Letter to President Zuma: SA in 2020

Dear Mr. President

The year 2010 marks the start of the second decade of the 21st century and 16 years since our first democratic elections in 1994. A lot has happened in our country over the past 16 years. On the upside, the relations between the races have improved but we are nowhere near true harmony (and perhaps that could never be attained in such a heterogeneous society like ours); GDP has grown in leaps and bounds; and while the economic gap between the poor and the wealthy has widened, there are now more Blacks, Coloureds and Indians in the middle class than before 1994. On the downside, denialism has resulted in a high incidence of HIV/AIDS; poverty levels remain high and crime has ravaged our country. While our performance on the cricket and rugby fields has been admirable, football has been nothing but a major national embarrassment both on and off the field.

Mr. President, like most citizens I have certain wishes for my country and it is for this reason that I’ve been asking myself the question “What will South Africa look like in 2020?” It is in with this question in mind that I have taken the time to write this open letter to you.

Sport

Mr President sport plays a very important part in the lives of South Africans and the beautiful game of football, even more so. It is therefore my wish that when we look back a decade from now we can proudly say South Africa hosted a resoundingly successful 2010 FIFA World Cup accompanied by visible benefits from the related FIFA World Cup legacy programmes. I hope that one of the most visible results of benefits of the legacy programmes would be a significant improvement in South Africa’s position on FIFA World ranking, from position 85 (according to the Nov 2009 rankings) to at least position 40 if not better, making South Africa both an African as well as a global force to be reckoned with on the pitch. Mr President, the Olympic Games attract the most elite talent across a diversity of major sporting codes, as such it is conventional wisdom that a country’s performance at the Games mirrors its general pedigree as a sporting nation. Based on this logic Mr Presdient, it is my wish that our athletes would bring home significantly more medals from the 2018 Olympic Games than the solitary silver medal attained from the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. This can only be possible if the administration of the Athletics and Olympic bodies are completely overhauled.

Economy

Mr President performance of the economy is by far the most important barometer of how well our country is progressing. It is my wish therefore that our GDP per capita could improve from its current US$5,600 level to a much higher figure, perhaps closer to US$10,000 and that this resultant growth in GDP would mean reduced levels of poverty and a narrower gap between the rich and the poor. In 2009 South Africa had a very high gini coefficient of between .56 and .67, depending on the source of reference. Mr President, I also wish that a decade from now South Africa would be a world leader in one economic discipline or another, especially at a tertiary level, meaning even less reliance on natural resources. Of course the success of this leadership position would have to be defined by the impact on our country's exports, the product or service must attract significant international interest and customer base. Other former third world countries such as the Far Easter nations transformed themselves into First World nations by becoming leaders in the production of finished goods such as motor cars and electronic goods, and South Africa needs its own version of finished goods successes.

Social

Mr President on the social side, I do wish that a decade from now South Africa could be regarded as a success story in its efforts to deal with the HIV epidemic. This would mean there would be excellent strategies to deal with the prevention of mother-to-child transmissions; effective and affordable treatment for those already infected, especially among the poor. It is my wish that the HIV infection prevalence rate would be less than the current 10% of total the population, as is currently the case. Perhaps more important than anything else Mr President, I wish that more people would be employed than is currently the case. Our unemployment rate in the past decade has been consistently above the 20% level, it would be exciting indeed to see this figure decline to a level closer to 10% or lower, a decade from hence. This could be achieved through concerted economic growth strategies as well as a compelling education plan . My opinion is that improved education ought to be at the heart of these strategies with a focus on producing more graduates with qualifications in the hard sciences (SA Education Proposition).

Politics

Mr President, I think it is safe to say that barring a catastrophe, the ANC will the 2019 general elections under a new President. It is common knowledge that our constitution as it currently stands allows an individual to be President for only two terms. Looking at the legacy of your presidency it is my wish that your vision for improved service deliver would be a reality a decade from now. Another wish I have is that a decade from now you would have transformed and enhanced our education system to point where we consistently achieve matriculation pass rates (with exemptions) above 65%, with a majority of these passing matriculants going on to attain degrees, diploma’s and certificates which would make them more employable than many of the learners currently leaving the schooling system.

A compelling housing proposition for SA

Housing is a major problem in South Africa, you simply need to look at the number of informal housing settlements that are continuing to mushroom across the country to comprehend the magnitude of the problem. According to the Ministry of Human Settlements (formerly Department of Housing) the department built just over 1,8 million subsidized houses between the period 1994 to 2005. This translates to an average of 163,000 houses built per annum over that period, a figure which is rather disappointing given the millions of people who live in makeshift dwellings or completely homeless. South Africa’s housing problem is exacerbates by the high unemployment rate, which means that a large number of those people living in informal houses simply cannot afford to fund a proper home even under government’s generous housing subsidies. The right to adequate housing and the right to human dignity are enshrined in our Constitution, as such government is obliged to devise plans to ensure that every citizen has access to adequate housing, housing which has supply of clean running water as well as electricity. The challenge facing the Government of President Zuma and Mr. Tokyo Sexwale the Minister of Human Settlements, is one of delivering adequate housing to a population which can hardly afford to pay for a house let alone maintaining it once occupied. Mr Sexwale’s team needs a compelling and radical housing proposition and in my view this kind of strategy would take a number of elements into account, in order to succeed.

Financing

Currently government has a number of funding schemes run under the auspices of a number of different institutions however, such schemes are effectively involved in the conventional loan financing business. What government really needs is a radical funding model which takes into account the high unemployment levels. One of the ways to achieve this is for government to increase expenditure budget allocated to the Ministry of Human Settlements from its current 1.4% (around R10.9 Bil) share of total national expenditure in the 2009/10 fiscus (excluding debt finance costs) to a figure perhaps similar to that allocated to Defence, around R35 Bil and perhaps reduce the Defence and other departments’ allocations accordingly. Government may also need to discriminate in terms of how it allocates houses, between those earning a living-wage on the one hand and on the other hand those earning less than the living-wage or nothing at all. I dare say that increasing taxes to fund the housing problem would not only be undesirable but would be lacking in the innovation required to deal effectively with the problem.


Innovation: Water and Energy Supply

South Africa's top 10 personalities of 2009

The criteria for my top ten was very simply based on media coverage the personalities received in their sphere of influence and more importantly on the social impact of the reasons for the interest generated by each personality. Looking at the personalities in my top ten, they are dominated by politicians but the list also includes, an athlete, sports admistartors, business personalities, an economist and an "entertainer", where the word entertainer is used very loosely. The names are not listed in any particular order.

