DAVID LEWIS: All hail Ismail Momoniat for getting SA off greylist

I have no doubt that when Treasury technical adviser and head of SA’s Financial Action Task Force (FATF) delegation Ismail Momoniat, aka Momo, took on the task of getting SA off the FATF greylist he put together a team of people who assisted him in climbing this mountain. But without Momoniat’s don’t-take-no-for-an-answer style of leadership SA would still be on that list.

Nor was this simply a matter of smooth-talking a bunch of our international peers. It necessitated getting legislation through our sclerotic lawmaking process and it required a demonstrable improvement in the performance of public institutions, including several of our criminal justice agencies.

I have always resisted great (wo)man theories of history, not least because the great women and men at the centre of these accounts are mostly a bunch of oppressive autocrats. But then along comes this softly spoken public servant, a big brain to be sure but mostly a person of unimpeachable integrity who has (despite the best efforts of the EFF) risen through the ranks of the public service and has retained his understanding of what it means to be a public servant.

Accumulating wealth is not part of this meaning; nor is genuflecting before avaricious, incompetent politicians. So my rejection of great person theories of history is challenged by my belief that a dozen public servants of Momoniat’s leadership quality would put SA to rights.

Acting police minister Firoz Cachalia has much in common with Momoniat, as does Mcebisi Jonas, a former deputy finance minister. All three have been active ANC members since their teens, part of the same generation of ANC leaders who rose to high government office in the democratic era. They are all thoughtful intellectuals, not given to alarmist speculation or capricious, ill-considered action.

They are people of unimpeachable integrity with exemplary records in fighting for democracy and opposing corruption. And all are deeply concerned about the future of the country they love. South Africans would do well to heed the warnings issued independently by Cachalia and Jonas a few weeks ago.

Cachalia, in an interview conducted on the margins of an event hosted by the Kgalema Motlanthe Foundation, identified the infiltration by organised crime of government procurement systems as a threat to national security, so much so that he believes SA is at risk of becoming the next Ecuador or Colombia, both well-known narco states. Cachalia identified the removal of the police from party politics and the professionalisation of SA Police Service (SAPS) personnel as essential elements of a solution.

In an address to the same gathering, Jonas warned that SA was in danger of sliding into anticonstitutionalism and authoritarian government if, he is reported as saying, “faith in democratic institutions is not rekindled”. For this threat to be mitigated he argued that four sets of measures were needed:

• Effective border management to regulate the inflow of immigrants.
• The restoration of law and order. Of the measures needed to attain this he, like Cachalia, particularly singled out the cleaning up and depoliticisation of the police and intelligence services.
• The development of an effective and professional public service, which presupposes its arms-length distance from party politics.
• An acceleration of the pace of economic growth and transformation.

I would add a fifth task to Jonas’s list of urgent measures: tackling the decay of our metropolitan centres, Johannesburg in particular. Here the jury is in and it has concluded that the essential platforms for stimulating self-sustaining economic growth are the metropolitan areas of any country.

Want to know why SA economic growth is stagnant? Take a drive through Johannesburg. There you will see the filth and chaos of the old CBD adjacent to the great mansions of Westcliff. Or go to Sandton with its glass and steel towers and dead, empty boulevards, and then walk across the bridge over the highway to Alexandra. You will conclude that this is a country where two nations — one very wealthy, the other very poor — live side by side with little in common.

Or, for a more hopeful experience, go to the Ethiopian quarter in the CBD if you want to see entrepreneurship in action. Here you’ll find a continent-wide shopping precinct where the annual turnover is said to be higher than that of Sandton City and where adjacent hotels and restaurants do a thriving trade with customers from across Sub-Saharan Africa.

The only public servants these businesspeople ever see are corrupt police officers flagrantly pursuing their protection rackets. Anyone who wants to learn about the confrontation between successful entrepreneurs and corrupt public servants should read The Chaos Precinct, Tanya Zack’s riveting, recently published account of life and work in this entrepreneurial hub.

However, there are problems that afflict the rich and poor of Johannesburg. Fittingly in water scarce Sub-Saharan Africa, it’s the supply of water throughout Johannesburg that concerns all the residents and businesspeople of this metropolitan agglomeration (as I write this I receive a WhatsApp from my vigilant residents’ association saying “Hi, the water is off – they are still repairing Derry Road”).

Water infrastructure is collapsing and it knows little of the distinction between the rich and poor areas of Johannesburg. The same may be said of other public services — electricity, garbage collection, road repairs and security.

But the water problem may be in hand. Not because Johannesburg’s mayor (yes there is one, someone named Dada Morero), has woken from a long slumber and launched a charm offensive focused on the water crisis. But rather because a small NGO, WaterCan, led by a well-informed, kick-ass woman named Ferrial Adam, is on his case. (Of course, Dodo is besieged by a second force of nature, Hurricane Helen, who will settle for nothing less than his chain of office).

So the Johannesburg problem is not intractable. It’s a leadership issue. It’s about who governs the city after the next local government election. It’s about who manages the city. It’s about whether delinquent boards of directors of municipal entities — City Power, for example — suffer the consequences of their mismanagement. It’s about how the boards of municipal entities are selected.

Indeed, the most intractable problem SA (including Johannesburg) faces is that which keeps Cachalia awake at night, namely the depoliticisation and professionalisation of the police service. How does one begin to turn around a chronically inward-looking institution of 200,000 people with an annual budget of about R100bn? Once again, it’s leadership, stupid!

One should start by requiring the leadership of the SAPS and its various units to reapply for their jobs. Those who pass muster should be retained; those who do not should be fired or, if absolutely necessary, bought out. This process should be governed by a small board of people with the necessary skill, experience and integrity to exercise oversight of a process of this complexity and delicacy.

And they, in turn, should appoint an individual with the spine and integrity to manage this process. Anyone got Momoniat’s number?

• Lewis, a former trade unionist, academic, policymaker, regulator and company board member, was a co-founder and director of Corruption Watch.