DA members of the coalition cabinet were taken aback last week to learn from Business Day that “the inaugural meeting for preparations for the national dialogue, endorsed by President Cyril Ramaphosa as a mechanism to chart the way forward for SA’s future, has been scheduled for December 16”.
“A special cabinet meeting was scheduled for next week,” the paper reported, referring to this week, “when members of the executive were expected to be briefed on the dialogue, expected to be held in 2025, deputy president Paul Mashatile said.”
DA ministers were concerned that no-one had told them about any such big plan, but they’d been told to gather on Tuesday. By that time though, the ANC and DA portions of the coalition were at war over whether we were an “ally” of Russia, as Ramaphosa announced on a visit to Russia.
And over whether home affairs minister Leon Schreiber had committed an outrage by announcing on Sunday that he had signed regulations to allow Ukrainian and SA diplomats to travel to see each other without visas.
Ukraine’s foreign minister was due in SA on the Monday and signing the document was due to be a highlight of his trip, but the presidency and ANC were so irritated with Schreiber that Ramaphosa refused to sign it at all.
This after the presidency had put out a statement saying that: “On Monday, October 28 2024, SA international relations & co-operation minister Ronald Lamola will host his Ukrainian counterpart, minister Andrii Sybiha. Among the highlights of the visit will be the signing of an agreement on visa waiver for diplomatic service or official passports ... This development, which has been in the making since 2020, signals SA’s commitment to growing diplomatic relations with Ukraine.”
When the special cabinet meeting to discuss the national dialogue was suddenly called off on Monday, the reasonable assumption was that the ANC had decided not to talk to the DA about it for the moment.
Like much in SA, the national dialogue is being made up as it goes along. When I asked a friend who is deeply involved in setting it up, she put it like this: “Govt has not taken over the national dialogue. The president as head of state will announce the commencement of the national dialogue in a week or so, charging the national foundations and Nedlac to set up a preparatory committee that will prepare for the staging of a national convention sometime in February, which will kick off the dialogue, which will appropriately take place in every voting district of our country. In every community, town, tenement and hamlet for a period of about three months.
“Collating inputs which will then be debated at a second national convention, about October, which will come up with a national pact/social contract to be sent to parliament soon thereafter for a vote. These are the broad parameters on the national dialogue agreed to between the foundations and emissaries of the president ... Mashatile heads the interministerial committee on the national dialogue, which will be the government’s interface with the preparatory committee.”
When I read that out to a senior DA figure he nearly fell off his chair. “This is outrageous,” he said. “The DA knows nothing of this and has never agreed to it and won’t agree to any national conventions and sending things to parliament for a vote. There was a f****ng election!”
I happen to think a national dialogue is a good idea, provided the politicians are kept well away from it. Sadly, that is probably impossible, and Ramaphosa seems determined to appropriate it. His previous attempts to secure pacts and agreements have all fallen flat, but while he keeps mentioning the national dialogue he will have some trouble getting his claws into this one, even if he gets to announce its formation.
The foundations involved at the heart of it — those bearing the names Mandela, Mbeki, Kathrada, Tambo, De Klerk — will resist politicising it. If they don’t, they’ll lose it.
But anything being sent to parliament is asking for trouble. The end result of the dialogue is supposed to be a new pact that deals with some of the weaknesses of the democracy we have — political accountability is an obvious sore point, as is the failure to consider cost or economic impact when producing legislation.
Any ambitious pact would probably also seek changes to the constitution. I would remove competencies from provinces unable to exercise them — health and education in the Eastern Cape for instance, would be run from the centre until the province passed a means test — and pass more services to capable provinces. Devolve rail transport services to the Western Cape, for instance, if it wants them.
But there are dark forces in parliament who, given the chance, would try to completely rewrite our founding document, and you can’t blame the DA for being nervous of them.
As for the national dialogue itself, I would suggest to the ANC, or the presidency, or whoever is managing the coalition, that they try to calm things down a little. However irritating it may be, they have to talk to the DA more in private, and before things happen. And take deep breaths. Take it easy.
• Bruce is a former editor of Business Day and the Financial Mail.
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