According to Godwin’s Law, if an Internet discussion goes on long enough, someone will eventually mention Hitler. And, at that point, the discussion is closed, because no one has anything interesting to contribute.
Ousted University of the Witwatersrand SRC president Mcebo Dlamini apparently has attempted to go one better, by mentioning Hitler before discussion reached the Internet. Apparently this happened only after he was threatened with discipline action for other unspecified misconduct. So possibly the “H” word was mentioned so he could turn the issue into attacking the Zionist conspiracy that runs the university in the form of Vice-Chancellor Adam Habib (that is apparently now a Jewish name?).
For anyone who thinks there is something theoretical about what Hitler would have done to black people this is not true. Read this.
Also, aside from the holocaust, Hitler triggered a world war that killed nearly 50-million people (80% on sides opposing him and his fellow dictators in Italy and Japan). In addition to Jews, gays, Gypsies, the disabled and Soviet prisoners of war to name a few categories of victims were brutally put to death. Anyone who sees Hitler as some sort of role model is either deeply ignorant or mentally ill.
Hitler’s “ability to organise a nation and get the people to rally behind him” that Dlamini admires was also greatly admired by the apartheid regime. Next thing he will eulogize the apartheid regime for its positive qualities. More reading here.
None of this of course justifies misbehaviour by anyone else. But let us argue on the basis of the facts, and not reinvent history to suit the argument. We can argue separately whether Zionism has a case to answer, and whether South African society – more specifically, education as a sector – has adequately transformed.
But what this is not is an instance of racist power being wielded on a defenseless victim.
Showing posts with label Black Consciousness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Black Consciousness. Show all posts
Friday, 8 May 2015
Friday, 25 July 2014
After hearing news of events in Cape Town today, I issued the following statement.
Finally, today, I am vindicated, along with MAR as she is know affectionately, and those who supported her.
Roll on Wednesday, when the judge will make his findings.
All along, we have not opposed the MP’s interdict and indeed most of the NEC MAR appointed has resigned from the party. We recognize that a fight to the finish for the party will finish the party. All we want is the truth to out.
And get on with our lives. We are working on a new active citizens social movement that will take the best ideas of Agang away from politics. You can sign up here. Indicating intent to resign from Agang is optional – many of those signing up are not members, and a few are staying on in Agang. We don’t mind because it is not a political party.
Following Agang’s MPs withdrawal of all allegations directly or indirectly made against former party leader, Dr Mamphela Ramphele in the Cape High Court today, Judge Dennis Davis gave members of AgangSA until Monday 14:00 to file opposing affidavits as to why Agang’s MPs should be expelled from Parliament.For those who missed my previous Agang article, I was sucked into leadership issues on 13 June after allegations implicating Dr Ramphele in fraud surfaced. I had sight of the “evidence” the other side produced, and it was clear they had nothing, and this was a smear campaign aimed at destabilizing the party.
This followed an interim interdict granted on 17 July by which the MPs sought to prevent their expulsion on the basis of serious allegations made by them against Dr Ramphele. Having withdrawn their allegations today, the court will have to decide whether there is still a basis for the interim order as previously granted which prevents their expulsion. Judge Davies also heard that 14 respondents to the matter had not been given reasonable time to respond. Two members of Agang’s NEC appeared in the Cape High Court today within minutes of the matter being heard – Nameka Mguzulo and Yunus Vollenhoven. The Judge also said it would be necessary to establish which is the legal National Executive Committee leading Agang in terms of its Constitution, after agreeing to hear submissions from the convenor of Agang's Presidential Task Team, Merle O’Brien appointed by Dr Ramphele to investigate and report on the state of the party.
The matter will be heard on Wednesday at the Cape High Court by Judge Davies.
Finally, today, I am vindicated, along with MAR as she is know affectionately, and those who supported her.
Roll on Wednesday, when the judge will make his findings.
All along, we have not opposed the MP’s interdict and indeed most of the NEC MAR appointed has resigned from the party. We recognize that a fight to the finish for the party will finish the party. All we want is the truth to out.