1. President Jacob Zuma: he came back from the political wilderness to lead the ANC to an election victory and became the fourth president of the Republic of South Africa since the first democratic lections of 1994. All signs are that Mr. Zuma’s legacy as President will be one based on service delivery;
2. Helen Zille: her party gave the ANC a run for their money in the general elections resulting in her party winning the Western Province making her Premier of that province, the only province not governed by the ANC;
3. Julius Malema: like him or not, Julius has made himself head in 2009. No doubt he will continue to do so in 2010;
4. Sizwe Nxasana: in June 2009 he was appointed the first Black CEO of a banking group. Nxasana will take over as Group CEO of First Rand Limited on 1 Jan 2010;
5. Alan Knott-Craig: he finally relinquished his post as CEO of the Vodacom Group, having started the company from scratch and led it to become the number mobile company in South Africa. He capped off the year by releasing his autobiography "Second is Nothing";
6. Tito Mboweni: the former Governor of the Reserve Bank took his last bow and made a calm and un-eventful exit at the helm of the Bank. Uneventfulness and Calmness is what the markets expected from Mboweni’s exit, and that’s what the markets received;
7. Caster Semenya: she epitomises both pain and joy. If Caster has not been broken by the ASA debacle at the IAAF World Championships in Berlin, she must surely be a stronger person for this experience. I hope it is the latter;
8. Carlos Alberto Perreira: the Bafana Bafana coach takes my award for “the come back-kid of the year”. Now all he needs to do take South Africa to the knock-out stage of the 2010 FIFA World Cup;
9. Irvin Khoza and Danny Jordaan: these two gentlemen have made South Africa proud by successfully delivering first, the FIFA Confederations Cup and then more recently the 2010 FIFA World Cup Draw. Now the stage is set for the final event in 2010;
10. Ras Dumisani: Not only did he embarrass himself but he also embarrassed South Africa with his uninspired rendition of the national anthem in France. The less said about Ras the better.
    

May you have a Properous 2010

SA needs innovative employment proposition

Jobs, jobs and more jobs is what our economy needs to show that the economic tide is truly changing for the better. For a number of years before even the recession - which South Africa and the rest of the world seems to be coming out of - has been experiencing unemployment rate above the 20% mark. According to Stats SA’s Labour Force Report for the third quarter of 2009, South Africa’s unemployment rate stood at 24.5%, with the Black population showing the highest unemployment rate (28.8%) and the White population, the least unemployment (4.8). Looking forward renewed hopes for GDP growth will play a big part in creating the demand that will help create new jobs. However South Africa would need an exponential annual GDP growth in order to create the number of jobs required to make a sizable dent into such a high unemployment rate. As such, the Government of President Zuma needs to devise a bold plan aimed at creating hundreds of thousands of jobs annually. To be sure, government has through its various infrastructure investment projects created a thousands of jobs and put many South Africans to work, think the Bus Rapid Transport system (BRT), think the Gautrain and of course don’t forget the multitude of stadia that have been built or renovated in support of the 2010 FIFA World Cup, among a host of crucial state-funded initiatives. While these programme tend to generate a huge number of direct employment opportunities, such opportunities often tend to fall away once the projects reach completion. What is therefore required are government projects which generate sustainable direct and indirect jobs. One of the most effective ways to create long-term sustainable jobs, government ought review the education system with a view to developing and producing more graduates with qualifications in the hard sciences (as stated in my previous blogs). Indeed in an article he published in “The World in 2010” a magazine published annually by “The Economist”, President Jacob Zuma openly acknowledges that education holds the key to unlocking South Africa’s economic potential, stating that, “Unemployment remains stubbornly high, in part because of our narrow skills base. It is for this reason that my administration is stressing education in plans for the next five years”. Asian economies used education as means to change their economic fortunes to great success and President Zuma and his Cabinet will need to find innovative ways of creating sustainable jobs in order to deal with unemployment, once and for all. Some of the innovative job creation ideas government needs to consider include: closer collaboration on job-creation strategy between government the private sector and society in general. To this end, perhaps the role and mandate of the National Economic Development and Labour Council (NEDLAC) ought to be reviewed; creation of an education fund aimed at creating more graduates with qualifications in the hard sciences as a key driver of exponential GDP growth; position South Africa as a leader in innovation and design of solution for a greener production technologies which could be exported to other countries. Whatever happens, South Africa needs to shy away from a conventional approach to solving the unemployment problem, the situation is simply too dire not to think outside the box.

More effective Government communication

Let me be the first one to acknowledge that since 1994 the South African government has established some innovative communications platforms through the Government Communications Information System (GCIS), an entity which provides communication services to all arms of government. Certainly the communication of government initiatives to the citizens of South Africa and the general population is one of the biggest tasks which faces the GCIS on a daily basis. To this end, the GCIS has established a government news internet portal (BuaNews.gov.za) along with other publications which target different audiences within society. Let’s also not forget the websites of the different government departments which seem to be well structured and resourced. All in all, the GCIS is doing some really good work, especially in the way that it has embraced information technology as a communication tool. However, I must point out that many of the GCIS initiatives are simply below-the-line in nature with a very narrow reach among the general population, even the above mentioned internet portal and the different government departments websites are have limited reach given the low internet penetration rate in our country. Therefore, apart from the occasional announcements made by Government and carried by the different media, the average citizen is not well-informed of government’s performance. What always amazes me is that the ruling party always seems to spend a huge amount of money on above-the-line communication around the different election periods, be it the national general election or the municipal elections. Even some government departments have been known to use above the line campaigns to communicate their achievement during the election period. Who can forget the wonderful campaign by the Department of Housing (now Dep. of Human Settlements) where the department bragged about its successes in delivering houses to the poor. Now wouldn’t it be nice of government to stay connected to the citizens in this manner all year-round? It would certainly make us all appreciate government more! My challenge therefore is for government and ,to a lesser extent, the ruling party to have a clear above-the-line strategy (by department) aimed squarely at keeping the average tax-payer informed of progress on government initiatives, big or small .

Time for sound economic proposition

News that South Africa is finally out of a technical recession following a recent announcement by Stats SA that the economy grew in the third quarter of 2009 by 0.9% was refreshing and encouraging indeed. The end of the recession brings with it hope that the economy will see a renewed appetite for new jobs and possibly growth in personal expenditure going into the fourth quarter of 2009. However, the third quarter GDP figure cannot and must not detract from the need to carry out a debate on how South Africa ought to position itself for aggressive economic growth over the next decade or two, in an effort to eradicate poverty and severe inequality between the haves and have-nots. While South Africa’s economy has strong elements of a first world country, led mainly by the advanced financial and manufacturing sectors, a large part of South Africa’s population (+24% remains unemployed). Furthermore, according to the most recently available figures from Statistics South Africa, South Africa’s poverty levels are at a staggering 47.1% of the total population, a significant majority of the poor being black. Obvious as this may sound, any strategy by government to grow the economy must therefore take into account the fact that poverty remains largely defined along race lines. Poverty means that those who are poor have a general lack of affordability and this creates other majors ills such as malnutrition, high prevalence of sickness and disease, higher levels of crime, low levels of education among the youth (as they need to start earning a living from an early age), among many other ills. As stated in my previous blog posting titled “Time for new education proposition”, if South Africa wants to become part of the “Knowledge Economy” it has to echnologies to enhance the production of goods and services. My proposal is that President’s Zuma’s government economic growth proposition therefore ought to contain the following key drivers:

An education system that aims to produce tertiary graduates specialising mainly in the hard sciences. Currently in South Africa education is compulsory up to the age of 15 years or Grade nine, my view is that this ought to be increased up to at least the age of 18 or grade 12 or an equivalent thereof;

Policies which are favourable towards entrepreneurship, be it through a more relaxed tax regime, easier access to funding or a combination of the two;

Policies which encourage exportation of the lucrative processed goods market, as opposed to the mere exportation of raw materials;

Policies which place even higher value on intellectual property rights than is currently the case.

