unfortunately, that’s not the case: the report certainly did not go ‘almost unnoticed’ and the Sunday Times quite clearly deliberately manufactured the impression that it was breaking news, no doubt because it had nothing better to report on.

It is yet another indictment of a newspaper that has fallen far from the lofty perch it once occupied.

On 6 May 2009 (over a month before the Sunday Times would publish its version), The Star newspaper ran a story titled: ‘Report exposes extent of dodgy state tenders’. The opening paragraph of which read as follows:

“Companies with links to government officials pocketed business worth nearly R600 million from the state in the past four years, the auditor-general has reported. The report says government employees at national and provincial departments were either directors or had relatives with direct interests, in firms that secured state contracts.”

(The article also appeared in The Business Report, the Independent Group’s generic business supplement, which is carried in a large number of its newspapers: The Mercury, Cape Times, Star, etc.)

In its entirety the Star’s story constitutes a solid overview of the A-G’s report and that newspaper, not the Sunday Times, was first to break the story.

(It is interesting to compare the nature of the two headlines: The Star’s – factual, accurate and devoid of sensation – and the Sunday Times – dramatic, sensational and, in and of itself, of little help in determining anything about the content of the story to which it refers.)

The two stories are remarkably similar, although the Sunday Times does go into more detail by fleshing out some particular examples. I am not suggesting the Sunday Times cribbed, only that there can be little doubt the story had been accurately reported on prior to the Sunday Times saying anything about it.

The Sowetan also reacted to the A-G’s report. In a story titled ‘‘Shady deals’ implicate top officials’, on 19 May 2009, it stated:

“Mpumalanga has been listed as the second most corrupt province – implicated in shady government tenders – after Limpopo. But the provincial government says the report, tabled in Parliament by Auditor-General Terence Nombembe, is “good” because it shows “that corruption is reported and that this will afford the province an opportunity to fight it”. According to the report, companies with links to the Mpumalanga government pocketed R115 million in business deals in the period between 2005 and 2007. This allegedly involved 573 government officials.”

The DA too, was also well aware of the A-G’s report, and its significance.

On 13 May, DA Chief Whip Ian Davidson put out a media statement to all media (including a substantial number of journalists at the Sunday Times) which focused in large part on the report, and which was titled ‘Sexwale resignation: action needs to be taken on conflict of interest’. Among other things, it stated:

“In a report tabled two weeks ago, the Auditor-General found that some government employees had made misrepresentations in tender documentation by not declaring their connections to companies making tender bids.

“A total of 49 state employees were found to be directors or members of companies that did business with national departments. Only 4% of these employees had permission to do this. For the period between August 2007 and July 2008, a total amount of R35 million was paid to these companies. Public servants did not have permission to be directors or members of these tendering companies.”

SAPA wrote that statement up (which meant it would have received some radio airplay, certainly it was reported on Good Hope FM and Umhlobo Wenene) and the DA’s comment about the report featured prominently in it. That story, in turn, was carried in The Star and the Business Day, on 14 May.

Provincial versions of the A-G’s report, specific to a particular region, were tabled in a number of legislatures, notably Mpumalanga, Limpopo and Gauteng. In most of these cases, the DA responded regionally to the report as well and, as with its national response, those media releases would have been sent to a full media list, including the Sunday Times. In most cases, those statements were also carried in the media.

Desiree van der Walt, for example, the DA’s leader in Limpopo, responded to the A-G’s report in a media statement on 21 May, which was subsequently carried as a news story in the Sowetan on 22 May. The story was titled ‘DA says Limpopo must fight corruption’ and stated:

“The DA in Limpopo has called on the new provincial government to fight corruption in the civil service with as much determination as it intends to deliver services. DA provincial leader Desiree van der Walt said this yesterday after the Auditor-General’s report painted a bleak financial picture of the province. The damning report indicated that close to 1000 public servants had conducted business with the provincial government amounting to R269million.”

And the DA’s spokesperson on corruption in Gauteng – and member of that provincial legislature – Jack Bloom also reacted to the A-G’s report in a media statement (on 27 May), this time on the findings with regard to Gauteng:

“According to a report by the Auditor-General recently tabled in the Gauteng Legislature, R26 million was paid to companies that were linked to 193 employees in Gauteng Provincial Departments. This was for the two-year period from 1 April 2005 to 31 March 2007. R12.4 million was paid to employees doing business with their own department, R1.3 million to companies linked to employee’s spouses, and R12.5 million to employee-related companies doing business with other departments.”

In its story the Sunday Times went into some detail setting out the various provincial findings of the A-G’s report; yet it made no reference to any of these reactions or comments. And those reactions weren’t limited to the DA either. The Star’s original story carried comment from Public Service Commissioner Stan Sangweni, the Sowetan from the Auditor-General himself and a Mpumalanga government spokesperson; other regional papers (The Limpopo Informant, for example) also carried government reactions.

All of these the Sunday Times chose to ignore. Why? Because if it included them in its story, it would have given the game away. Certainly it would have prevented the paper from running the report as a front page banner headline.

Instead it sought out new commentary, from people who had not yet been approached, reinforcing the perception that it was breaking news and the reaction to it.

