Nkosikhulule Nyembezi
CAPE TOWN - The sudden loss of more than two million jobs and then wiping off the economy of more than R50 billion due to the July 2021 unrest have created a social, political, and economic crisis that dwarfs anything South Africa has seen in recent history.
On April 1, President Cyril Ramaphosa lamented this catastrophe while giving testimony before the Human Rights Commission, saying that “for one week and one day in July 2021, we stared into the heart of darkness,” watched in horror “as parts of KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng were engulfed in violence, looting, and destruction” in what caused many of us to feel “the greatest sense of betrayal that there were among us those who would go so far as to plot to destroy the country we have spent the past 28 years building.”
Even before the unrest, employment statistics consistently showed us that the flow of the workforce from the formal to the informal sector and from the active job seeker to the discouraged job seeker categories was far greater than what economic forecasters predicted, further upending South African politics and economy.
But the scale of this crisis is staggering, and it is still in its early stages, given the long-term effect on the economy of the riots and the coronavirus pandemic.
Coping with it will demand more coordination, imagination, funds, and determination, both within government, businesses, and civil society. Unfortunately, as we learnt from Ramaphosa’s uninspiring testimony, our government leaders are yet to hear the wake-up call and take decisive action beyond analysing the complex challenges facing our nation.
Ramaphosa was courageous in his admission that while there had been intelligence reports about the possibility of instability, neither the security forces nor the government anticipated the “nature and ferocity of these events”.
Yet, what was immediately discouraging in his narrative was a lack of plausible explanation of how after so many months have passed since the unrest, and despite numerous promises to get its house in order, Ramaphosa offered yet another lukewarm promise that “the government will ensure that the National Security Council meets at least every two months,” and that “the staffing and training of the public order policing unit will be improved.”
There was little consolation in his report that the government has “begun the process of filling vacancies in the State Security Agency” and that “the Minister of Police and the SAPS will be required to submit an updated report on the status and functionality of community policing forums to the National Security Council at its next meeting.”
This was an anti-climax that left many wondering: what is causing the delay in the promulgation of regulations “that will require the intelligence structures to provide intelligence to the National Intelligence Coordination Committee, so that intelligence is shared and used, properly and timeously, by relevant structures?”
Failure to arrest, prosecute, and convict those involved in the looting raises an inevitable comparison to the harsh treatment by the police and the army of ordinary people found with stolen food items. But the answer to a double standard cannot be to condone any acts of lawlessness.
To put it in perspective, Ramaphosa told the commission that the government had taken “decisive steps” to ensure that such events did not reoccur and that “those who were behind them are brought to justice”.
Yet, while he reiterated his stance of a failed insurrection, the police have, so far, only managed to arrest and charge those alleged to have used social media, in particular, to ‘instigate’ the rioters. Of those, all except one have been released on bail, while one case has been withdrawn.
This lack of progress leaves a negative impression that the so-called masterminds remain elusive.
It is this situation that raises suspicion that Ramaphosa was shedding crocodile tears when he said he had been troubled and touched by the operation executed by the police and military to recover looted items from the poor after the unrest.
He told the hearing that ‘operation khipha i-receipt’ – which is loosely translated as ‘operation produce a receipt’ – did not please him as he watched visuals on television of police and military going door-to-door in informal dwellings searching for looted goods.
With a measure of self-composure, he said this was particularly troubling to him, given that the retrieved food items were ultimately destroyed amid what he described as the “sea of poverty and hunger” in South Africa.
“And much as something terrible had happened when our people had been exposed to this temptation of going out to loot, I was not pleased at all as we saw poor people being visited by police and the goods – that may well have been taken from places – being taken out and destroyed,” he added.
Over time, resentment of the government’s indecisive action against the masterminds of the unrest may grow.
People who started off welcoming the promises to squash lawlessness could turn against those making empty promises, putting pressure on their communities to devise strategies to defend their businesses and private property on their terms.
Without any bold government action to ease this pressure, by supporting community policing forums, adequately resourcing and deploying personnel commanded by various heads of the security cluster, and ultimately driving the creation of jobs that pay a living wage makes this unwelcome tactic of setting out to privatise initiatives to combat crime more widespread.
These makeshift efforts are important but insufficient given the millions of people who are affected and whose livelihoods depend on assurances that their communities are safe to invest in and create the much-needed jobs. Efforts to decisively accommodate those economically displaced by the unrest need not be confined to security measures but must extend to opening investment and job opportunities.
As the country navigates a period of greater instability, its leaders can no longer ignore the need for a coordinated and humane response to all of those pushed out of balance by political unrest, economic stagnation, and other desperate circumstances.
Nyembezi is a human rights activist and policy analyst
Cape Times