This or any economic growth proposition will, in one way or the other, result in increased government budget deficit. The rich South Africans are already heavily taxed, therefore I would not support increased taxation to help prop up government coffers. Perhaps the time has come for our government to accept that we are a developmental state and that we would need to consider more borrowing in order to fund government expenditure. My assumption is that the investment made in the development of our people now and over the next decade would ultimately result in an economy that is grows at a fast enough rate than the cost of servicing the incurred debt. I have no doubt in my mind that the newly-formed Ministry of Planning in the office of The Presidency guided by Minister Trevor Manuel is already considering such issues.

Time for new education proposition

In my previous blog posting below I made a case in favour of the South African government devising an education strategy with a strong focus on the hard sciences. However, the real challenge facing the Ministers of Basic and Higher Education is one of preparing South Africa for the rise of the Knowledge Economy. Much has been written about the knowledge economy and what it represents and at the basic level, this is the economy where the “raw materials” used to generate wealth are information and technology. The economies of most developed countries are knowledge-driven characterised by a high degree of innovation as well as the use of technology as a way to enhance production and services delivery. Take a moment to reflect on the products and services you consumer or use on a daily basis and chances are these are most likely to originate from a developing country such as the USA, Japan, South Korea or some European country. These are countries that have invested a great deal in the education of their citizens because it is only through education that knowledge can be gained. In order to generate sufficient levels of knowledge to make South Africa compete on the international stage with regards innovation and technological advancement, South Africa must have a clear education proposition. Some of the elements which must be taken into consideration regarding this education proposition relate to how the education system is financed and the degree of access to such education by the average citizen. My opinion is that all children up to matric primary school ought to have free access to education. From secondary up to tertiary levels, students who achieve a pre-determined standard of results in terms of academic performance ought to receive free education. However access to education is only part of the education strategy picture, the three other key elements to consider are 1) the quality of teachers; 2) the quality of the syllabus, including the accessories needed to deliver the syllabus and 3) the quality of infrastructure, the bricks and mortar. This strategy would no doubt increase government’s education expenditure but it will no doubt contribute towards creating a more knowledgeable society. To this end government would need to find other ways to finance education, this could be through diverting some of the funds from the national lottery towards the Basic and Higher Education Ministries, as well as some form of a tax. Perhaps instead of creating a completely new tax to fund the new education proposition budget, government could indeed divert funds from an existing tax towards this purposes. Another more obvious option but perhaps not so easy to achieve is to reduce the budget allocation of one department or more and increase the overall budget of the two education departments. If South Africa is to become globally competitive, we need an overhaul of the education system because what we have now will simply not cut it.

SA requires ambitious education plan!

In her celebrated article in the Asian edition of "Time" magazine titled “School Daze” which focuses on the evolution of the education system in Asia, American journalist Hannah Beech observes that, “the East Asian economic miracle was built on a number of sturdy pillars: hard work, high savings rates and Confucian values—in particular, an almost fanatical belief in the value of education. And for years, Asia could rest easy in the know-ledge that its school systems were producing the best and the brightest.” Without any doubt education has played a big part in the transformation of many Asian economies (Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan, among others) from the poor nations they were at the turn of the 20th century to first world economies by the end of that century. From the very onset Asian governments chose the strategy of “producing” skilled scientists through education as a way of growing their economies. The success of this strategic focus on education as a way of developing and growing Asian economies is now a matter for the history books, but what can South Africa learn from this experience? South Africa needs a bold and ambitious education strategy coupled with other strategies, aimed at advancing government’s overall vision of establishing a prosperous nation. I suspect that part of this bold new education strategy would include the identification of the key disciplines necessary to transform our economy, the Asian countries chose to focus on the hard sciences however upon analysis it may emerge that South Africa could well be better suited to focusing on social sciences. Given government’s limited resources, a choice between two (hard versus social sciences) has to be made. A key consideration on the choice between the hard and social sciences is that government would also have to consider the impact on both school level and tertiary level curricula. Funding is also a key consideration in terms of the education strategy chosen, many Asian countries have preferred the option of free education up to tertiary level as this ensured that individuals who excelled at school level could seamlessly progress to tertiary institutions thus guaranteeing a steady supply of qualified graduates into the labour market. For me the choice is a simple one, South Africa’s government must focus on an education system which puts great emphasis on and gives great reward to individuals who excel in the hard sciences. One hopes that these are the kind of issues the National Planning Commission, once established, would grapple with.

ASA needs revamped corporate structure

South Africa is a nation of sports fanatics, people passionate about their teams and the individual sports stars. That South Africa has won the IRB Rugby World Cup twice since readmission into world sport is bears testimony to our ability both on the sporting field as well as in the boardroom. For years the rugby boardroom under the auspices of SA Rugby and Football Union (SARFU) was under the strong leadership of Dr. Louis Luyt whom some argue that he single-handedly put in place the foundation which set South African rugby on its path for success. Like rugby, South African cricket also enjoyed the leadership of a strong individual, one Dr Ali Bacher, who also set in place great foundations for the success that South African cricket currently enjoys. South African football was also blessed with the astute leadership of the late Dr Stix Morewa, whom many accredit with championing the professionalization of the football in our country. Athletics on the other hand has enjoyed relatively more success on the field than in the boardroom. At the risk of upsetting former leaders of Athletics South Africa (ASA), the organization has not had the fortune of a great leader at the helm and ASA therefore lacks the critical foundations such a leader would have put in place to ensure sustained success. When ASA first came into being it had a corporate structure that included a President and a Chief Executive Officer at the helm. The CEO then had a team of expert sporting administrators as part of his team. I say, bring back this structure. ASA, under the leadership of Leonard Chuene who effectively serves as an executive President of the ASA, coupled with the fact that ASA also no longer has the role of CEO has lead to the current impasse. I say, the President of ASA must be non-Executive, ASA must have a CEO who must be surrounded by a team of professionals to help run the sport more professionally. This team of professionals could range from medical and fitness experts, to seasoned marketing and communications individuals. The involvement of politicians in the running of sporting organizations should always be limited, if there’s to be any involvement at all. However, such is the extent of the disaster at ASA that in this instance I would urge the Sport Minister to get involved. Get involved in changing the corporate structure as I’ve suggested above. Professionalizing and corporatizing ASA is one of the few ways in which the Athletics body could regain credibility and over time re-ignite sponsors interest in Athletics. After all, sponsors provide the much needed funding towards the development of the sport, sponsors are the lifeblood of athletics and indeed of any sport.

