Africa Brief                                                 
The three-dimensional Zuma  
by Cees Bruggemans          
            
There appear to be three faces to our president, not unlike the Three Faces of Eve, that don't make it any easier to understand the man, his actions, his times & what comes next. But one should perhaps try, for we have an ever sharper duality, regarding whether he would go (early) or whether he stays (to the end of his second term, though a third and more term now seems a bridge too far following events of last weekend).
The three dimensions I have in mind operate independently of each other, possible hugely increasing complexity.
Firstly, there is the overarching one of wanting to address all of SA's many structural challenges (unemployment, poverty, inequality) instead of simply accepting these many imbalances as given, hopeless & beyond repair (the mark of a failed state or a society marked by fatalism, both existing).
Secondly, there is the crucial dimension by which route these aims are to be achieved, via standard global practice leveraging off our market economy and its social-democratic system, or by way of a totally different approach.
Thirdly, there is the ethic dimension, whether all this is to be undertaken in service of the common good (the national interest) or whether this is the figleaf hiding a much more selfish, narrowly personal, enrichment intention.
If there is a fourth dimension, I am not sure of its presence, but one can perhaps still question the true nature of the intentions (be they good or evil?), and what could (still) flow from that?
If this is the playing field, how is it manifesting itself, with what results and what consequences?
There appears at first blush little doubt about the first dimension. The intentions are clear, about addressing the many evils thrown up by the past, and making for a better society, captured in the slogan "a better life for all".
One seemingly needs to spend little time on this aspect, seeing that few would accept the past as given. Instead, our outsider unemployment, their poverty, and their inequality with insiders, is well understood and earmarked for root-and-branch treatment.
On this first dimension, there appears really no difference between Zuma and every thinking South African. It is the one dimension all of our society seems to be agreed on. These are the long term goals for SA society, in the process also transforming it beyond recognition.
One could, of course, tweak this societal goal somewhat, and argue the reasoning differently, that the main intention is the transformation of society, and as part of this address structural unemployment, poverty & inequality. In essence, this is much the same thing, unless the methods used (as per the second dimension) lead to a different (suboptimal) outcome, namely a racially transformed society but one that hasn't succeeded in ending general (outsider) unemployment, poverty & inequality.
One kind of wonders, sometimes, where on this spectrum Zuma resides, giving the impression of addressing/adhering to the first interpretation, but actually very busily active with the latter, and thereby so far yielding suboptimal results (advanced success in changing the face of the nation, but dismally failing in ending structural unemployment, poverty, inequality, thus ending up with severe partial failure).
This business of achieving political freedom first, and then achieving economic freedom, not the hard way by building it (redistribution through growth), but by simply taking it (forced redistribution). This leads into the second and third dimensions, and if need be a fourth.
The second dimension has had a checkered past so far in its application, with each ANC President (Mandela, Mbeki, Zuma) bringing a somewhat different interpretation to the table. The Rainbow Constitution started off as a social pact between haves & have-nots, black & white, that we would retain a market economy within a social-democratic setting and transform society.
In its application, however, things got tweaked along the way, and seemingly ever more progressively the further away we get from 1994, to the point of true populists recently embarking on depicting Mandela as a sellout to white capital, something that has resonance especially with lost youth.
We have come a long way from Tipperary, a long way from home, they sang as they marched towards the Flemish front in WW1, and so it goes with us.
Zuma has the transformation bit firmly between his teeth, it is the one thing he & many followers understand perfectly and think they can influence, control, do, while the ending of structural unemployment, poverty & inequality may sound far more ambitious and not always obvious how to achieve. In the process, track is lost of comprehensively achieving stated aims in favour of partial achievement, and then possibly only for favoured enclaves. Sub-optimality in action.
When it comes to ways & means, then, there is a wholesale parting of the ways, if often stealthily done. Lip service paid to market capitalism, but with emphasis on state capitalism and simple socialism. Markets are depicted as evil things, and the state supposedly needs to be deeply involved to ensure the right outcomes are achieved.
The result in an open society like ours, already structured, is viciously clashing paradigms (best understood as market capitalism wrapped inside social democracy versus state capitalism wrapped inside African socialism). With the Constitution shielding the former, and having inadequate state capacity to attempt the latter (sufficient numbers of skilled, experienced cadres of civil servants), what results mainly is paralysis, as the resulting clashes invite loss of business confidence, growth stagnation and deepening structural stasis.