This implication was not limited to the story itself, or the Sunday Times’ decision to feature it so prominently, but also to the way in which it presented the story on its website. As it so often does, when it runs a story based on a leaked document or report, the newspaper often invites readers to log onto the website and read the exclusive report for themselves. In this case the paper makes no claim that the documents are exclusive to it, but accompanying the story are the various A-G’s reports, reinforcing the perception that the Sunday Times, and the Sunday Times alone, had uncovered this issue. Every one of those reports are, of course, readily available on the auditor-general’s website, and have been for some time.

The decline of the Sunday Times is well documented. Its gradual fall from grace, as it has rejected some of the key tenets of professional journalism (accuracy, originality, objectivity and the public interest) for the warm and far less onerous embrace of tabloid reporting, is as sad as is it detrimental to South Africa’s fourth estate, which has long since suffered from a lack of real depth or quality.

Things came to a head in December last year when, after a series of fundamentally problematic stories promoted an internal review of its procedures, the paper was forced to admit its approach to reporting was seriously compromised by weak systems and poor editorial control. One of the problems cited, to quote its own story on the matter, was that “rewriting by senior editors was raised as a problem, with many expressing unhappiness with the process of rewriting a lead story into a ’splash’“. This story might not have been rewritten, but it certainly misrepresented old news as a “splash”. In that sense, it would appear not much has changed.

What the Sunday Times did was misleading and inaccurate and constitutes poor journalism. Clearly, with no alternative (an indictment in and of itself), the newspaper made a conscious decision to publish an old story, to which there had been a substantial reaction, as new and, as yet, unreported. In doing so, it effectively misled the public, did not disclose all the relevant information and allowed its insatiable desire for sensationalism to trump sound journalism.

The only possible defence is that of ignorance – that it genuinely did stumble across the A-G’s report and, blissfully unaware of the extent to which it had been covered, gave the story the prominence it did. If that is the case, it is a sorry excuse indeed. A basic internet search quickly reveals how well the report was covered. And besides, following the news is a newspaper’s core business.

A better explanation, the one which explains most of the problems at the Sunday Times, is that the drive to sell more copies has steadily eroded the newspaper’s ability to properly distinguish good journalism from bad.

A look at the television adverts of six leading political parties and what they say about the nature of those party’s campaigns..

THE REAL ANC TODAY
Volume 2; Issue 4.

HOW TO SPOT A NEGATIVE CAMPAIGN

By Gareth van Onselen

Introduction

One particularly tired criticism, peddled about the DA by the ANC in particular and some parts of the media in general, is that the party often campaigns ‘negatively’.

It is a criticism that doesn’t hold up to scrutiny, however, and to prove my point I have collated the television adverts for some of the major political parties (broadcast in the run-up to the 2009 election).

By going through them it quickly becomes clear that the DA ran an extremely positive campaign.

(A quick word about the Stop Zuma posters, before someone suggests those constituted ‘negative’ campaigning. As I understand it, going negative means presenting something as dangerous or problematic when there is an equal chance it is in fact a positive development. It is a decision to define or emphasize something as entirely negative, either at the expense of something positive or by simply ignoring it. If something is objectively problematic, saying it is problematic is not negative, it is perfectly rational. And on this point I am quite confident there is enough evidence to suggest there are a number of things about Jacob Zuma and a Zuma presidency that fairly constitute cause for concern. At any rate, the Stop Zuma posters were up for one week of a two month campaign, the DA’s primary messages were ‘Vote to Win’ and ‘One Nation One Future’.)

That said, here are the adverts. I have ranked them from best to worst but have not relied entirely on their respective ‘positivity’ to make that judgment. I make no claims that this is any way scientific, just some thoughts designed to generate a bit of debate.

The Democratic Alliance

We start with the best, which I believe to be the DA’s . Here it is:

The ad is uplifting. It is well produced and its message is positive. It is also empowering, it tells you that you can make a difference and that you have a role to play.

The African National Congress

Next up is the ANC’s advert:

This ad, one of three similar adverts produced by the ruling party, is also very well produced, but less uplifting than the DA’s. It is less uplifting because it is based on a concession: things aren’t as good as they should be. It is hard to be positive when you have to account for your shortcomings first. To do this the ANC, as it always does, invokes the past. This is a powerful emotional plea but it does mean the advert is by its nature retrospective, instead of forward-looking. And then there is the Zuma clip at the end. Zuma is a polarising figure, so while he might energise ANC supporters, there is little chance his message would win over new supporters.

The Congress of the People

Third up – although, I would say, tied second – Cope:

The ad is also well produced, much simpler than the ANC’s. I put it on the same level as the ANC’s because it has a number of implicit problems, much like the ANC’s. Hope is, of course, a positive idea and a fairly strong emotional cord to pull on, but hope is also an idea that implies something more than carefully laid plans are needed – almost a bit of magic. Hope is the kind of thing you do when every other avenue is exhausted – you hope and you pray. Compare the idea to the DA’s message, which says you can make a difference by voting for the DA. Far more direct, far more tangible. The difference you can make is real. The other problem is that, with COPE being so new, there is very little substance behind that message, and therefore it is slightly less credible.

