THOBANI ZIKALALA
The state of South African politics is in shambles as such demands of us to examine it a bit deeper than it has been done in recent times.
In doing this we must look at a key role player, the South African politician. The politician is at the centre of almost all political activity in the South African political landscape.
In fact, there is no polity that is without a politician as a key protagonist. In all political activity the politician must be under constant scrutiny for their actions are key in shaping the political direction of such a society.
At the current juncture, the politician in South Africa has been centre of a lot of controversy mostly on the negative side. Also, the South African political landscape has also become a dangerous territory with the increase in political killings.
The intersection between politics and business in the South African political landscape has blurred the lines and has made political participation a dangerous affair. This has led to the question, are South African politicians agents of social change or political merchants?
The South African political economy is organised on capitalist principles, to put it more bluntly South Africa is a capitalist state. As such it is underpinned by the principle of profit maximisation based on the minority ownership of factors production.
Economic exclusion and exploitation are also in the underpinnings of such a society. This type of economic organisation coupled with decreasing state capacity has led to almost all key state projects being implemented by private capital.
This has left South African politicians who are largely without economic ownership vulnerable to capital. This is fertile ground for corrupt relationships between politicians and businessmen who are owners of capital. As businessmen seek to influence the direction of the state, they find vulnerable participants in the South African politician. This can be seen in the intersection of political and economic interests in Marikana which resulted in the loss of more than 34 lives.
Who can forget the fiasco of December 2015 when the capital allegedly threatened economic loss if the president did not appoint Pravin Gordhan as finance minister? Of course, this can also be seen in the ongoing arms deal case and the shenanigans of PPE contracts during the Covid-19 pandemic. All in all, if you follow a lot of government contracts you will find traces of such relationships.
In any capitalist country with a large working-class who lie under exploitation hope becomes a commodity. Hope for better conditions, for a better life and world. It becomes the most important commodity you can sell to the working-class who are without economic owners and thus no economic influence. The South African politician has discovered this reality, and such has packaged this hope carefully with political rhetoric.
On the other hand, politicians can also be understood in two paradigms. On one side are the politicians who have accepted this reality and status quo, they have accepted that their social upward mobility depends on the status quo.
This is foregrounded by the fact of relationships forged with owners of capital as such the interests of the politician are intertwined with those of capital. Capital assists in all ways necessary for this politician to remain in office because it favours their interests of profit maximisation.
This politician’s political message is always littered with phrases like “ensuring economic stability” and other related terms which are never unpacked as to what their real meaning is. On the side is the politicians who are against the status quo. They have accepted that the fate of their social upward mobility lies outside of the status quo. Thus, their political message of “hope” is packaged with radical rhetoric.
In their message, you will hear phrases such as “transformation” etc. These phrases are never unpacked. In fact, they are always used as catchphrases with no real content added to them. The objective is to sell or better put inspire hope to gain public goodwill. This goodwill is in the form of votes.
The goal for the South African politician is to gain access or proximity to state administration for social upward mobility. This is the actual contestation and because of the very limited barriers to entry to this, every politician or aspiring believes they can win. This contest is not without the influence of business persons who are the funders of this political contestation and in this contested political terrain this contest can also be very deadly. This has weakened the state of political leadership and thus lowered the bar. It has given effect to the question I ask, are these agents of social change or political merchants?
It Is my considered view that the South African politician is not an agent of social change as the case should be, but they are merely a political merchant. A political merchant selling hope as a commodity to the largely dejected political mass of South Africa. This political mass has been turned into a consumer of hope by the largely dire political and economic situation of the country.
Largely characterised by high unemployment, high levels of poverty and inequality. This mass needs this hope to be able to carry on trusting that things will change. The politician has understood or has been made to understand this as such their whole political message revolves around this hope.
This is also largely why the problems of the country have been made to be about individuals rather than a prevailing structural problem. Even for those who seem to understand that the South African political problems are structural you struggle to see their political consistency between what they do and what they say.
Better put, you struggle to see a correlation between their political speech and the impact of such. In fact, the radical South African politician is a liberal radical. This means their radical politics choose when to be radical and when to be not. Indeed, the South African politician is a merchant and not an agent for social change. This is not to say there are no good politicians out there but the dominant political class who enjoy large followings are in the business of selling to maintain proximity to state administration.
Thobani Zikalala is an Independent Political Commentator.
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