Rocky road route will spell disaster

IF Government and business do not join forces to pick up the country’s declining economy, South Africa could face grim political consequences.

This is according to the South African Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR).

It points to four ideological routes – the ‘rocky road’, ‘narrow road’, ‘toll road’ and the ‘wide road’.

‘The ‘rocky road’ is our worst-case scenario for a future South Africa, featuring a powerful and interventionist development state that believes it can head off future political defeat by destroying democratic institutions in a desperate bid to cling to power,’ said SAIRR CEO Frans Cronjé.

Cronjé asserted it all depended on Government’s response to the current economic and socio-political pressures.

‘Money is tight, political supporters are jumping ship and global perceptions are swinging rapidly against the country.

‘Will Government be forced to reform to the right by adopting a single-minded ‘pursuit of growth’ policy in the realisation that, without this growth, it will be unable to meet its supporters’ expectations?

‘Or will it persist with the view that an interventionist development state can work and that it just needs to regulate the private sector into greater compliance?

‘More importantly, do we remain a free and open society, or do we lose rights and freedom to the point where a future government can rule with impunity, ignore court orders and send the police to Parliament?’

More positive scenarios would be the ‘wide road’, underpinned by a popular mandate for market reforms; the ‘narrow road’ where there will be forced, yet market-friendly reforms or the ‘toll road’ dominated by policy confusion amid active institutions.

Pragmatism or peril

Deputy Dean in the Faculty of Commerce Administration and Law at the University of Zululand (Unizul), Dr Irrshad Kaseeram, agreed that ‘SA needs pragmatism, or else we are doomed’.

‘It does appear we are on a rocky road to mediocrity through a strong interventionist developmental state, which controls legislative and executive powers and is attempting to chip away at the institutions of democracy.

‘However, there is hope , for we have robust institutions of democracy in the form of a free press, an independent judiciary, a vibrant and vociferous public as well as independent and pragmatic thinkers within state institutions like the Public Protector, Thuli Madonsela, and Finance Minister Nonhlanhla Nene.’