In July, through the work of investigative journalists around the world and the bravery of a willing whistleblower, the world was treated to a trove of sensitive and revealing company information about the erstwhile business practices of Uber up to 2017, known collectively as the Uber Files. The files include emails, presentations and company memos from Uber operations in about 40 countries over four years. They paint a picture of Uber knowingly manipulating government officials, flouting laws and misleading its gig workers, all in pursuit of more growth and profit.
One of the most interesting aspects of the news coverage was the Washington Post’s editorial choice to lead one of its pieces with an SA human interest tale: the story of a Capetonian Uber driver who thought he’d finally found the tool to his own economic liberation. Instead he became an indirect victim of corporate policies that made it increasingly harder for him to earn well (no matter how hard he worked), and in a sense set him up to be a direct victim of crime targeting Uber drivers, when the driver in question was robbed on the job.
I’ve been wanting to talk about the implications of the revelations for a while, but also wondering about the timing and relevance. Then a few weeks later, while I was ruminating on the reveals of the Uber Files, it was confirmed that the construction of Amazon’s Cape Town “headquarters” could go ahead even while the Western Cape High Court stuck a pin in the calendar, promising to hear an appeal against the ban in January 2023.
As BusinessLIVE has reported, even if the ban is upheld the “project may be fairly advanced by then”, which just about renders the point of opposing the building moot. I’m not saying the Liesbeek site is paradise, but the paving and parking lot that so worried Joni Mitchell will be long since laid.
I’m not saying the Liesbeek site is paradise, but the paving and parking lot that so worried Joni Mitchell will be long since laid.
If you’re not following the case closely it may begin to feel convoluted with all the rulings and appeals, but this delay boils down to a considerable win for the developer, Liesbeek Leisure Properties Trust (LLPT). It is tasked with building a mixed-use office block to the value of a reported R4.6bn in which the e-commerce giant Amazon will be an anchor tenant. However, the site for that development in Observatory, Cape Town, is claimed to be both ecologically sensitive and spiritually and culturally significant to indigenous Khoi people.
The position of the activists and civil society groups opposing the development (including the Observatory Civic Association and the Goringhaicona Khoi Khoin Traditional Council) is that this is an important heritage site that should not be developed (or damaged) for private profit. The position of LLPT — echoed by various representatives of the city’s government over the last few months — is that if we don’t give it the go-ahead Amazon will pull out of the deal and that will cost us jobs. Precious, precious jobs, and money.
LLPT said its lawyers have advised that Amazon might be entitled to extract penalties for the delayed delivery of the property, and it has made a big deal in the press about the “thousands of jobs” at stake if it all goes, um, toes up. I am not privy to those discussions, of course, or a lawyer, but I am prepared to offer a giant arched eyebrow in this direction. Amazon has been growing its workforce in the country steadily, without the benefit of a fancy headquarters, and I highly doubt its e-commerce plans for the country — launching its marketing place in SA in 2023 — are predicated on where the canteen is.
Inexplicable amnesia
Of course, the developers and the project partners want their baby to come to fruition. They don’t want to face penalties, fines and lost income. I sympathise, and concur on the principle of being a welcoming site for successful international companies, but not at the risk of the very people we promise it will uplift. And deploying the “No Jobs” bogeyman feels like a low blow when Amazon is facing unionisation and worker pushback worldwide.
There’s no straight line to be drawn between that “old” Uber and the arrival of Amazon on our shores — or any other would-be investor seeking wine tours and mountain views — but viewed in the context of revelations like those in the Uber Files it occurs to me that an inexplicable amnesia is frequently revealed when companies show up promising jobs and direct investment.
We have vast economic development needs in SA, and tech companies have been printing money for decades. What city or national government can say no to the carrot of localised cash injections when one in three South Africans seeking work can’t find it? And how can we stand in the way of innovations that allow people to earn, as the gig platforms do? Or at least that’s what we would have asked years ago.
Now, in 2022, with our post-Covid-19 disillusionment and the stack of leaks and whistleblower-based case studies growing annually, the tech narrative needs to grow up. The way that we talk about tech, and frankly, the way tech talks about itself, must change. It’s time to see more clear-eyed accounting for the promises after the fact, and acknowledgment that tech wants us — these lovely youthful populations of Africa — as much as we want them.
• Thompson Davy, a freelance journalist, is an impactAFRICA fellow and WanaData member.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.