And get on with our lives. We are working on a new active citizens social movement that will take the best ideas of Agang away from politics. You can sign up here. Indicating intent to resign from Agang is optional – many of those signing up are not members, and a few are staying on in Agang. We don’t mind because it is not a political party.
Sunday, 20 July 2014
Why I Quit Agang
I recently quit from Agang. The party had some laudable goals including empowering ordinary people, and putting them back in charge of their future – rekindling of the fire that drove the Black Consciousness movement 40 years ago. Many of these goals can be pursued pretty well without political representation – all it takes is working in your community.
If you like the idea of positive work in the community, we will soon be launching a new movement with those goals, taking the best of Agang out of the political space.
If interested, sign up here. You have the option also to indicate intent to resign from Agang, but the new initiative is open to all, not just former Agang members.
In the last South African general election, I was a candidate for Agang SA at provincial and national level. I was number 2 on the Eastern Cape list (much to my surprise – I had not offered to run with any expectation of such a high spot) and number 18 on the national list. I was also on the Eastern Cape executive with two portfolios, Policy Convenor and Spokesperson.
I became involved in the national leadership on 13 June, when I had exchanged emails with various members expressing concern about where the party was headed. On that day, I received a phone call from Dr Ramphele inviting me to Cape Town to help sort out the mess. I booked my ticket (at my own expense) and spent the weekend with her and other supporters. Here are some of the things I discovered:
I ended up both on the reconstituted NEC and the task team. Needless to say, the MPs rejected all of these changes; having sat on their asses for 6 weeks and done nothing to stabilize the party, they now used the possibility of being sidelined from the NEC as an excuse to destabilize it further and grab control.
It is important to understand that in South Africa’s voting system, you do not vote for MPs in their own right. You vote for a party, often strongly identified with its leader. Between elections, MPs do not have a constituency or voting district that can call them to account. If MPs run the party without any controls, they are not accountable until the next election. A coup by MPs therefore is a serious subversion of democracy.
Starting around mid-May, a series of national inter-provincial meetings was called by obscure members who had no standing to do so. The Eastern Cape executive was concerned about the intent of these meetings and declined to attend, accompanied by an increasing list of provincial chairs. At the end, we had support in this stand from four other provinces. It is important to understand that the support from the five provinces concerned was from elected leaders. The only province where the leadership was in dispute was Gauteng, where the dissenting faction had suspended the leadership, and Dr Ramphele had reinstated them.
While Agang had not established comprehensive democratic processes, the provincial executives were elected. Calling a series of meetings, culminating in the 29 June meeting that “voted” in a new NEC and “suspended” Dr Ramphele, without involving the majority of the provincial executives, therefore can hardly be considered democratic. And this from a group that accuse her of being dictatorial and undemocratic.
At an early stage of this, Tshishonga was ducking and diving. While he did nothing to help stabilize the party, he professed no involvement with the instability. His failure to show up at the 12 June NEC meeting to me pointed to irresponsibility at best, complicity at worst. He and Tloumma were in full possession of the facts about the fraud allegation at that stage. Their clear duty as senior office bearers was to give Dr Ramphele the opportunity to examine and explain the evidence, rather than to use it as a weapon against her in a power grab.
By the 29 June meeting, we felt we had exhausted all options for reconciliation. Tloumma had agreed to mediation with Dr Ramphele, and failed to show up at the appointed time. He had also agreed to bring in new members to the task team to make it more representative, and reneged.
Even so, after Dr Ramphele announced her withdrawal from politics on 8 July, we made one more try. The answer: accept their new NEC. We could not accept that their NEC had any constitutional validity, and negotiation in any case requires some give and take from both sides, not a fixed position.