ESKOM now needs an outsider CEO

There’s no escaping the story regarding the leadership debacle at ESKOM what with every media covering the developments. Since the story is so topical I’ve found it necessary to make my own comment. Let me say that the Board of Directors of Eskom under the previous Chairman, Mohammed Valli Moosa, should never have appointed Jacob Maroga as Eskom CEO. As an insider and up to the point at which he was appointed CEO, Mr Maroga was part of the executive team which for a long time failed to steer ESKOM in the right direction, so it was always going to be difficult for him to make a real difference as CEO. The current Board would be well advised to appoint a complete outsider to replace Mr. Maroga, that is if the news that Maroga has resigned indeed turn out to be true. So where should the ESKOM Board look to find the new CEO? Well one of the first places to look would be at former Anglo American executives. You may be aware that recently Anglo announced a restructuring which resulted in some really capable people such as Ian Cockrell leaving the organization. Other Anglo executives left months ago, soon after Cynthia Carroll was appointed CEO. These former Anglo executives are seasoned professionals who should be able to do a great job in turning around the fortunes of ESKOM. The beauty about Ian Cockrell is that he used to run the coal division at Anglo and coal as we know is a very critical raw material for ESKOM in the generation of electricity. So imagine a CEO who has an intimate understanding of the inner workings of coal mining and the coal industry in general. Whether it’s Cockrell or someone else, ESKOM needs an outsider CEO, someone who can look at the problems facing the state enterprise from a different and new perspective. ESKOM is one situation where appointing someone from within would be a mistake that the Board and the South African public simply cannot afford.

What if SA Gov was run like GovSA Ltd! – Final

GovSA Ltd’s Profit Proposition

Government generates all its revenues from all sorts of taxes ranging from corporate tax; individual tax (the biggest revenue generator); surcharge tax on certain products and services; value added tax (VAT) as well as customs and excise duties. However, as we’ve seen with the recent mid-term budget policy statement delivered to parliament by Minister Gordhan, sometimes the revenue raised from taxes is simply not enough to accommodate government expenditure. When this happens government usually has two options available to it regarding additional funding namely, borrowing or the most undesirable option of them all, the simple of printing money via the Reserve Bank.

The most ideal option for any government is clearly to generate enough revenue from taxes to cover total planned expenditure; this therefore requires a very clear profit proposition or tax and revenue collection strategy by government. At a provincial and local levels, government generates some revenues from charging for certain services such as water and electricity as well as from fines levied on certain transgressions such as traffic offences.

The role people and technology in Government

A key success factor for government in effectively collecting all monies to due to it is to ensure that it has well trained people doing the collection job but more importantly government must couple this with the employment of technology to make the revenue collection more convenient. In part two of this series I highlighted government’s success in employing technology to collect taxes through its e-Filing platform. Another great idea that government has employed is the electronic payment method for traffic fines. Where government seems to fail is in the collection of revenue from household- related services , specifically standard rates and taxes. Local government seem to find it difficult to properly administer the billing regarding rates and taxes and as a result many homeowners fined themselves unintentionally in arrears owing thousands of Rands as a result of poor government systems and processes.

GovSA Ltd’s People Proposition

By far the most critical proposition which is essential to effective government is a people proposition. Government’s people proposition should aim to have a motivated and well trained staff. We often hear of commercial organizations strategically focusing on attracting and retaining top talent as, imagine therefore if the government of President Zuma had the same focus. Having top talent in government is certainly one of the most critical requirements for excellent service delivery. Ultimately .President Zuma’s success in execution depends on both its people and its partners, to this end the values as defined by the President Zuma must form part of the culture of the GovSA Ltd. organization as a whole.

Gov SA Ltd’s Performance Evaluation

Performance against each of the three value propositions discussed in this series, namely government value proposition, government profit proposition and government people proposition is essential. Therefore, having a strict performance evaluation mechanism across all government departments is key with scorecards that trickle all the way from the top of the organization to the individual employees on the ground. The Managing Director of the newly formed division of Performance Management Monitoring and Evaluation would play the role of providing the guidelines of how performance ought to be evaluated and how often the evaluation ought to take place. However it’s not enough to have government scorecard in place, what is critical is that this scorecard must be made public and the results of government’s performance against such a scorecard must also be made available to the citizens. Imagine how refreshing it would be to have a government that is transparent and willing to share with its citizens on its successes and falilures.

A new solution for Zimbabwe

Let me at the outset acknowledge that the political problem in Zimbabwe is very, very complicated indeed. Many organizations and people of influence have been and are busy toying with ideas about how best to resolve this problem so that there can be political and economic stability in that country. The power-sharing idea was a good one and it seemed to work for a while. However I suspect that if one were to examine the details of the principles of the power-sharing deal more closely they would reveal that the deal was doomed from the start. I say this because I truly believe that in order for any deal to succeed in Zimbabwe the deal must be based on resolving the real dilemma. The dilemma is that on the one hand President Mugabe, through the courts continues to press charges against opposition members and leaders. On the other hand President Mugabe himself must surely be fearful of the threat of prosecution of himself and ZANU-PF members by future governments.

Let me therefore offer a very simple and yet not entirely original solution to the people of Zimbabwe. The ZANU-PF led government to drop all criminal and civil charges against all MDC and other opposition party members and offer unconditional immunity against prosecution for all related past offences. This immunity must also extend to members of ZANU-PF including President Mugabe himself. I strongly believe that the threat of prosecution of ZANU-PF members by future governments, especially governments led by current oppositions parties, is partly what is motivating President Mugabe to stay in power. Remove this threat and perhaps President Mugabe and his people will see the political problem in Zimbabwe differently, President Mugabe might instead find motivation in ending the instability and put the citizens of Zimbabwe first.

Centralizing Government Procurement

We’ve been reading recently about the huge sums of money spent by different cabinet Ministers in President Zuma’s government on luxury vehicles. Two points need to be made on this matter, the first point is that we seem to only read about the cabinet Ministers, but what about Deputy Minsters Provincial Premiers, Provincial MEC’s and the Mayors? The second and most critical point to be made on this matter is one relating to centralized procurement. President Zuma ought to effect a policy where the procurement of vehicles for all government officials (not just pool cars) is centralized such that one government unit is tasked with negotiating the price of vehicles and procures such vehicles in bulk. It would appear from the reports we read in the media that each Minister seems to have made his/her own arrangements regarding the type of car and the car specifications. Imagine the savings government would achieve on bulk purchasing of cars for all senior government officials, across all levels of government. Of course this idea of centralized procurement ought to be considered and applied across other services which government utilises from time to time such as mobile telecommunication services, air travel services etc. This is by no means to say I want the lowest quality for our government officials, I simply want the best service at the lowest price possible and this can only be achieved through a centralised procurement regime.

MTBPS: not so good news!

Two things stand out from Minister Pravin Gordhan’s mid-term budget policy statement (MTBPS) which he delivered to parliament on 27 Oct. The first element is the fact that for the first time in many years, our government is going to borrow money to supplement the projected budget deficit. Minister Gordhan expect SARS to raise 5% less (R34 billion) in taxes than what was communicated in the budget speech of February 2009. Coupled with this reduction in government revenues, is an increase in government expenditure as compared to the 2008/9 fiscus. These factors combined mean a budget deficit equivalent to 7.6% of the expected GDP, hence the need for borrowing. Reducing government departments’ budget to ensure that government expenditure falls within the expected revenue sounds like an obvious solution to the problem however, South Africa is a country which still requires a lot of government intervention in terms of infrastructure and human development, as such reducing expenditure would have a long-term negative social impact. Other than borrowing, the only thing Minister Gordhan could hope for is that the economy turns to a point where more people become employed and thereby increasing the overall tax base.