The Independent Democrats

Next we have the ID’s advert:

This ad is by all accounts a shocker, and I would have put it last were it not for the extreme negativity of the last two, which is the main theme of this post. It is poorly produced (the editing at the point where de Lille spells out the ID’s ’solutions’ is so bad each new sentence cuts off the end of her last). But perhaps the biggest blunder is relationship between the copy and the background music. The initial part of the ad is fairly depressing, as de Lille painstakingly describes her sorry reality and the soporific music really makes the whole thing fundamentally melancholy. At a certain point, around 40 seconds, de Lille starts talking positive – but the music doesn’t change! The consequence is that you are left with the distinct feeling that anything she and the ID has done is in vane, and we are all doomed. As a last ditch effort to lift the mood there is a final cheery song at the end, but by this stage one is struggling to see the screen through the tears.

The African Christian Democratic Party

At this point, things start to get negative. Have a look at the ACDP’s ad:

Right, well, I think that clears that up. Anyone battling to define exactly what constitutes a negative advert need look no further. Not much more to say about this ad, well produced I suppose but hardly inspiring. Perhaps a bigger problem with the ad, for the ACDP, is that they hardly have a reputation as a fighter on the big issues – crime, poverty, AIDS – they are more about family values and abortion. So, even if the advert did induce someone into wanting to vote out of fear, there is no real reason why they would chose the ACDP.

The Freedom Front Plus

But even the ACDP pales in comparison to the one produced by the FF Plus. Have a look at this:

Quite something, isn’t it?

The FF+ has a bit more credibility on crime than the ACDP – it has been outspoken on the subject for some time – so they picked the right issue to go negative on. I’m not saying crime isn’t an objective problem, it certainly is, but the thing about this ad – from the visuals, to the background sound, to the endless statistics that show up on the screen – is that it is designed to induce fear, and only fear. It makes no attempt to suggest any solutions. It is basically saying: ‘vote for us, or else’. You are left with a feeling (generated in large part by the background sound) that we are in some sort of post-apocolyptic nightmare where the sun never shines and people ran out of food six months ago. (On a lighter note, I like the implied parallel between Einstein and Mulder: As SAA might say, Einstein thought of it, but Mulder perfected it.)

Now, as a last thought, if there is anyone out there who still thinks the DA is negative, watch the FF Plus’s advert again. Then watch the DA’s.

(I couldn’t find nor have I seen, an advert for the IFP, but if anyone has a link for one, please send it through.)

A look at the way in which the Sowetan newspaper broke the story about Helen Zille’s comment on Jacob Zuma and how it constitutes an excellent illustration of poor journalism and weak editorial control.

Related Stories:

• Analysing the Analysts
• A Numbing of the Public Mind
• Strengthening South Africa’s Public Debate

THE REAL ANC TODAY
Volume 2; Issue 3.

UNDERSTANDING POOR JOURNALISM

By Gareth van Onselen

Introduction

The hysteria surrounding DA Leader Helen Zille’s recent comment about Jacob Zuma appears to be dissipating. At its height, a number of the statements made crossed the line between the rational and irrational and then drifted off into the distance, towards what can only be described as the idiotic, the inane and the incomprehensible.

There is a particular cliché appropriate to any attempt to understand this issue, which goes like this: ‘never argue with an idiot, they will bring you down to their level and then proceed to beat you with experience’.

Quite right. So I’m not going to bother sifting through the garbage spewed out by those two leading intellectual institutions, the ANC Youth League and the MK Military Veterans’ Association. That would be like trying understand why sewer rats enjoy, well, the sewers – a very messy exercise; and, quite frankly, about as valuable as the subject matter.

Instead I would like to go back to the beginning, to the newspaper responsible for breaking ‘the story’ and the editorial it wrote subsequent to it.

That is not to suggest that the content of that editorial is qualitatively better than the ANCYL or MKMVA’s contributions, only that the language is more reasonable and so it is easier to dissect.

The purpose of the exercise is to better understand poor journalism, a task for which that particular newspaper’s approach, with regards to this matter, ideally lends itself.

The initial story

The newspaper in question is the Sowetan and it ran its initial hard news story on 12 May. The paper took one quote from a statement by Helen Zille (initially a letter written to the Cape Argus) and made it the subject of a story. The quote in question was the following:

“Zuma is a self-confessed womaniser with deeply sexist views, who put all his wives at risk by having unprotected sex with an HIV-positive woman”.

The story was titled “Zuma an AIDS risk – Zille” but, more gratuitously, the paper ran it as a front page banner headline as well. The sub-headline read: “Zille’s amazing attack on Msholozi” and the excerpt from her statement was printed below the main headline. Those three things, as well as a picture of Zille, took up the whole first page. The first line of the story started: “DA leader Helen Zille has launched an extraordinary new attack on President Jacob Zuma…”

The use of the words ‘amazing’ and ‘extraordinary’ are the result of the Sowetan’s character – it is, for all intents and purposes, a tabloid – a more serious publication would not editorialise in this manner. Together with the description of the statement as a ‘new attack’ and the prominence given to it, they created the impression that Zille’s statement was both original and outlandish. It was, of course, neither of those things.