When the MPs and their acolytes took the matter to court to obtain an interdict to enforce their interpretation of events, we decided it would be futile to oppose them. While their case was riddled with logic and factual errors, the party was R20-million in debt with unpaid salaries and creditors. Any action in the High Court involves significant costs, and we could not ethically commit to such costs when so much money was owed. We also could not see a positive outcome: no matter who won the case, the public does not warm to parties that conduct their affairs by acrimonious lawsuits. So we did not oppose, and the judge gave them exactly what they wanted.
In a situation where I was prohibited from speaking for the party – noting that I was a provincial spokesperson and not deposed from that position – and where the party’s NEC was now fully under the control of those who were willing to destroy the party to keep their seats in parliament, I had no option but to walk away, along with the rest of the NEC that the court had overturned.
So the short summary: if you are happy with the new management of Agang, stay with them. If not, join us in our new initiative. If you liked the idea of Agang but didn’t buy into it as a party, let’s hear from you too. Here is the link again.
If you like the idea of positive work in the community, we will soon be launching a new movement with those goals, taking the best of Agang out of the political space.
If interested, sign up here. You have the option also to indicate intent to resign from Agang, but the new initiative is open to all, not just former Agang members.
In the last South African general election, I was a candidate for Agang SA at provincial and national level. I was number 2 on the Eastern Cape list (much to my surprise – I had not offered to run with any expectation of such a high spot) and number 18 on the national list. I was also on the Eastern Cape executive with two portfolios, Policy Convenor and Spokesperson.
I became involved in the national leadership on 13 June, when I had exchanged emails with various members expressing concern about where the party was headed. On that day, I received a phone call from Dr Ramphele inviting me to Cape Town to help sort out the mess. I booked my ticket (at my own expense) and spent the weekend with her and other supporters. Here are some of the things I discovered:
- the fraud allegations against her were based on flimsy evidence that clearly implicated someone else rather than her in inappropriate paperwork submitted to the IEC
- the party had a massive debt, including over R1-million owed to SARS (South Africa’s tax agency)
- how, I wondered would a organization not trading for profit owe so much in taxes?
- party officials had paid themselves huge executive salaries and not bothered with basics like ensuring that PAYE (payroll income tax deductions) was remitted to SARS
- the party had lost control of its member database because of failure to pay service providers
- we could not do a membership audit needed as a first step towards democratizing our party structures; that included a long-overdue national elective conference
- we could not communicate with members
- the NEC generally was not functioning
- key members had resigned and not been replaced
- meetings were held without minutes and agendas
- meetings had to be cancelled for lack of a quorum
- the critical tasks to fix the financial and infrastructural problems were not being tackled
- the NEC was supposed to have met on 12 June, when it could have dealt with the fraud allegations
- only 3 members had turned up so it could take no decisions, lacking a quorum
- meanwhile wild and incorrect rumours of fraud were circulating, and the two MPs (Tshishonga and Tloumma) were doing nothing to stop this – including press statements being issued by previously unknown “spokespersons”
I ended up both on the reconstituted NEC and the task team. Needless to say, the MPs rejected all of these changes; having sat on their asses for 6 weeks and done nothing to stabilize the party, they now used the possibility of being sidelined from the NEC as an excuse to destabilize it further and grab control.
It is important to understand that in South Africa’s voting system, you do not vote for MPs in their own right. You vote for a party, often strongly identified with its leader. Between elections, MPs do not have a constituency or voting district that can call them to account. If MPs run the party without any controls, they are not accountable until the next election. A coup by MPs therefore is a serious subversion of democracy.
Starting around mid-May, a series of national inter-provincial meetings was called by obscure members who had no standing to do so. The Eastern Cape executive was concerned about the intent of these meetings and declined to attend, accompanied by an increasing list of provincial chairs. At the end, we had support in this stand from four other provinces. It is important to understand that the support from the five provinces concerned was from elected leaders. The only province where the leadership was in dispute was Gauteng, where the dissenting faction had suspended the leadership, and Dr Ramphele had reinstated them.
While Agang had not established comprehensive democratic processes, the provincial executives were elected. Calling a series of meetings, culminating in the 29 June meeting that “voted” in a new NEC and “suspended” Dr Ramphele, without involving the majority of the provincial executives, therefore can hardly be considered democratic. And this from a group that accuse her of being dictatorial and undemocratic.
