There are a lot of really angry people around town these days. School pupils, their parents and teachers are livid with the government’s high-handed attitude in mismanaging the country’s education system generally – and the schools in Grahamstown in particular.
There are a lot of really angry people around town these days. School pupils, their parents and teachers are livid with the government’s high-handed attitude in mismanaging the country’s education system generally – and the schools in Grahamstown in particular.
Several schools have demonstrated against the department this week already. Residents in Phaphamani Township have protested for two days, because local authorities have not fulfilled their service-delivery promises.
On Wednesday, hundreds of people marching under the banners of the Unemployed Peoples Movement, Women's Social Forum and the Rural People's Movement paused outside the High Court to shout slogans against rapists.
They then continued their march to the City Hall, where demonstrators at times mixed up outrage against rapists with fury against municipal officials, who did not do their jobs. The root cause of most of these problems is that elected officials do not pay enough attention to the needs of the people they are supposed to be serving.
If one draws a salary as a municipal councillor, as a cabinet minister, or anything in between, you are supposed to work in the interests of the people who elected you. This is not happening. If elected officials do not meet the expectations of their constituencies, they should be voted out in the next election.
The problem is that this is not going to happen. The elected officials are perfectly aware that they will win the next election, whether they work hard, or do nothing at all. All they have to do is to toe the line of the ruling faction within the ANC.
The ruling party is in an impregnable position, and everyone knows that. School children can march, residents living in abject poverty can block roads and the police can even arrest demonstration leaders – it makes no difference, because all those people who are so angry with the authorities will shortly vote those same authorities back into power in the next local election – coming up before the end of May – or the next national election due in the next four years or so.
This is completely counter-intuitive, because the fundamental tenets of democracy say that if you don’t like this government, then vote in another one. The fact that the ANC is assured of winning the next election, irrespective of how badly it manages the country, indicates that we have a serious problem: Either the electorate is nuts, or there simply isn’t a credible opposition.
Neither option bodes well for the future of this country.