During his 2006 rape trial Zuma made three controversial statements:

• “And I said to myself that I know as we grew up in the Zulu culture you don’t just leave a woman in that situation, because if you do then she will… say you are a rapist”;
• “[Taking a shower]… would minimise the risk of contracting the disease [Aids]”; and
• “If a woman is dressed in a skirt, she will sit properly with her legs together. But she [his accuser] would cross her legs and wouldn’t even mind if the skirt was raised very much.”

In his judgment, Judge Willem van der Merwe stated that, “It is totally unacceptable that a man should have unprotected sex with a person other than his regular partner and definitely not with a person who, to his knowledge, is HIV-positive.”

He also pointed out that, “The accused was criticised for the fact that he, in his responsible position in government, took the chance of being infected with HIV. He was also criticised for running the risk of infecting his wives. The accused conceded all that.”

And Zuma would again concede his behaviour and statements had been deeply problematic in a public apology subsequent to the trial: “I wish to state categorically and place on record that I erred in having unprotected sex. I should have known better and I should have acted with greater caution and responsibility. For this, I unconditionally apologise to all the people of this country.”

A substantial number of newspapers responded to Zuma’s comments with moral indignation. The Sunday Times wrote in an editorial: “…as he tries to draw a false screen of moral relativism across his record, we would do well to continue to hold him to account for his own behaviour. In proclaiming, during his artfully choreographed public apology, that he was just a human being, Zuma sought to drag all of us down to his own level of moral turpitude”; and the Pretoria News wrote that “Zuma is not fit to lead a country where women’s rights are high on the agenda, where the fight against Aids is, or should be, an urgent national priority and where the protection of the weak and vulnerable is the duty of the powerful. South Africa deserves a president who can lead by example. Jacob Zuma has shown he cannot do that”. The Citizen labelled him “foolish” and the Financial Mail pleaded, “The great and the good in the ANC must surely know that Zuma is entirely unsuitable for the highest office in the land.”

There are many other examples.

And then there was the ANC itself, which called Zuma to account for his testimony before the party’s NEC. Quoting an anonymous NEC member the Sunday Times wrote that Zuma would be required to explain his “stupid statements” which “severely embarrassed the ANC”.

So, the Sowetan’s suggestion that Zille’s comments were ‘amazing’, ‘extraordinary’ and ‘new’ can be described as disingenuous at best, deliberately malicious at worst. Every single element of Zille’s quote was established fact, its tone was objective and, importantly, its content had long since been conceded by everyone from the ANC NEC to Jacob Zuma himself.

To run that story, in the manner the Sowetan did, was poor journalism; the consequence of weak editorial control and feeble judgment.

The editorial

Having effectively framed Zille, and facilitated the creation of an environment in which the ANCYL and MKMVA could happily practice their very particular mix of the unintelligible and the inexplicable, the Sowetan then saw fit to pass judgment on the whole affair the next day. This editorial, perhaps more so than the initial story, is deserving of a considered response, so misguided is its logic, senseless its argument and hypocritical its opinion.

“Cheap shots cost us dear” was the ironic headline, as if the paper’s story from the previous day had never existed. “We were not expecting the relationship between the ruling ANC and the official opposition, the DA, to be congenial,” it opined, “but the slugging match between the two, especially after we published a story in which DA leader and Western Cape Premier Helen Zille made scurrilous allegations against President Jacob Zuma pertaining to his domestic and personal arrangements – and the reaction to these, has gone too far.”

It takes either blissful ignorance or a grossly over-inflated ego, or both, for the Sowetan to pass that kind of comment after running the story it did, in the way it did, the day before.

Let’s look at some of those words and phrases in a bit more detail.

The word ‘scurrilous’, for example, is defined as follows: “abusive or defamatory”, “foul-mouthed or vulgar” or “wicked”. Now, remember, as set out above, Zille did nothing more than state the facts. She didn’t call Zuma “foolish” (like the Citizen) or describe his statements as “stupid” (Like an ANC NEC member). She just repeated what everyone had long since agreed. To suggest that is defamatory is silly; certainly it wasn’t wicked or vulgar.

On the other side of the exchange, the ANCYL had released a statement which said the following about Zille: “Zille has appointed an all male cabinet of useless people, [sic] majority of whom are her boyfriends and concubines so that she can continue to sleep around with them…” and “the fake racist girl who was dropped on a [sic] head as child should understand that South Africa will never be a Mickey-mouse Republic like she wants to portray it.” (The MKMVA would release its own stupefying statement on the 13th.)

To imply, as the Sowetan did, that there is some sort of equivalence between those two sides is to ignore the blatantly obvious and reveals a profound misunderstanding of the word ‘scurrilous’ and its application.

The editorial continues: “Zille’s attack on Zuma was unwarranted and opportunistic. It was a flimsy attempt to divert attention from the undesirability of having an all-male cabinet.”

The implication here is that criticism of Zille’s cabinet was justified and correct and that it was Zille, as opposed to those people obsessed with quotas and political correctness, who initiated this exchange – that the attack on Zille’s cabinet was legitimate, but her response, illegitimate.

I am not going to defend the cabinet here, Zille has done that quite expertly and coherently here and here. But it is worth mentioning that there certainly is something deeply problematic with being labelled sexist by an institution whose leader (and let’s not forget his subsequent assault on homosexuality) has behaved in a fundamentally sexist fashion.

