Leadership in SA has been downgraded to junk status

President Jacob Zuma recently gave a flippant response to the possible downgrade of the country to junk status by the rating agencies.

Responding to a question in Parliament last week, he downplayed the likely effect, contending that many other countries had been downgraded and essentially, it had been no big deal.

As it turns out, while the rating agencies have so far not downgraded the country, they are not keen to upgrade it either, raising concerns about SA’s political instability.

The president’s dismissive posture contrasts with the messages that have been consistently sent by the ANC and Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan that all stakeholders should work together to avoid a downgrade, which will inevitably have disastrous consequences, especially for the poor in our country.

Our president’s irresponsible comments came hard on the heels of a series of negative events that have been playing out across the country.

We are still reeling from the implications of the recently released State of Capture report and its implications for ethical leadership and governance; the dropping of fraud charges against the finance minister; the continuing instability of the higher education sector and the announcement of worsening unemployment. All these take place as more in society question the leadership of the president, including some in the governing party.

In the wake of the attack on Gordhan by some state institutions, business leaders wrote to Zuma, decrying the political situation and raising concerns about the effect these may have on the economy. They said it was "shocking that our national collective effort to avoid a ratings downgrade and to restore inclusive economic growth is now being so insidiously subverted.

"If this sinister behaviour is allowed to continue, the consequences will be devastating for our economy, and will fatally undermine our national efforts to address poverty, inequality and unemployment."

This cry and all the other protests are falling on deaf ears if the response of the ANC’s national executive committee is anything to go by. Former public protector Thuli Madonsela laid bare an example of the lack of ethical leadership in a report, entitled Collateral Damage that dealt with a case of alleged maladministration and abuse of power by the Estate Agency Affairs Board against its CEO, Nomonde Mapetla.

Madonsela was scathing about the behaviour of the board, which hounded and harassed Mapetla and subsequently fired her without following process, apparently to cover up corrupt activities she was investigating.

The corrupt practice of estate agents raiding their client trust accounts to fund their own operations needed to be brought to a halt and the board as regulator was charged by legislation to protect customer deposits.

This case brings into sharp focus the failure to appoint leaders of state institutions capable of safeguarding their credibility and vital role.

The private sector is also complicit — if R43bn has been wasted on unauthorised expenditure by state institutions, the obvious question is: who was on the other side of these transactions? The cancer of unethical leadership is not confined to the public sector.

One wonders what more needs to happen before the leadership of the ANC intervenes in the crisis. South Africans have been through so much. They deserve ethical leaders who can restore hope for the future.

• Tabane is author of Let’s Talk Frankly and anchor of Power Perspective on Power FM