Poor GDP Projected

This brings me to the second element which stood out from the MTBPS which is that the Minister is projecting a 1.9% contraction in GDP by the end of 2009. This contraction in GDP puts paid to any hopes that enough jobs could be created by the end of the year to boost government’s revenue from taxes. Interestingly, revenue generated from customers and excise duties is expected to decline and the direct effect of this is that less funds will flow to the Southern African Customs Union members. Small countries such as Lesotho and Swaziland who rely so heavily on the SACU revenue will be hit very hard indeed. This lends a certain level of truth to the belief that when South Africa sneezes the rest of Southern Africa catches the flu.

What if SA Gov was run like GovSA Ltd! – Part 2

Famous American social anthropologist, Margaret Mead once said this about the role of government in society: “never depend upon institutions or government to solve any problem. All social movements are founded by, guided by, motivated and seen through by the passion of individuals.” While Mead is more famous for her contribution to the sexual revolution of the 1960’s than she is for her contribution to political theory, her statement sounds a very pertinent warning, which is that on their own, governments have an inherent limitation to act effectively in the interest of the citizens. This limitation in exacerbated by the fact that at the heart of every government and the President Zuma-led government is not different, is politics and the struggle for the control of power. James Madison even warns that, “the essence of Government is power; and power, lodged as it must be in human hands, will ever be liable to abuse” While this may make governments sound like monsters, it simply means that for governments to gain legitimacy and to dispel any mistrust in the eyes of its citizens, governments must be seen to be accountable and responsible. Group CEO Zuma’s policies, which can otherwise be termed value propositions, must clearly outline the value that GovSA Ltd intends to add to the lives of the people at the end of his current four-year term and what measures he intends putting in place to deal with those who abuse the power he as Group CEO has entrusted unto them.

GovSA Ltd’s Value Proposition

All companies must have a value proposition which seeks to define the unique benefits that will be built into the products and services they put on offer. Every compelling value proposition starts with a thorough segmentation, meaning GovSA Ltd would have to do a detailed segmentation of the SA market, looking at both the citizens and the general population. The business intelligence department (Stats SA) ought to serve as a major source of information necessary to achieving this segmentation, providing such critical information as the changing size of our population, gender split of the population, income levels of the population, among many other dimensions .

GovSA Ltd must also have a clear value proposition defining how it intends to package and deliver services to its customers, the citizens and the general population of South Africa. Each division of GovSA Ltd ought to design a specific value proposition based on the overall vision that is yet to be defined by the Group CEO, which vision in turn should be guided by the overall plan as defined by the Strategic Planning division (so far only a green paper on what the role of this division will play has been put to Parliament). Over and above the definition of the service offering, other key elements of the value propositions of the different divisions of GovSA Ltd would include the nature of the after-sales service which GovSA Ltd wishes to offer. Another critical element of the value proposition relates to pricing, i.e. is GovSA Ltd intending to offer its services at a low cost or charge a premium. Additional considerations for the value proposition relate to the distribution of the services themselves, or put differently, the ease with which the customers (citizens and the population in general) can access the services offered by GovSA Ltd. If one were to do a swot-analysis of President Zuma’s government, service delivery and policing would arguably feature at the top of the list of weaknesses, among a list of many other weaknesses. High levels of crime and HIV/AIDS would be high on the list of threats currently facing our country, among the many other threats.

Service Delivery

President Zuma would therefore have to put his Group CEO hat on in an effort to come up with a value proposition regarding both service delivery and policing. Most of the services delivered by government usually have a price tag thus, once the value proposition regarding service delivery has been defined, it must be very clear to the general population that the value they stand to derive from buying these services somehow is equal to or ideally, exceeds the cost involved in purchasing those services. Ultimately service delivery depends on the quality of people’s skills & attitude as well as the infrastructure and technology used to deliver those services. Key to government’s success towards effective service delivery, is that it must put its citizens first therefore the South African government’s philosophy of “Batho Pele – People First” seems to be inspired by government’s desire to put its citizens first. A study titled “Integrating Service Delivery Across Levels of Government: Case Studies of Canada and Other Countries” co-authored by Professors J. Roy and J Langford found that there are “two trends driving a global demand to integrate the delivery of citizen-oriented services across levels of government. First, government agencies are adopting a citizen-centric philosophy in the delivery of their services because they see better outcomes and because technological advances make it easier to do. And second, governments, nonprofits, and the private sector are all increasingly using collaborative networks across organizational and political boundaries to do business because they have found the network model dramatically improves their effectiveness.” Many have applauded the SA Revenue Service (SARS) for the introduction of an electronic, online tax-filing service. The e-filing service serves as one of the best examples of how government is using technology to enhance the delivery of the tax filing service. To be sure, e-filing will also make government more effective in collecting the taxes due from its citizens. Taking other key government services online would leap-frog government’s service delivery efforts and standards. Imagine therefore being able to book for your driver’s license renewal online or being able to track online the progress of a case the police are handling on your behalf. The study quoted above also gives other pointers about critical factors necessary for the success of technology-enabled service delivery. Chief among these are the need for a single service provider across all levels of government, coupled with a single government portal providing a link between the citizens and the relevant government department(s).


Policing

Policing, is one of the services which are largely delivered by government to the population in general free of any direct charges( the police derives it’s funds from taxes), meaning government derives little if any revenue at all for delivering this service. One of the key elements of effective policing, is community policing. Convetional police can never fight crime effectively on their own. In 1994, the Bureau of Justice Assistance in Washington DC published a study on community policing (“Understanding Community Policing: A Framework for Action”) and this document outlines two complimentary elements necessary for successful community policing strategies, namely “community partnership” and “problem solving”. The document goes on to explain these two elements as follows: “to develop community partnership, police must develop positive relationships with the community, must involve the community in the quest for better crime control and prevention, and must pool their resources with those of the community to address the most urgent concerns of community members. Problem solving is the process through which the specific concerns of communities are identified and through which the most appropriate remedies to abate these problems are found.” The South African government’s value proposition regarding policing must therefore include a strong community participation component. To get back to Margaret Mead’s point, government alone will not solve social problems, the role of the individual within the community therefore is key in spefically solving the crime problem, among many social problems which exist.

If Group CEO Zuma and GovSALtd are to prove successful over the next three and a half years until the next general elections, he would be well advised to make sure that technology is at the heart of his service-delivery plan and that strong partnerships are forged between government departments and the community in general.