Again, one need look no further than the newspapers themselves for confirmation of this. Take the Cape Argus for example. Subsequent to the ANC Women’s League nominating Zuma as its presidential candidate (a decision which received far less coverage than Zille’s, I wonder what the MKMVA made of it?) an editorial described the move as a “body blow to the cause of equity” and argued that “the ANC Women’s League has a lot of explaining to do to the women of South Africa” before stating that “there are not many men in the ANC who have been so publicly outed on their lack of understanding of gender issues”.

Questioning the ability of the ANC to pass judgment on gender equity issues, as Zille did, is a perfectly valid point. It’s a bit like Eskom pronouncing on sound financial management.

The last refuge of the scoundrel

But things get better. The Sowetan continues, “It no longer matters who started it. Each ought to respect the other’s office even if they dislike the person occupying that office. Robust politics does not mean resorting to such juvenile behaviour. Now they have called untold damage to the office of the president and possibly stoked racial tensions.”

What a miraculous thing is ‘The Office of the President’. It cleanses all sins. The institution and the individual merge into a pure and virtuous union, indistinguishable, elevated above the norms and standards applicable to mortal men.

What nonsense. Those people who conveniently merge ‘The President’ (the individual) with ‘The Office of the President’ (the institution) are either unable to separate principle from practice or have a logical default, to which their analysis inevitably falls victim. If it is the former, and it is deliberate, then it serves as a safe hiding place, where the President’s actions are protected from proper scrutiny – the last refuge of the scoundrel. If it is the latter, then it’s nothing a bit of common sense cannot fix.

The reason people say one should respect ‘The Office of the President’, as opposed to just ‘The President’ is because ‘The Office of the President’ is defined by a set of principles and values to which ‘The President’ should aspire. Not vice versa. The President must aspire to embody those principles and values – hence the often asked question, ‘is this person fit to be President?’; those principles and values are not automatically adopted by the President on taking office.

Helen Zille never once undermined or degraded The Office of the President; quite the opposite, she pointed out – as a great many newspapers and commentators have done over the past three years – that Jacob Zuma does not embody those principles and values and that it is the ANC and Jacob Zuma who are undermining the Office of the President, by respectively appointing and accepting a position for which he is not fit. That is the duty of a loyal opposition, dedicated to upholding the Constitution – and of the fourth estate, who are tasked with a similar responsibility.

By saying what she did about Zuma, Zille was standing up for The Office of the President, upholding its ideals and protecting its standing. It had nothing to do with personal relationships and everything to do with Zuma’s conduct and behaviour, his principles and values.

Conclusion

There is a strong case to be made that what the Sowetan did was to create the news and then report on it. There can be no bigger indictment of a newspaper, the purpose of which is to be objective and accurate, informative and insightful.

Put bluntly, the Sowetan took a particular quote, presented it as ‘amazing’, ‘new’ and ‘extraordinary’ and gave it disproportionate prominence (the purpose of which was to further enhance the idea that it was new and dramatic) and then proceeded to pass judgment on the very thing it was guilty of itself: taking a cheap shot, that was unwarranted and opportunistic.

There can be little doubt that the pursuit of ‘the news’ had nothing to do with its decision to publish the story on its front page and everything to do with generating a fight between the DA and the ANC (the very thing it then proceeded to denounce); the fallout of which it would then proceed to gleefully report on in the following weeks.

That is not journalism. The newspaper should be ashamed.

The 2009 Election has come and gone and, now that the results are in, it is possible to gauge how well the DA did and how its results compare to those of the other political parties.

What follows is a brief overview of the DA’s performance.

THE REAL ANC TODAY
Volume 2
Issue 2

THE 2009 NATIONAL AND PROVINCIAL ELECTIONS

AN ANALYSIS OF THE DA’S PERFORMANCE

OVERVIEW

(The following overview is based on the attached document, which should be read for a more complete picture.)

1. THE NATIONAL BALLOT:

1.1. DA GROWTH:

• The DA won a total of 2 945 829 votes or 16.66%, which translates into 67 seats in the National Assembly. It will be allocated another 10 Members to the National Council of Provinces for a total of 77 Members of Parliament.
• The DA grew by 34.7% (1 014 628 votes; 4.29 percentage points and 17 seats).
• This is the third election in a row the DA has grown. It is the only party to have done this.
• The DA is more than double the size of the next biggest opposition party: 9.24 percentage points, 1.6 million votes, or 37 seats bigger.
• The DA’s growth, of over 1 million votes, is bigger than that of any other party.

