Every SANDF assault makes it harder for Ramaphosa to keep a grip on the pressure cooker

The South African Police Service was not always known as such. Those old enough would remember our police as the South African Police (officially) or the police force (colloquially). The turn of democracy brought with it a desire to shift the philosophy underlying our cops from the perceived heavy handed enforcing of the law to the servicing of people under the rule of law. Thus the SAPS came to be.

Altering names to express change in philosophy is an effective psychological tool for effecting change both internally and, in time, the perception of an organisation. Institutions the world over have done it, from countries to higher learning organisations.

Some have been more effective than others, but if asked to draw a list, I’d have no idea where to place the South African National Defence Force. The only shift in their name came in in the form of adding the word ‘National’ to the already existing South African Defence Force. At the time, sure, it inspired some unity among a military made of previously separate militias and armies, though it still had “force” in there and, sure, you would probably want much more force in your national defence than you would in your police – but I doubt they ever considered whether they would need to point their defence force on their own people ever again.

It’s easy to call for a total lockdown. The consequences may be disastrous, but to design a total lockdown is simple. What is not simple is structuring how you deviate from a total lockdown; who is allowed to do what, when, how to enforce it … and all this while your political opponents are singing, Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better.

What’s worse, here, is you have to do that in a country where political education is jaded, maintaining a hold on a narrative is a sensitive stab in the dark with no undo button and people’s immediate interests are in many respects diametrically opposed.

Quick example: if you’ve got lots of money, you probably won’t care if the price of bread goes from R11,99 to R15. You might not even notice. If you have no money, you might not even care if there’s just another thing added to the list of potential causes of death if it stands between you and eating on the day. If you have your money abroad, it may even be good for you if the rand-dollar exchange rate breaches R20.

So planning this lockdown is a balancing act no person could possibly envy and any plan certainly won’t please all the people all the time, so you hope that, on balance, people are more pleased than they are upset by your response.

The first thing to do to get as many on board from the off is to lay it out as a reality we need to deal with. This is why the president starts his speeches by telling us how the global situation is bad followed by a sly but important mention of countries doing a worse job at dealing with it than we are. With that political capital, one can cultivate significant buy-in for some difficult decisions.

But a democratic populous would never buy in to being assaulted by its own defence force, so as reports of that happening occur, regardless of their legitimacy, the president and his team lose political capital.

What do you expect, though, when you deploy a defence force that hasn’t seen action in more than a decade with authority to enforce a broad and sometimes vague set of rules … rules that might not accommodate a significant number of people’s needs?

In the same breath as his appeal to the army that this was not a moment for skop, skiet and donder violence, he also impressed on them the importance of the frontline work they would be doing. At the same time, he reassured the soldiers that our people are not hostile. They are not going to be against them. They are not going to resist them.

All that sounds great until you find those who do resist … or an enforcement officer who does not understand the complexity of the situation … or the complexity of the laws and regulations … or a civilian who is desperate and cannot abide by the regulations … or a civilian who does not understand the complexity of the law/situation. There are so many things that could go wrong it’s no surprise that Twitter is increasingly seeing reports of abuse of authority.

But if you take a relatively inexperienced defence force, point it at its own people, give it a novel mission and emphasise how important the work they’re doing is while telling them that people will respect the regulations –knowing that many won’t and some can’t – you’re creating a pressure cooker.

I suspect the president knew this rather unavoidable issue given the circumstances and hoped that the celebratory roast would be ready before the pressure cooker burst, but if the informal reports are anything to go by, we may need to simmer a while longer than anticipated on a stovetop that’s not getting any cooler.

I’ve mentioned before that the president will have to address the issue of enforcement brutality and, if he wants to maintain a hold on the narrative, he’ll need to get on to Twitter pretty quickly.

Richard Anthony Chemaly entertainment attorney, radio broadcaster and lecturer of communication ethics.

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