ANC has looted the state and destroyed the parastatals

We have been giving the ANC the opportunity of controlling the state of the Republic of South Africa since 1994. Every five years we have renewed that authority, through the instances of the ten million or so voters who voted African National Congress. The ANC has had access to and authority over the state without interruption from 1994 to 2019, that is twenty-five years of continuous ANC-led management of the state, the infrastructure of the state and the parastatals.

And let us look at the shining examples of this ANC-led management ISCOR and Sasol. Well let’s be honest, ISCOR is a highly successful corporation, that was privatised in 1989. Sasol has been owned in part by the South African Government’s Employee Pension Fund, but is not a subsidiary of it; and does not qualify as a state-owned enterprise. So in both instances the ANC-led government hasn’t been able to wreak havoc with either ISCOR or SASOL. Other shining examples of “parastatals” include Telkom and Vodacom, both of which count the South African Government as only a minor shareholder.

I’m not being funny, it’s just that every other parastatal doesn’t have a happy story of cadre-deployment, black-empowerment and government interference. It’s just a coincidence that the successful “parastatals” aren’t actually parastatals, isn’t it? Or perhaps it is indicative of something. Let us look at the circumstances of the actual parastatals then and make appropriate assessments.

Eskom is on the verge of bankruptcy. SABC is bankrupt. Transnet is on the verge of bankruptcy. SAA is bankrupt. PRASA is on the verge of bankruptcy. PetroSA is bankrupt. I have to stop there and ask the million dollar question, what the hell went wrong? Which comrade was deployed where on what mission to do what nonsense? It’s almost unbelievable that so much could go so wrong so quickly.

It seems then as the state has to deal with being more indebted, in not having a revenue surplus and not being able to count on any of its parastatals for income; that it is fair to say that the state has been looted. And in saying this we take cognisance of an above R10.00 to the US dollar rate, an unemployment rate of 30% – 50% and an inflation rate of between 10% and 30%. All of which point to some rather meaningless rhetoric about economic development. What was the ANC going on about, “economic development”? Is “economic development” a euphemism for looting the state?

It stands that the opportunity is for us, as the twenty million voters of South Africa, to not renew the authority previously granted to the ANC; to stand up for ourselves and say, “No, we will not allow ourselves to be misled and defrauded by the ANC”. We have the means to do this, simply by voting for some other political party. We have to consider what state and condition South Africa will be in when we hand it over to the next generation, and let it not be said that we did nothing while the looting and destruction was taking place. We cannot be so lazy that we do nothing.