• The DA captured 76% (7 581 votes) of the 9 857 votes cast overseas:

- ACDP: 184 votes (1.87%)
- ANC: 673 votes (6.83%)
- CDA: 23 votes (0.23%)
- COPE: 918 votes (9.31%)
- DA: 7 581 votes (76.91%)
- ID: 136 votes (1.38%)
- PAC: 13 votes (0.13%)
- UDM: 20 votes (0.20%)
- FF+: 270 votes (2.74%)
- Total: 9 857 votes cast

1.2. COMPARISON:

• The DA was the only party to grow in the National Assembly (leaving aside COPE and the APC, which both started from a 0% base). Every other party represented lost support:

- ACDP: down by 0.79 percentage points (from 1.60 to 0.81)
- ANC: down by 3.78 (from 69.68 to 65.90)
- AZAPO: down by 0.05 (from 0.27 to 0.22)
- ID: down by 0.81 (from 1.73 to 0.92)
- IFP: down by 2.42 (from 6.97 to 4.55)
- MF: down by 0.10 (from 0.35 to 0.25)
- PAC: down by 0.46 (from 0.73 to 0.27)
- UCDP: down by 0.38 (from 0.75 to 0.38)
- UDM: down by 1.43 (from 2.28 to 0.85)
- FF+: down by 0.06 (from 0.89 to 0.83)

1.3. 10 YEAR COMPARISON:

(In 2000 the Democratic Party merged with the New National Party and the Federal Alliance to form the Democratic Alliance. In 2003 a small faction of NNP members crossed the floor back into the NNP, and later merged that party with the ANC.)

• Since 1999 the DP/DA has grown by 1 418 492 votes and 7.1 percentage points, more than any other party.
• In 2004 the DA grew by 403 864 votes (26.4%) and, in 2009, by 1 014 628 votes (34.7%).

2. THE PROVINCIAL BALLOT:

2.1. DA GROWTH:

• The DA grew in eight out of nine provinces, increasing the total number of DA seats in provincial legislatures from 51 in 2004, to 65 in 2009. It is represented by at least two members in every legislature:

- Eastern Cape: Grew by 37.6% or 61 525 votes, to 10.0%
- Free State: Grew by 39.8% or 34 130 votes, to 11.6%
- Gauteng: Grew by 28.3% or 200 535 votes, to 21.9%
- KwaZulu-Natal: Grew by 39.3% or 89 702 votes, to 9.1%
- Mpumalanga: Grew by 26.0% or 20 085 votes, to 7.5%
- North West: Grew by 36.7% or 23 803 votes, to 8.2%
- Northern Cape: Grew by 44.0% or 15 520 votes, to 12.6%
- Western Cape: Grew by 138.3% or 587 736 votes, 51.5%

2.2. THE WESTERN CAPE:

• The DA won an outright majority (51.5%) on the Western Cape provincial ballot and a majority in the legislature (22 out of the 42 seats).
• Its growth in this province has been significant, not just in the 2009 election but in the 2004 election that preceded it.
• In 2004 the DA grew by 124% or 235 649 votes to 27.1%, in 2009 it exceeded even that, growing by 138% or 587 736 votes and capturing in excess of 1 million votes in the province.

2.3. TEN YEAR COMPARISON:

• In the past three elections, the number of seats the DP/DA has won in provincial legislatures has systematically increased, from 35 in 1999, to 51 in 2004, to 65 in 2009.

One of the most significant developments of the 2009 General and Provincial Elections was the decline of smaller parties. What follows is an overview of that trend in general and an analysis of the five more established smaller parties.

It demonstrates that they are all in decline and, if the facts are anything to go by, that the decline is terminal.

THE REAL ANC TODAY
Volume 2
Issue 1

SMALL, SMALLER, SMALLEST

An analysis of the declining support for smaller parties in the 2009 general and provincial elections

By: Gareth van Onselen

Introduction

There are a number of stories that emanate from the 2009 Election. One of the more obvious is the poor showing of the smaller parties, which were, by all accounts, decimated.

What follows is a brief overview of the five more established smaller parties: the African Christian Democratic Party, Freedom Front Plus, United Democratic Movement, Independent Democrats and, as of this election, the Inkatha Freedom Party. Outside of the ANC, DA and COPE, they constitute the five next biggest parties in the National Assembly.

An analysis of their results (see the following set of tables) shows that support for these smaller parties has declined dramatically and, where they do have support in the provinces, it is both limited and sporadic. Indeed, there is a strong case to be made that, come 2014, all five parties would do well to stand in only a select number of provinces or run the repeat risk of a return which, in most regions, is nothing more than embarrassing.

The national ballot

We start with the national ballot.

All five lost support:

• IFP: Lost 284 404 votes (or 26.1% of its support), down to 4.55%
• ID: Lost 106 850 votes (or 39.6% of its support), down to 0.92%
• UDM: Lost 206 037 votes (or 57.9% of its support), down to 0.85%
• FF+: Gained 10 331 votes but declined in percentage terms, down to 0.83%
• ACDP: Lost 107 614 votes (or 43.0% of its support), down to 0.81%

There is an argument to be made that the IFP’s 4.5% means it is not a ‘small party’. However, 97% of its support comes from KZN. Subtract that and the party is virtually non-existent in the rest of the country.

UDM leader Bantu Holomisa has argued that the message of the 2009 Election is that the electorate no longer wants a multitude of smaller parties, but a smaller number of bigger parties. That might be true, but to suggest this is the message of this most recent election is to ignore some longer term trends.

The IFP’s decline, for example, precedes the 2009 Election. In 2004 it lost 282 813 votes (20.6% of its 1999 support), down from 8.6% to 7%. That is almost the exact same number of votes (284 404) it lost in 2009. It has lost 567 217 votes since 1999. The UDM too, lost a significant amount of support in 2004 – 191 703 votes to be precise (or 35% of its 1999 support), down from 3.4% to 2.3%. So the decline of both these parties has now been unfolding for some time.