(to be continued)

What if SA Gov was run like GovSA Ltd! – Part 1

The idea of government that is run like a company is not a new one, the government of Dubai is a very good example of how such an idea can be put to work successfully. It is precisely because it is such a simple yet powerful idea that the idea is worth exploring further now that South Africa happens to have a new government in charge. I invite you therefore to imagine that our government under the leadership of President Jacob Zuma was run like a publicly listed commercial company which I shall call GovSA Ltd! Imagine President Zuma as Group Chief Executive Officer of GovSA Ltd and the Minsters in charge of the different vertical functional ministries as the Managing Directors of these divisions of GovSA Ltd. Imagine that the Treasury headed up by the Chief Financial Officer and Statistics SA as the division and department, respectively, which provide support services to all the other divisions of GovSA Ltd serving both vertical and horizontal functions. Statistics South Africa would play the same role as that of the business intelligence department, providing critical information to be used by the managers within Gov SA Ltd in making their decisions. Imagine the head of the newly formed ministry of Strategic Planning as government’s Chief Operations Officer accountable to the Group CEO (the President).Imagine also that the National Assembly, our parliament as the Board with each member of the Assembly as a Director on this Board, with the Speaker of the Assembly as Chairman of the Board of Directors of GovSA Ltd. Imagine that the Assembly was subject to not only the constitution of the country in terms the oversight role it ought to have over GovSA Ltd but that such oversight responsibilities were enforced and adhered to as per the guideline set out by the Institute of Directors of SA (IoD). Imagine still that the South African citizens and population in general as both shareholders and customers of Gov SA Ltd. By itself, this analogy of government run as a company is interesting however if the structure of the SA government is to be aligned to that of a publicly listed company, then GovSA Ltd ought to operate and execute like any responsible listed company.

The positioning of brand GovSA SA Ltd.

The official website of office of the Group CEO (read the President), defines his vision as “Excellence in governance for a better life for all”. The Group CEO has further defined the values that ought to guide the behaviour of all the divisions of GovSA Ltd and the six values are: Fairness; Loyalty; Openness; Empowerment; Integrity and Excellence. The problem however is that almost six months after taking over as Group CEO of GovSA Ltd, Group CEO Zuma is yet to define a new vision statement, with the above statement having been carried over from the previous Group CEO. However it is becoming quite apparent that Group CEO Zuma is intent on using the outcomes of the recently published green paper on Strategic Planning as a guide towards crafting a new vision statement that will determine his tenure as Group CEO.

The Importance of Propositions

In their book titled “Blue Ocean Strategy”, W.C Kim and R Mauborgne describe three types of strategy propositions, namely: Value Proposition which is about attracting buyers; Profit Proposition which seeks to enable the derivation of profit from the defined value proposition and a People Proposition, which seeks to motivate those working for or with the organization to execute the strategy. Kim and Mauborgne emphasise the fact that each of these propositions do not work in isolation but together in concert.


(to be continued)

Wave-Power as source of renewable energy

According to reports in popular and academic media, our planet has long been suffering from the stresses caused by carbon dioxide polution and green-house gas emissions into the atmosphere.One of the biggest culprits of carbon dioxide emissions are the many electricity power stations using coal to generate electricity. Currently, ESKOM generates a vast majority of the power it supplies from coal-power stations with a small amount of ESKOM’s electrical power output coming from both hydro-energy as well as South Africa’s only nuclear-energy station in Koeberg. Over the past number of decades many individuals and organizations have been experimenting with renewable sources of energy, with a specific aim of producing electricity and these experiments have explored such energy sources as solar, nuclear, geothermal, wind and water. In South Africa, the efforts to find alternative renewable sources of energy are led by, among others, the Sustainable Energy Society of South Africa (SESSA),a non-governmental organization. SESSA’s stated aim is to use renewable energy and thereby reduce the dependence of South Africa on the carbon-emitting energy-production methods.

Ocean-Wave Energy

One of the greatest sources of renewable energy is water, more specifically the oceans. South Africa has a coastline which stretches just under 3,000 kilometers with the Atlantic Ocean to the west and the Indian Ocean to the east. Unlike the abundant solar power which is available only during day-light, the seas around South Africa’s shores pound all-day round and all-year round which makes sea waves the ideal alternative source of energy. Pelamis Wave Power, a Scottish based company is a leader in the manufacture of a structure which converts sea-wave energy into electrical energy. This structure floats on the surface of the sea and through the use of special hydraulic motors, the bouncing motion of the structure caused by the waves produces energy which is used to drive generators which produce electrical energy. Pelamis already operates a commercial wave-power farm just off the northern coast of Portugal. While the jury is still out on the commercial viability of this technology, one hopes that ESKOM has already begun exploring such alternative sources of energy as sea wave power.

Role of Government

However, ESKOM cannot be expected to act alone in finding renewable sources of electrical energy to this end, it is incumbent upon the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (NERSA) and government of President Zuma to create a legislative framework aimed at accelerating ESKOM’s long-term investment efforts into sustainable electricity-production methods. In an article appearing in the Havard Business Review, former US President Bill Clinton pionts out that "just as information technology exploded in the 1990's, green technology is set to be the major growth sector." Our government therefore must legislate for this renewable energy phenomenon before it gains critical mass.

ICASA must resolve the mobile TV debate

South Africa is estimated to have a total of 11 million households, of which 7.3 million or just over 66% own at least one television set, well within the 65,3% world average, according to information hub. http://www.nationmaster.com/ . South Africa’s household ownership rate of TV sets is extremely high by developing world and specifically African, standards. As an example, according to Nation Master, Africa’s most populous nation Nigeria, has a household TV set ownership rate of a mere 25,6%. The ownership rate in most developed countries is significantly higher than the global average, with the top ten countries recording rates above the 99% mark. From a marketing perspective, it obviously means that in the developed world, television is an effective medium through which to reach the broader population and this is clearly not so for marketers in the developing world, South Africa included, where TV has to be supplemented with other mediums.

The Mobile TV debate

Which brings me to the debate currently brewing in South Africa about whether ICASA (the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa) should issue a mobile TV license or not. Recently, free-to-air broadcaster, e.tv lodged a court application to prevent ICASA from implementing the proposed digital migration plan. According to media reports, chief among e.tv’s concerns about the digitization plan, is ICASA’s intention to commence a process aimed at issuing a mobile TV license. E.tv points out that mobile TV, sometimes referred to as Digital Video Broadcast via Handheld(DVB-H) device, a mobile broadcast format which has gained favour globally, has no track record of commercial viability in any market where it has been launched and that it would therefore be irresponsible of ICASA to award a DVB-H license without a detailed feasibility study. One would hope and assume that ICASA indeed has plans to carryout a feasibility study before issuing a DVB-H license and therefore e.tv’s protestations could be seen to be driven largely by the broadcaster’s fear of the impact DVB-H could have on the overall TV audience dynamics in South Africa.

Is mobile TV viable?

