Maroga report a fascinating read on race politics
November 10, 2009
Eskom chief executive Jacob Maroga's strategy document, submitted to the Eskom board at the end of last month, throws a little light on the shroud of secrecy that has descended over Megawatt Park around its leadership tussle.
It makes for a fascinating read, if less about the technicalities of electricity supply and more about race politics.
It has the feel of being penned by a man fighting for his job, and if yesterday's resignation of chairman Bobby Godsell is anything to go by, he may have been successful.
Maroga starts by making the point that his strategy document is "aimed at a wider audience" and is not confidential. He goes on to bemoan a culture of "fake face-to-face politeness", anonymous letters and leaked documents.
In what might be viewed as an attempt to justify his 2007 sacking of consultant Susan Olsen - who warned Maroga about massive problems in coal procurement - he criticises Eskom's "over-reliance" on outside experts. Maroga then thunders about the leaking of a report written by a white person and leaked by a white person to a white-dominated organisation - presumably the DA - and white journalists in the white-dominated media.
He also drops the news that white former executive directors of Eskom, going by the name of the "sherpas", approached him with the desire to impart advice after Eskom's blackouts and subsequent load-shedding period. "While I initially accepted this good gesture at face value, it became clear that their motivation was driven by the mentality of white supervision rather than a genuine desire to support the leadership of Eskom. We have since parted ways," Maroga says.
Maroga then explains his decision to use the services of "leadership and organisational effectiveness advisers", US-based Telein Group, rather than "traditional business consultants". Having lambasted Eskom's reliance on consultants, Maroga is silent on the irony of employing another outside expert (we are not told whether Telein is white-owned or -managed).
With such race-related accusations flying around, it becomes clearer why organisations such as the ANC Youth League and Black Management Forum have waded in.
A lot less lifestyle
There was a time when upwardly mobile householders sought homes in posh suburbs, like Houghton, on an acre of land, maintained by a full-time gardener. By the 1960s, they started switching their focus to quarter-acre stands in newly trendy areas, like Parkhurst, as the maintenance benefits outweighed the loss of park-like gardens.
The trend accelerated in the past decade as people forsook stand-alone homes for residential units in cluster developments, where they found the safety of a secured perimeter compensated for having to live cheek by jowl with their neighbours.
They may get even closer, says John Loos of FNB Home Loans, who predicts South Africa's middle classes will have a lot less lavish lifestyle in future. He believes the roads in metro areas, the country's biggest property markets, will be choked with traffic as more people acquire cars and the driving population expands faster than the road network. Despite ambitious public transport projects, he predicts only limited relief as infrastructure backlogs remain.
Moreover, for public transport to work requires greater population density to ensure there are enough potential passengers to make the routes economically viable for the transport firm. Loos says the increasing congestion will force us all to live as close to work as possible, curtailing the country's traditional urban sprawl, pushing up property prices and reducing the size of homes and stands, particularly around the main routes where homes and stands will get smaller as they are costlier.
Already the effect has been seen in Rosebank, where the planned Gautrain station has accelerated Rosebank's shopping and hotel development, sending a ripple effect through residential development in adjoining areas and even further abroad. It will be interesting to see how long gracious homes survive the onslaught. page 4
Democracy a lottery
The DA has withdrawn in protest from the selection process of a new national lotteries board. The trade and industry portfolio committee, headed by Joanmariae Fubbs, an ANC MP, has apparently recommended a group of six names for the seven-member board that need to be ratified by President Jacob Zuma in consultation with Trade and Industry Minister Rob Davies.
But DA trade and industry spokesman Kobus Marais said his party was disappointed that the ANC approached the process in "a disingenuous manner". Many of the ANC members, he said, did not attend the meeting and the party needed to ship in MPs from other committees to reach quorum. He argues many were not present during the interview stage but rammed through recommendations approved by the ruling movement.
Marais said: "What became clear is that the ANC predetermined who they wanted on the lottery board and had no interest in... appointing based on merit."
The outgoing board, one has to acknowledge, hasn't been a startling success. The department itself revealed that the board and the national lotteries distribution trust fund failed to pay out R2.2 billion in approved funding applications from charities in 2008/09. In 2007/08 of the 8 375 applications sent, 5 101 were not processed. Marais said this meant 61 percent of applications "were not even looked at". Over four years nearly R7bn in approved allocations had been unpaid, having added up figures released by the minister.
Fubbs, a former journalist, declined to comment on the process when approached yesterday. It is not clear whether the ANC will have second thoughts about pushing through the names, but Marais believes they are already cast in stone.
Such is politics, one supposes, especially of the majoritarian kind - where the majority dictate the terms. It is the first, rather uncomfortable, rule of a democracy.
Edited by Peter DeIonno. With contributions by Ingi Salgado, Ethel Hazelhurst and Donwald Pressly
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