The ACDP and FF+ did gain some support in 2004 but, in percentage terms, it was so small as to be almost meaningless – 0.09% for the FF+ and 0.17% for the ACDP – certainly not the beginning of a huge upward swing (as the 2009 results would confirm).

The ID, of course, was only established prior to the 2004 Election, so it is not possible to gauge its support over a ten year period.

The smaller one’s percentage of the national vote, the more likely it is that one’s percentage of the provincial vote, in each province, will be smaller still. And as, for the most part, we are talking about parties with less than 1% of the national vote, when you turn to the provinces, it quickly becomes apparent just how thinly spread the smaller parties are.

The provincial ballot

All five parties stood in all nine provinces. The results would suggest this was folly. Standing for an election in all nine provinces not only involves a substantial financial commitment (for one, in the form of a deposit – returned only if you win a seat nationally or in the respective province) but it means you are stretching your limited resources across the whole country, instead of focusing them on those areas where your support is strongest.

Let’s start with the Inkatha Freedom Party (Table  4):

• Eastern Cape: 2 270 votes or 0.10% (- 2 103 votes or 48% down from 2004)
• Free State: 2 232 votes or 0.22% (- 1 331 or 37%)
• Gauteng: 61 856 votes or 1.49% (- 23 644 or 28%) [1 seat won]
• KwaZulu-Natal: 780 008 or 22.40% (- 229 259 or 23%) [18 seats won]
• Limpopo: 936 votes or 0.06% (did not stand in 2004)
• Mpumalanga: 6 540 votes or 0.50% (- 4 103 or 39%)
• North West: 1 619 votes or 0.15% (- 1 592 or 50%)
• Northern Cape: 757 votes or 0.19% (+ 6 or 0.8%)
• Western Cape: 1 158 votes or 0.08% (- 1 064 or 48%)

Outside of KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng, the IFP obtained less than 1% of the vote in every other province: 0.10%, 0.22%, 0.06%, 0.5%, 0.15%, 0.19% and 0.08% (in fact, in five of those, it got less than 0.2% of the vote).

In absolute terms, in six provinces it got less than 2 500 votes. With the exception of the Northern Cape (where it increased its support by 6 votes, off a base of 751) it lost support in every province. In percentage terms, it lost 35% or more of its 2004 support in five provinces and 45% or more in three.

It won seats in just two of the nine legislatures and its total of 19 seats is 13 less than the 32 it won in 2004 and 18 less than the 37 it won in 1999.

The Independent Democrats (Table 5):

•    Eastern Cape: 10 466 votes or 0.46% (- 6 848 or 40%)
•    Free State: 1 654 votes or 0.16% (- 3 635 or 69%)
•    Gauteng: 25 243 votes or 0.61% (- 26 678 or 51%) [1 seat won]
•    KwaZulu-Natal: 6 253 votes or 0.20% (- 7 303 or 54%)
•    Limpopo: 1 333 votes or 0.09% (- 1 397 or 51%)
•    Mpumalanga: 1 527 votes or 0.12% (- 1 879 or 55%)
•    North West: 4 989 votes or 0.46% (- 720 or 13%)
•    Northern Cape: 19 995 votes or 4.94% (- 2 490 or 11%) [2 seats won]
•    Western Cape: 92 116 votes or 4.68% (- 30 751 or 25%) [2 seats won]

Outside of the Northern and Western Cape, the ID obtained less than 1% of the vote in every other province (although in Gauteng this was enough to win a seat): 0.46%, 0.16%, 0.61%, 0.20%, 0.09%, 0.12% and 0.46% (four of those being 0.2% or less).

In absolute terms, it lost support in every province, getting less than 6 500 votes in five provinces and less than 2 000 in three. In percentage terms, it lost 40% or more of its support in six provinces and 50% or more in five.

It won seats in just three of the nine legislatures and its total of five seats is one less than the six it won in 2004.

Next, the United Democratic Movement (Table 6):

•    Eastern Cape: 93 196 votes or 4.13% (- 112 797 or 55%) [4 seats won]
•    Free State: 3 722 votes or 0.36% (- 5 225 or 58%)
•    Gauteng: 16 480 votes or 0.40% (- 17 164 or 51%)
•    KwaZulu-Natal: 7 953 votes or 0.23% (- 12 593 or 61%)
•    Limpopo: 5 193 votes or 0.35% (- 22 587 or 81%)
•    Mpumalanga: 3 366 votes or 0.26% (- 7 795 or 70%)
•    North West: 5 467 votes or 0.51% (- 7 046 or 56%)
•    Northern Cape: 604 votes or 0.15% (- 827 or 58%)
•    Western Cape: 14 013 votes or 0.71% (- 13 476 or 49%)

Outside of the Eastern Cape, the UDM obtained less than 1% in every other province: 0.36%, 0.4%, 0.23%, 0.35%, 0.26%, 0.51%, 0.15% and 0.71% (in six of those it managed 0.4% or less).