Many countries around the world have been involved in DVB-H trials since the early part of this decade. 3 Mobile, the European broadband network operator, was among the first in the world to launch a commercial DVB-H offering in the form of 3TV in Italy. Interestingly, 3TV Italy offers both free-to-air (non-subscription) and pay-tv services. Many other countries such as Finland have also been testing DVB-H and back in December of 2006 the Finnish regulatory body awarded Digita, a mobile network operator, the only DVB-H license in that country. Almost four years down the line, Digita is yet to launch a commercial offering. Marianne Hynninen, the Business Manager of Digita’s mobile TV division says, “plans are underway to launch our mobile TV service before the end of this year.” Hynninen further points outs that, “a leading media research organization in Finland (Finnpanel) estimates that there is a total of 16,000 (sixteen thousand) households situated in the area where the DVB-H signal will be broadcast.” In my view, this is a very small number given that Finland has in excess of 2,3 million households, meaning the DVB-H signal will only be available to less than 1% of Finnish households. Hynninen could not be drawn into a discussion about whether or not Digita’s mobile TV service will be commercially viable. However, based on the numbers stated above, I personally doubt very much that Digita will be depositing any profits into their bank account any time soon, unless the DVB-H signal broadcast range is increased to cover more of the country and therefore a greater number of households. Regulators in many other countries in Europe, North America and Asia have been issuing DVB-H licenses over the past few years yet to date very few of those licensed entities have launched commercially. Perhaps e.tv and other like-minded entities are justified in pushing ICASA to carryout a detailed feasibility study before issuing a DVB-H license.

Critical elements ICASA must consider

There are many critical questions which ICASA must surely answer vis-a-vis DVB-H licensing, these include but are not limited to: a) should the regulator issue separate licences for free-to-air and pay-TV or one licence for both services?; b) should the regulator issue a license to one or more licensees?; c) should the regulator award licences to incumbent mobile network operators and TV broadcasters (Multichoice has been testing DVB-H in South Africa since 2006) or to entities with no track record in either the telecoms nor the broadcast business and lastly d) what should be the coverage area of the DVB-H signal? I must add that in reading the document published by ICASA in December 2008, wherein the Regulator invites interested parties to apply for a license to deliver DVB-H services, it’s evident that the regulator has indeed already begun to address some of the questions listed above. I must point out that following the outcry led by e.tv, ICASA has since withdrawn its call for interested parties t apply for a DVB-H, license this is presumably to because IACSA wants to tighten up on the feasibility for the mobile TV in South Arica.

ICASA must act quickly

Perhaps a more critical element that will determine the commercial viability of mobile TV in South Africa relates to something that ICASA may not be able to influence directly and that is, the price at which DVB-H-capable handsets will go to market, as this may be the single biggest barrier to the growth of mobile TV in South Africa. Assuming however that the handset manufacturers are able to bring the price down over time, my opinion is that given the number of people in South Africa who are still without a television set in their homes, a mobile TV companion could come in very handy indeed, no pun intended. Imagine therefore watching next year’s FIFA World Cup on your mobile handset wherever you may be, or being able to keep track of your favourite soap opera, regardless of your location. For the sake of the consumer, IACSA must carryout the feasibility study on the commercial viability of mobile TV and it must do it quickly. As consumers perhaps we should all be singing those famous lyrics, “I want my, I want my MTV”, from a Dire Straits song, except this time instead of making reference to the now popular music channel South Africans would be referring to mobile, mobile TV.

How South Africa can produce world-beating athletes

Next year South Africa will host the world’s biggest sporting spectacle, the FIFA World Cup and it is quite obvious that if it were not for automatic qualification as the host nation, South Africa would be doubtful participants in next year’s finals. Since being readmitted into the international fold, South African football has failed to impress, save for the 1996 Africa Cup of Nation trophy. Having said this, a number of South African footballers have played successfully for clubs in some of the world’s best leagues. While the debate regarding poor sporting performance seems to be focused on football for now, South Africa seems to be struggling to be competitive globally in many other sporting disciplines. Tennis is a major global sport and while South Africa has produced fantastic individual players over the years, South Africa is hardly a tennis power-house, one only needs to reflect on South Africa’track record in the Davis Cup to see how poorly we have performed as a country in the game of tennis. Many other examples of poor national performance across different sporting codes can be listed. Perhaps South Africa can learn a few lessons from countries who have managed to succeed at being consistent winners on the sporting field. What I find interesting in looking at these successful countries, is that many excel at a few sporting codes. East African countries consistently produce winners in medium to long distance running. South American countries excel in ball sports such as football, volleyball and the like. The Caribbean nations excel in cricket and short distance running. Russia and the Asian countries such as China and Japan seem to excel in specialised swimming disciplines as well as gymnastics. East European countries excel in sport s such as weight-lifting. Western countries such as mainland Europe and the United State of America on the other hand seem to excel in a wider and more diverse variety of sporting codes and this could be large as result of an abundance of financial resources in these countries. Admittedly this is by no means an empirical analysis but a view based largely on common knowledge.

Prioritization and Specialization

The Ministry of Sport and Recreation (SRSA), in collaboration with the South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee (SASCOC) need to consider a strategy which seeks to identify sporting codes of priority. These sporting codes would then receive special funding and concerted development effort with the aim of producing athletes who can win against the best in the world. One of the ways in which SRSA and SASCOC could arrive at a shot list of the priority sporting codes would be to closely examine those sports which already derive significant community interest such as football, basketball, rugby, cricket, road running etc. While the process of prioritization would ultimately lead to a type of specialization, I do not for one second suggest that other sporting codes be neglected but I am proposing that as a country we choose sporting codes in which success will be pursued without compromise but with a clear strategy on how to develop the necessary environment to excel in these chosen sports. This leads me to a point about creating a dedicated department within the SRSA that would deal with the implementation of priority sporting codes programme.


Priority Sporting Codes Programme

The simple aim of the priority sporting codes programme would be to produce world-beating athletes within these chosen sporting codes. The programme would therefore have to concern itself with the identification of coaches to help develop and train athletes in these priority sporting codes. The Programme would also work closely with the department of Education to ensure that these sports of priority receive necessary attention at school level so that raw talent is nurtured. Perhaps more importantly, the programme would provide funding for coaching and player development as well as the building and maintenance of relevant infrastructure. The infrastructure would incorporate what could ultimately serve as centres of excellence for the identified priority sporting codes. If South Africa is to produce winners on the sporting field, then SRSA needs to have a strategy aimed at changing the way we deal with sport as a society.

SAPS needs a trully game-changing plan

An announcement by the SA Police Service (SAPS) that it is to launch a revamped police file programme on one of the SABC channels is welcome news indeed. The announcement comes only weeks after the new national police Commissioner, Bheki Cele took up office. The purpose of the show is clearly to name- and- shame suspected and known criminals with the hope that the public will tip-off the police regarding the location of individuals featured on the show. The TV show in itself however will not curb crime, the SAPS needs to ensure that it creates structures aimed at dealing with the expected public participation. These structures may include a call centre to accept tip-offs and redirect such tip-offs to the relevant SAPS departments. In my view SA’s crime problem needs to be dealt with using a much heavier hand than even the “shoot-to-kill” approach which is being touted by Commissioner Cele. Perhaps a specialist police force trained in the skill of sharp-shooting and the use of intelligent brute force is necessary at this point in our history. This armed specialist force could be something similar in nature to the famous special weapons and tactics (SWAT) team in the USA which would work side-by-side with the normal police. The role of the normal police, in my view, should be to deal with petty criminals and to maintain high visibility in the community. To further ensure success, the SAPS must combine brute force with swift investigation and prosecutorial efforts, meaning that the entire criminal justice system would have to collaborate like never before to pursue and achieve the same ends. What Commissioner Cele needs to put in place is a game-changing strategy to fight the high levels of violent crime because maintaining the status-quo just won’t cut it.

