President has a lot of work to do to save South Africa

Dear Mr President

South Africans across the spectrum are increasingly worried about the future of South Africa. Our country is seriously deteriorating due to the policy direction the ANC is taking. What you implement daily is continuously depriving the people of our country of opportunities.

Two aspects of the task of government

The task of a government in a democracy is primarily two aspects: the government must look after the safety of the inhabitants of the country and, secondly, you must create a favourable environment through the policy environment in which the private sector will be happy to invest and do business.

The last includes aspects such as the establishment of functional, efficient infrastructure and legislation that makes it easy to operate businesses.

Dysfunction since 1994

Since the ANC took over in 1994, every state or semi-state institution has changed from a functioning institution to a dysfunctional one. The list is extensive. Think of institutions such as Denel, Eskom, Post Office, the railways, Land Bank, etc. Indeed, there is not one institution that has improved.

With your transformation policy that includes aspects such as cadre deployment and black economic empowerment, the approach was to look instead at race and how strongly they support your party in appointments, not necessarily at expertise.

The price for our country and its people is already immeasurably high.

Unemployment rises annually

Every year, unemployment rises and it seems your solution is to just hand out more and more social welfare allowances.

Any thinking person realises your policy direction is not sustainable and you are working in the direction of large-scale discontent that will surely spill over into anarchy.

Even for that, you no longer have the necessary capacity in your security services to stabilise large-scale unrest.

Man made problems

South Africa’s man-made problems can only be solved sustainably if the economy grows so jobs are created. This requires profitable businesses run by the private sector.

Let’s get back to a government’s basic responsibility: safety.

Murders

With more than 70 murders a day in South Africa, an overseas commissioner of police confronts me with the question: don’t you have a government?

Crime

Then, we haven’t even got to all the other crime that is in no way addressed and combated as it should be. Your government is very soft on crime, with the result that it has largely spiralled out of control. You can be considered an absentee government when it comes to crime.

Since 2018, the state has been dragging its feet to implement the signed Rural Security Plan. This year, another summit was held on the plan – little new has been added – and still nothing is happening.

It appears the SA Police Service (Saps) is unable to implement the plan, or does not want to do so. Meanwhile, South Africa is bleeding more and more and our farmers are experiencing major problems with product theft in all its forms and farm attacks and murders.

The only logical deductions that can be made about our crime situation are:

-Saps does not appear to have the ability or will to act preventively/effectively;

-After several years, there is still foot dragging to effectively implement the Rural Safety Strategy at ground level in many places, forcing the public to look after their own safety;

-Summits that must take place in provinces to implement the plan are currently being postponed one after the other, or have not yet been scheduled;

-Saps will have to get its house in order, get rid of corruption, and pay urgent attention to the security situation; and

-You, as president, and the minister of police must take a public stand against crime, violence and especially against farm attacks and murders, but also show you comply with the responsibility to look after the safety of the country’s residents.

-You can’t, or don’t want to fulfil the responsibility properly, you should admit it and then communicate it to the public so we can take care of safety ourselves.

Rural Security Strategy

This will mean that communities will implement the Rural Security Strategy and Saps must decide whether it wants to be part of the solution, rather than still be part of the problem.

The situation is unacceptable. Law-abiding citizens pay taxes to get this service from the state, but then must incur all the costs to take care of their own safety.

Citizens are paying the price

The ANC is engaged in a battle for survival and South Africa’s people are paying the price.

It might be good to make an analysis of where your tax money comes from – in other words, who pays what percentage of your income. Perhaps it could be a good idea to take care of those people because without them, government would be sitting with an empty state coffer.

A responsible government would use all possible expertise to solve issues.

The ANC’s cadre deployment policy means you are, indeed, acting against the constitution, which clearly states everyone is equal in the country.

Building a South Africa that future generations can be proud of, where opportunities are created for them, can only happen if you seriously reflect on your policy direction.

Until now, it has only created poverty and unemployment.

-TLU SA works to keep farmers safely and sustainably on their farms. Geldenhuys is TLU SA president.

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