At an early stage of this, Tshishonga was ducking and diving. While he did nothing to help stabilize the party, he professed no involvement with the instability. His failure to show up at the 12 June NEC meeting to me pointed to irresponsibility at best, complicity at worst. He and Tloumma were in full possession of the facts about the fraud allegation at that stage. Their clear duty as senior office bearers was to give Dr Ramphele the opportunity to examine and explain the evidence, rather than to use it as a weapon against her in a power grab.
By the 29 June meeting, we felt we had exhausted all options for reconciliation. Tloumma had agreed to mediation with Dr Ramphele, and failed to show up at the appointed time. He had also agreed to bring in new members to the task team to make it more representative, and reneged.
Even so, after Dr Ramphele announced her withdrawal from politics on 8 July, we made one more try. The answer: accept their new NEC. We could not accept that their NEC had any constitutional validity, and negotiation in any case requires some give and take from both sides, not a fixed position.
When the MPs and their acolytes took the matter to court to obtain an interdict to enforce their interpretation of events, we decided it would be futile to oppose them. While their case was riddled with logic and factual errors, the party was R20-million in debt with unpaid salaries and creditors. Any action in the High Court involves significant costs, and we could not ethically commit to such costs when so much money was owed. We also could not see a positive outcome: no matter who won the case, the public does not warm to parties that conduct their affairs by acrimonious lawsuits. So we did not oppose, and the judge gave them exactly what they wanted.
In a situation where I was prohibited from speaking for the party – noting that I was a provincial spokesperson and not deposed from that position – and where the party’s NEC was now fully under the control of those who were willing to destroy the party to keep their seats in parliament, I had no option but to walk away, along with the rest of the NEC that the court had overturned.
So the short summary: if you are happy with the new management of Agang, stay with them. If not, join us in our new initiative. If you liked the idea of Agang but didn’t buy into it as a party, let’s hear from you too. Here is the link again.
Saturday, 5 March 2011
A New Modernity
Japan has done it. South Korea has done it. China may yet do it. A society with a long cultural tradition that has become stuck in old ways or that has become corrupted and lost its internal drive can only escape by defining its own modernity. Yes, there are major flaws in each of those I've cited: Japan went the extremely bad path of adventurous militarism in the first half the the twentieth century, and even today has an excessively strong work ethic to the detriment of quality of life. China is still far from a modern society in truly embracing the universal values of freedom of speech, freedom of association and accountable government.
In much of Africa, defining modernity remains elusive because much of Africa is still caught up in a victim psychosis, something South African activist Steve Biko
identified in the 1970s as a critical problem. In his Black Consciousness movement, a critical element of their politics was building self esteem, including excluding White liberals from decision-making. The theory was not racially based, but rather aimed to liberate disadvantaged Black South Africans from the thinking that their plight was out of their control.
Today in the Middle East and North Africa, a transformation is under way that looks like defining a new modernity for the region. As I was formulating the thoughts that went into this article, I was pleased to encounter this TED talk by Wadah Khanfar, director-general of Al Jazeera. Much of what he says exactly echoes my thoughts on the subject.
What has made all this possible? Very much as in the 1976 Soweto uprising, young people who have not had the experience of their elders of being cowed by a police state have taken to the streets to demand their freedom. Sadly, in 1976, the Biko spirit was stilled before his organization had grown to critical mass. Biko himself was murdered by the apartheid regime in 1977, and many of his supporters gravitated to the ANC, as the only major organization in exile with any capacity to fight back – limited though that was. In the process, many of his core ideas were lost, not least the need to break free from the past. Today, much of the problem South Africa has in growing as a society arises from failures to transcend the apartheid past. Many Black people justifiably still feel they are victims but that feeling is not an empowering feeling, rather it is one that easily gives way to despair and disillusionment when facing intractable problems.