New farmers need to acquire skills

The notion of poverty reduction first came to light in the period leading up to the first democratic elections of 1994 and it was the ANC that brought focus to the idea that the best way to correct the imbalances of the past, it was necessary to find ways of reducing poverty. It’s interesting to note that in 1994 just over 48% of South African populous was living below the poverty level. Once in government, the ANC government came up with a number of strategies to address poverty, the most famous of which is the Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP). Key to the ruling party’s strategy to reduce poverty, was the concept of land reform, especially land that was being used for farming purposes. The ANC government, under the auspices of the Department of Rural Development and Land Affairs (previously Department of Land Affairs) set up the Land Redistribution and Agricultural Development (LRAD) programme whose main aim according to official department literature, is to “help previously disadvantaged citizens from African, Coloured and Indian communities to buy land or agricultural implements specifically for agricultural purposes.” The LRAD programme offers non-refundable supplementary financing to prospective farmers from the previously disadvantaged groups to help these farmers secure land for farming and production purposes. While the LRAD is very specific about the need for those who acquire the land to undergo training to gain farming skills there are many stories to be told of failed LRAD projects precisely because the farm owners lacked the necessary skills to sustain the farming processes to keep the land productive. Government, under the leadership of the ANC must be commended for its land reform initiatives however, if the LRAD programme is to gain the necessary momentum, government must review the programme’s skills transfer methods. One suggestion is for the established farmers from whom land is being bought to retain a material stake in the farm and put in place a skills transfer programme which is based on certain targets. The idea is that the established farmer would gradually relinquish his/her stake in the farm and eventually withdraw from the running of the farm, leaving it in the hands of the now capable new land owners. These targets would be based on such measures as farm profitability and land productivity. Linked to this skills transfer programme government ought to set up short courses with the aim of giving new land-owners a quick understanding of the basics of farming. The attendance of the course must be a pre-requisite for the new owners taking ownership of their new property. Whatever happens the LRAD is too important an initiative for our country for government to allow it to fail into oblivion.

Why ASA President had to lie

Athletics South Africa (ASA) President, Mr Leonard Chuene, definitely lied to the South African public, to the Minister of Sports and other people of influence regarding his own role in the Caster Semenya debacle, of that there is no doubt. However, I think the focus from now on should be on seeking to understand the reasons why Mr. Chuene needed to lie in the first place. The reality is that Caster was indeed South Africa’s strongest medal hopeful going into the recent Athletics World Championships in Berlin, Caster was going to serve as a platform to redeem ASA’s efforts in creating a world-beating SA team, however poor those efforts have been. Therein lies the core of problem which is that ASA has consistently failed to produce world-beating athletes largely because of lack of forward-planning and a clear talent development strategy. South Africa has produced top athletes in spite of ASA and not because of ASA. The reality is that to be a world leader is athletics, ASA can not afford to rely on disparate efforts of the individual coaches who are able to identify and nurture talent, ASA must find a way of co-ordinating the talent identification process and create a process by which new talent is developed to become competitive at the world stage. With the right leadership at ASA, there;s no reason why SA should not have gold-medal winners over the next few years. However for this to happen there needs to be a great degree of political will to change the way ASA is run as an organization. Otherwise all future ASA Presidents who succeed Mr Chuene may yet repeat the same lies.

What happened to consumers’ interests, ICASA?

In the ideal world, the broadcasting and telecommunications regulator, ICASA would have been the party responsible for bringing into the public domain the current debate regarding the exorbitant mobile telephony pricing in South Africa. Ultimately, the role of ICASA is to regulate the industry in the best interest of the consumer but it was not ICASA that first raised concern about the high prices the networks charge consumers, I read about this debate for the first time in a newspaper article penned by the Independent Democrat leader, Patricia de Lille. Now everyone has jumped on to the pricing bandwagon, including the CEO of Vodacom in a recent article he wrote in a Sunday newspaper wherein he tried to make an argument regarding why the pricing has been what it is. Interestingly the other two mobile players have been quite so far, one can only hope that silence simply means that all parties are working in the background to adjust the pricing in favour of the consumer. In my view the mobile telecommunications pricing issue may yet define the tenure of General Nyanda as Minister of Communications. I seem to sense that now the issue is out in the open, Government and ICASA are left with no choice but show the wiliness to resolve it, and fast.

Can the SABC learn from the BBC model?

The BBC is arguably the world’s biggest broadcaster in terms of the number of people who watch and listen to its programming. The BBC, as a public broadcaster, is funded by license fees paid by UK citizens. However what is more interesting is that the BBC has a very successful commercial arm, the BBC Worldwide. BBC Worldwide produces and sells content in the form of DVD’s, Books and operates such interesting channels as BBC Knowledge and BBC Entertainment. According to the BBC Worldwide’s annual financial report for the 2008/9 period, the company which is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the BBC, reported a profit of £103 (R1.3Bil) before exceptional items, from revenues of just over £1Bil. It would appear that over the years, those who have been involved in running the BBC realised that license fees alone would never sustain the business of public broadcasting, hence the establishment of BBC Worldwide. While the SABC runs some of it’s radio station and TV channels as commercial entities, these commercial assets have so far not been able to derive enough profits to make the SABC as a whole a profitable business. One would hope that the new Board when it is finally announced would take some lessons from the BBC model and somehow adopt it to our unique South African circumstances to help make the public broadcaster protiable.

English as the official language on all school premises

Having travelled throughout the continent and spent time in other countries on the continent, I've always been struck by how a majority of the population in these countries speak English very comfortably. Apparently what schools in some of these countrues do is they force school kids from a certain age to only speak English from the moment they enter school premises until they leave for home. This way kids are put in a situation where they are pressed to train theselves in the English langauge such that by the time they reach high school they are already fluent, meaning they can read books, journals etc comfortably. Interestingly, this appoach has not led to home langauges declining in usage, as the kids still go back home and converse in they home language, in this way English exists side-by-side with other languages. The point however is that ensuring that kids get comfotable with the English language earlier on in life must surely increas their chances of having a better grasp of the world around them. Imagine if our education system in South Africa adopted this approach, where English was the "official" langauge across all school premises through our country across all townships and suburbs alike. I'll be the first one to admit that this simple suggestion will not solve all our education problems it will go a long way in enhacing the future of all school-going kids in South Africa.

2010 FIFA World Cup

There's now less then one year to the staging of the FIFA World Cup in South Africa. While many have commented on the lack of excitment about the event from a marketing perspective, what is more concerning is the lack of information about the many different intiatives that will be at the heart of generating much needed revenue for the country. There's no news about companies that have been appointed as vendors to provide services in and around the stadia. I remember in the period leading up to the Cricket World Cup there was a lots of infomation about business opportunities that the Cricket World Cup would offer and how ordinary South Africans could be part of accessing such opportunities. If the 2010 FIFA World Cup is going to be a World Cup by Africans, ordinary citizens must feel that there are real opportunities for them and that not just those close to the action stand to benefit. The LOC needs to and for it's own credibility the LOC must clarify it's strategy regarding the advancement of local entrepreneurs.