KENNETH MOENG MOKGATLHE: We need leaders with conscience and compassion, not apartheid blamers

I was disappointed to learn that President Cyril Ramaphosa has joined his comrades in the governing ANC who want us to believe the National Party (NP) should be blamed for everything that is wrong in our country.

According to Ramaphosa, the ANC inherited a “broken country”, but he conveniently neglects to mention the leading role his party has played in letting the country go to the dogs over the past few decades.

Blaming apartheid demonstrates the immaturity of our political leadership. The people we elect into the highest public offices do not inspire confidence when they spend their time defending the governing party while trying to convince the populace that apartheid has been responsible for everything that has gone wrong in the 29 years since the ANC assumed office in 1994. 

As a diehard pan-Africanist I have never dreamt of a time when I would publicly acknowledge that systems and institutions functioned better under apartheid than they do now. I risk being labelled a “sell-out” by doing so, but it is not helpful to defend the worsening state of our government simply because it is presided over by fellow black Africans. We should be able to call it is as we see it, as we did against apartheid.

There is insurmountable evidence to prove that systems and institutions performed better under the NP than under the ANC. We need not look far from where we live or work: just compare the roads and general infrastructure, look at the trains (and railway lines and stations), visit a few towns, consider our struggling municipalities, the police stations that have become crime havens, the schools that are no longer places of safety, and all the state-owned entities that have all but collapsed.

Spending a few years in the Pan-Africanist Congress (PAC) exposed me to the historical accounts of the liberation movement. We are often told about the heroic role they played, but we are never told about the corruption that prevailed in the ANC and the PAC while SA citizens faced the brutal apartheid system.

Many deaths of freedom fighters that occurred in ANC military camps are still not accounted for, and funds certainly went missing

 Many joined the liberation movement out of greed and selfishness; it was not always about making a contribution to the liberation of the oppressed. The divisions and factions within the PAC during the struggle often revolved on controlling available resources.

The same happened in the ANC, so we should not be surprised at the way the party has behaved since 1994. Many deaths of freedom fighters that occurred in ANC military camps are still not accounted for, and funds certainly went missing. 

The legacy of apartheid is real, but the ANC has had the power to change things for 29 years and must share the blame for the “broken society” we are. When it assumed office in 1994 it did nothing to bring ethics back into governmental systems and institutions, to bring about a new and honest political culture that would be characterised by leaders with conscience and compassion.

It has become clear that we do not need highly intelligent or educated leaders — we need leaders who have compassion and can empathise with citizens’ struggles. We need people who will use their hearts to serve, rather than their heads to fill their pockets and stomachs. We need people who will not be able to sleep when things are not going well. Look at the behaviour of the current crop of political leaders when the country is facing so many problems. They do not care because they do not have compassion and love for their own people.

Ramaphosa and his ANC comrades should take responsibility for having brought SA into despair and hopelessness. It would be myopic to suggest that we forget about apartheid, colonialism and slavery, but using these tragic events to avoid taking responsibility for your own misdeeds is wrong.

• Mokgatlhe is an independent political analyst and writer based in the North West.