So where next for the Arab revolution? A key thing that is different this time around is that a tool for mass mobilisation exists that didn't exist in apartheid South Africa: social networks. The nearest analog I can think of for what is happening now is the early stages of the rejection of Robert Mugabe, when text messages were used to spread the word that he wasn't as popular as most people thought. The upshot of this was that he lost a referendum on a new constitution in February 2000, which would have entitled him to redistribute land without compensation. This did not amount to regime change, and gave Mugabe the space to organize against opposition before the next election, which he nonetheless only won by extensive fraud.
Where the Arab revolution differs is that it has effected regime change in sufficient countries to make a difference, and the tools of mass mobilisation will not be closed down easily in those countries. Already in Egypt, the prime minister appointed after the military takeover has been forced to step down. Libya is possibly the most difficult case, with plenty of evidence that the Gaddafi regime will kill as many people as it takes to cling to power.
The exact form the Arab modernity will take is yet to be determined. I would like to bet it will not include slavish copying of external cultures, nor will it include a regressive interpretation of Islam. Universal values are at the core of the change that is now sweeping the Arab world, and those universal values are being interpreted by ordinary people – not being imposed from outside. That is important, because democracy is not a piece of paper. No matter how good a constitution you have if the population as a whole is unwilling to or afraid of demanding their rights, it is only a piece of paper.
In much of Africa, defining modernity remains elusive because much of Africa is still caught up in a victim psychosis, something South African activist Steve Biko
identified in the 1970s as a critical problem. In his Black Consciousness movement, a critical element of their politics was building self esteem, including excluding White liberals from decision-making. The theory was not racially based, but rather aimed to liberate disadvantaged Black South Africans from the thinking that their plight was out of their control.Today in the Middle East and North Africa, a transformation is under way that looks like defining a new modernity for the region. As I was formulating the thoughts that went into this article, I was pleased to encounter this TED talk by Wadah Khanfar, director-general of Al Jazeera. Much of what he says exactly echoes my thoughts on the subject.
What has made all this possible? Very much as in the 1976 Soweto uprising, young people who have not had the experience of their elders of being cowed by a police state have taken to the streets to demand their freedom. Sadly, in 1976, the Biko spirit was stilled before his organization had grown to critical mass. Biko himself was murdered by the apartheid regime in 1977, and many of his supporters gravitated to the ANC, as the only major organization in exile with any capacity to fight back – limited though that was. In the process, many of his core ideas were lost, not least the need to break free from the past. Today, much of the problem South Africa has in growing as a society arises from failures to transcend the apartheid past. Many Black people justifiably still feel they are victims but that feeling is not an empowering feeling, rather it is one that easily gives way to despair and disillusionment when facing intractable problems.
So where next for the Arab revolution? A key thing that is different this time around is that a tool for mass mobilisation exists that didn't exist in apartheid South Africa: social networks. The nearest analog I can think of for what is happening now is the early stages of the rejection of Robert Mugabe, when text messages were used to spread the word that he wasn't as popular as most people thought. The upshot of this was that he lost a referendum on a new constitution in February 2000, which would have entitled him to redistribute land without compensation. This did not amount to regime change, and gave Mugabe the space to organize against opposition before the next election, which he nonetheless only won by extensive fraud.
Where the Arab revolution differs is that it has effected regime change in sufficient countries to make a difference, and the tools of mass mobilisation will not be closed down easily in those countries. Already in Egypt, the prime minister appointed after the military takeover has been forced to step down. Libya is possibly the most difficult case, with plenty of evidence that the Gaddafi regime will kill as many people as it takes to cling to power.
The exact form the Arab modernity will take is yet to be determined. I would like to bet it will not include slavish copying of external cultures, nor will it include a regressive interpretation of Islam. Universal values are at the core of the change that is now sweeping the Arab world, and those universal values are being interpreted by ordinary people – not being imposed from outside. That is important, because democracy is not a piece of paper. No matter how good a constitution you have if the population as a whole is unwilling to or afraid of demanding their rights, it is only a piece of paper.
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