In absolute terms, it lost support in every province, getting less than 8 000 votes in six provinces. In percentage terms, the damage was far worse: in eight out of nine provinces (the ninth being 49%) the UDM lost more than 50% of its 2004 support. In seven it lost more than 55% and in three more than 60%.

It won just three seats in one legislature in 2009, a dramatic decline from the 10 seats it won in five legislatures in 2004 and the 14 in six it won in 1999.

The Freedom Front Plus (Table 7):

•    Eastern Cape: 4 428 votes or 0.20% (- 1 264 or 22%)
•    Free State: 20 780 votes or 2.01% (- 4 166 or 17%) [1 seat won]
•    Gauteng: 67 660 votes or 1.63% (+ 22 012 or 48%) [1 seat won]
•    KwaZulu-Natal: 5 760 votes or 0.05% (- 2 004 or 26%)
•    Limpopo: 9 035 votes or 0.61% (- 689 or 7%)
•    Mpumalanga: 11 590 votes or 0.89% (- 2 142 or 16%)
•    North West: 19 463 votes or 1.81% (+ 2 340 or 14%)
•    Northern Cape: 5 034 votes or 1.24% (+ 86 or 2%)
•    Western Cape: 8 384 votes or 0.43% (- 1 321 or 15%)

Outside of the Free State and Gauteng (it won one seat in each), the FF+ obtained less than 1% of the vote in five provinces: 0.2%, 0.05%, 0.61%, 0.89% and 0.43%.

In absolute terms, it lost support in six out of nine provinces, getting less than 10 000 votes in five provinces and less than 6 000 in three. In percentage terms it lost 15% or more of its 2004 support in five provinces.

The FF+ won one seat in two different legislatures, three fewer than the five seats it won in 1999 and 2004, on each occasion spread across five different legislatures.

The African Christian Democratic Party (Table 8):

•    Eastern Cape: 11 974 votes or 0.53% (- 5 398 or 31%)
•    Free State: 7 556 votes or 0.73% (- 5 563 or 42%)
•    Gauteng: 36 099 votes or 0.87% (- 19 892 or 36%) [1 seat won]
•    KwaZulu-Natal: 23 537 votes or 0.68% (- 25 355 or 52%) [1 seat won]
•    Limpopo: 10 246 votes or 0.69% (- 10 172 or 50%)
•    Mpumalanga: 6 565 votes or 0.51% (- 5 500 or 46%)
•    North West: 7 366 votes or 0.69% (- 7 772 or 51%)
•    Northern Cape: 4 041 votes or 1.00% (- 1 954 or 33%)
•    Western Cape: 28 995 votes or 1.47% (- 24 939 or 46%) [1 seat won]

Outside of the Western Cape, the ACDP obtained 1% or less in every other province (although in Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal this was enough to win a seat): 0.53%, 0.73%, 0.87%, 0.68%, 0.69%, 0.51%, 0.69% and 1% (five of those were less than 0.7%).

In absolute terms, it lost support in every province, getting less than 8 000 votes in four provinces but, as with the UDM, it was in percentage terms that the real damage was done. The ACDP lost a minimum of 30% of its support in every province; in six provinces it lost more than 40% and in three it lost 50% or more.

The party won three seats in three different legislatures in 2009. In 2004 it won eight seats in six different legislatures and, in 1999, four in four different legislatures.

Weakness in numbers

A review of the facts confirms the obvious: the smaller parties lost a substantial amount of support in 2009, both in absolute and percentage terms and, for all intents and purposes, across the board.

Collectively these fives parties achieved less than 1% of the vote in 34 provinces; less than 0.5% in 21 and less than 0.25% in 14. In only one province did one of them manage more than 5%, in just five, more than 2%.

Some individual cases are simply silly: In Limpopo the IFP got 936 votes (0.06%) and the ID 1 333 (0.09%). In the Northern Cape, the UDM scraped together 604 votes (0.15%) and in KwaZulu-Natal the FF+ garnered just 5 760 votes (0.05%). In the Western Cape the IFP managed only 1 158 votes (0.08%).

To put those results into some sort of context, compare them to how some of the really small parties did (and here I refer to those regional – and often radical – parties that exist only in a specific province).

For example, in the Western Cape, the CAPE Party – which is advocating for the Northern and Western Cape to breakaway from South Africa and become a separate state (“The Cape is not only a sustainable country but with independence it would flourish and could potentially be one of the top 10 wealthiest countries income per capita in the world”) – got 2 552 votes, more than double the IFP. In fact, that’s more votes than these five parties individually managed in eight of the 45 provinces they stood in.

No doubt pride plays a part in the decision to stand nationally: any party that has the financial resources to stand in every province, one would think, has some clout. And that message is not without its marketing strengths either – the projection of growth and size is helpful for any party trying to increase its percentage of the vote. But there comes a point where one needs to do some hard sums; and there is a strong case to be made that, if the reason behind these five parties’ respective decisions to stand in every province was a show of strength, they’ve achieved the exact opposite.

Logic would suggest that, come 2014, these five parties should contest only those provinces where they won a seat or grew their support. That would allow them to focus their limited resources on those regions where their support is strongest. Perhaps most importantly, it might reverse a trend whereby South Africa’s smaller parties are increasingly defined by weakness and irrelevance.