Over the past week, South Africans have had a front-row seat to a very interesting debate that was sparked by ANC NEC member and minister of tourism, Lindiwe Sisulu, around the lack of transformation of SA society and the role of the constitution in facilitating the problem.
In an opinion piece titled “Hi Mzansi, have we seen justice?”, Sisulu raises a number of issues about the glacial pace of redress, the lack of economic justice and the failures of the constitution to effect material changes in the lives of the poor black majority.
It goes on to problematise black members of the judiciary, stating: “Today, in the high echelons of our judicial system are these mentally colonised Africans, who have settled with the worldview and mindset of those who have dispossessed their ancestors…There is a need for an overhaul of a justice system that does not work for Africa and Africans.”
This particular argument has provoked the ire of many, with everyone from the acting chief justice, members of the cabinet, ANC stalwarts and columnists alike, criticising Sisulu and going as far as to call for her axing. I find this deeply disturbing.
There are two important issues about Sisulu’s article, the responses to it and the ongoing rebuttals. The first is that Sisulu’s arguments are, to a very great degree, valid. It is true that the land question remains a fundamental question in SA and that the failure to resolve it has contributed significantly to the de-agrarianisation, food insecurity and poverty of the black majority. This is not conjecture – it is fact.
The second issue is that it is true that SA society and its institutions continue to retain a colonial character. In an article titled “Why Africa’s professors are afraid of colonial education being dismantled”, renowned professor of public affairs Mashupye Maserumule contends that the African professoriate is schooled in white tradition, with a culture of whiteness imprinted in them.
This is true not only of the professoriate, but of government practitioners and others, who implement colonial ideas and Western epistemologies precisely because these are the lenses from which they make sense of the world.
As both a government official and a scholar, I know this to be true. There is an entire archive of scholarship on this very subject, so it is curious that people want to pretend that this is false when Sisulu reiterates it.
My contention with Sisulu is not the argument she is posing – it is largely a factual argument. My contention is that she undermines our intelligence by pretending that this is a recent revelation, that she genuinely cares about the issues, when in fact, it is about her own personal interests in the upcoming ANC conference.
Sisulu has served the democratic government for decades and has known of all the issues that are raised in her missives. She is part of the political elite that she pretends to chastise and has always been completely alienated from the very confronting realities of poor black existence. To pretend otherwise is insulting.
Nonetheless, none of this justifies the responses to her articles, which include calls of her sanctioning and axing. Criticising the constitution is not wrong and particularly on the question of property rights that Sisulu highlights, it is not progressive.
Reflecting on the colonial edifice of democratic institutions and those who administer them is not wrong and has been done by many scholars, intellectuals and activists whose works are of great significance.
What is wrong is ostracising people for raising uncomfortable views that do not conform to that which is palatable. It is nothing more than bullying and is the foundation on which authoritarianism is built.
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