Bloated government provides many jobs for ANC pals
June 29, 2009
By Donwald Pressly
The size and shape of government was a dominant topic within the walls of our national legislature last week. President Jacob Zuma, in reply to his Budget vote on Thursday, argued that the size was not that important just as long as it was effective.
Athol Trollip, the leader of the DA in the National Assembly, said Zuma had created an enormous cabinet, which "appears to owe its existence to a not too unapparent appeasement strategy". He suggested that supporters of both former president Thabo Mbeki and Zuma needed to be accommodated in an extra-large 62-member national executive.
Then Sicelo Shiceka, the Minister of Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs, threw a curve ball. He said the government was sitting on an explosive report questioning whether the country needed its nine provinces. A decision would be made by next March whether some of the provinces would be merged or all nine scrapped by 2014.
This is not the first time the debate has raged in the ANC over provinces.
In 2006 the ANC leaked to the press that it was considering abolishing the provinces. Its rationale was to streamline the delivery of government services.
It then had majorities in all nine provinces, albeit with only slender majorities in the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal. This year the ANC lost its majority in the Western Cape, but it now has an overall majority in KwaZulu-Natal.
The obvious question is: why does the central government not support the provincial system? The obvious answer is that in some provinces - most notably the Eastern Cape - lack of efficient delivery has been a constant problem.
Most of the problems encountered in the management of provincial finances appear not to be linked to corruption.
Annual financial reports reflect significant underspending, suggesting a lack of administrative capacity rather than dishonesty.
While the bill for the 780 000 public servants at provincial level has not been quantified, it is likely to be well over R200 billion a year. As political economist Steven Friedman points out, it is unlikely that scrapping the provinces will eliminate the public servants.; they will simply be transferred to the other two levels of government, national and local.
Then there are the 420 members of the provincial legislatures, 99 of whom serve as MECs or premiers in the nine provincial executive committees. The ANC holds 292 of the seats, rather a large number of jobs-for-pals, which would have to parted with, and an enormous patronage lever for the ANC's national leadership that would be lost. It seems most politically unlikely, therefore, that the nine legislatures will simply be dissolved.
Merging the provinces may be an option, especially if it achieves for the ANC the end to an opposition-ruled province.
This would be achieved by merging the DA-led Western Cape with the Northern Cape and Eastern Cape, where there are still large ANC majorities.
That would, however, amount to the ANC meddling in the constitutional make-up of our country. It carries the danger of stirring resentment among voters and may actually deliver a more sizeable province into the hands of the opposition. page 16
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