Such failure of course does not in any way inhibit the champions of state capitalism, who if anything have apparently become more energized as failure has deepened, possibly fired up by their new-found, similarly anti-western friends among the BRICs, thinking specifically of China and Brazil, and to a lesser extent Russia.
Indeed, we appear a very belated copy cat of Brazil, though not as far advanced down this route, and therefore as yet not as deep in the mire either (Brazil suffering from budget deficits and inflation in excess of 10%, deep into recession at -3% GDP, and her respected hawkish finance minister resigning this Friday - not fired - and replaced by a more dovish, pliable one inclined to go along with presidente Rouseff's wishes). And the precious country investment rating lost.
There we go, too, within five more years of relentless slapstick?
Such understanding of the greater world leads to a long list of preferences at variance with the inherited SA world. Thus we find the presence of market capitalism and white ownership frequently rubbished and made off as evil realities to be transformed.
This isn't the Rainbow Constitution doing the driving. This is something quite else. It has an external dimension (western democracies are the enemy, non-western societies that freed themselves of western oppression (or escaped it) are the true role models, especially when disregarding individualism, property rights, personal freedom, in the process conveniently forgetting about the American Revolution). And this is replicated internally at home (by extension, confirming the historic global links in play here).
However looked at, it doesn't seem to be forward-looking, but instead repressive backward-looking in its approach. Self-actualisation takes place on the personal level, not as part of millions of identically marching clones. But this is apparently lost on the authoritative at heart.
So we are anti-western, anti-markets, anti-white capital, and not infrequently anti-white skills and in favour of total transformation where minorities are reduced to marginal sideshows, their apparent true relevance in larger demographics. It does not suggest an open and free society or for that matter much tolerance.
Meanwhile, we are daily confronted by the implications. State-to-state deals, forced favouring of some over others, irrespective of economic disincentive or the resulting suboptimal resource allocation, the willingness of far too easily sacrificing meritocracy over mediocrity.
A lack of progress as the state is short of effective capacity, active undermining of private capital, a deep failure to retain business & now market confidence in policy & political paradigms, a slowing of the wheels of activity.
Wishing to be what we are not, with little hope of just wishing it into existence, while apparently (still) refusing to work with the cards we have, which would allow long term achievement of nearly everything wanted if cleverly applied. Unless of course African Socialism is the true end destination, in which case we are talking at cross-purposes, which throughout has been the real essence at issue for some.
While therefore somewhat confused/split about ultimate aims, and not the least confused about proximate means (these genuinely clashing, ensuring  society doesn't function efficiently and steadily loses its way), there is still the third dimension.
Is all this busy activity in the name of the national interest purely a figleaf for personal enrichment & entrenchment of a few narrow clans & kinsmen, with little sympathy for everyone else (stealthily or otherwise)?
Going by the evidence so far, I wouldn't want to spend too many words on this subject. A daily news digest over many years tells its own story, and it is getting more profound and expensive by the day. A finders fee on a R1 trill nuclear deal would be 1% or 10%, Swiss deposited of course?
And that is only the latest tip of a much larger iceberg?
Which raises the question of premature recall, full term or extended tours of duty until the Second Coming.
This is something that will be decided in inner councils. We should know the outcome within the next two years. Beyond the make-up of leadership, there are the deeper questions of what we want and how we hope to achieve it. Here recent years have started to show how costly certain approaches can be. If we persist with these, the costs can only mount, rapidly, if Brazil is any guide.
There is still time to turn the ship, and try different approaches with better chances of success. For many, though, time is getting short.

Reference
Corbett Thigpen and Hervey Cleckley "The Three Faces of Eve, a case of Multiple Personality", 1957

Cees Bruggemans                                
Bruggemans & Associates Consulting Economists                 

Website www.bruggemans.co.za
Email  economics@bruggemans.co.za
Twitter  @ceesbruggemans
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Short Profile Dr CW Bruggemans
Chairman, Bruggemans & Associates Consulting Economists
Consulting Economist, Avior Capital Markets
Consulting Economist, Ince (Pty) Ltd
Consulting Economist, Hellmann Logistics (Pty) Ltd
Consulting Economist, Bureau for Economic Research (BER), Stellenbosch
Honorary Professor of Economics, University of Stellenbosch