Bitter taste of freedom: The social barricades blocking progress

With the unemployment rate standing at 31.9% and about 55.5% people living below the national upper poverty line, South Africa, which yesterday celebrated 31 years of democracy, may have made huge strides on the political front, but much more needs to be done to bridge the socioeconomic class divide, according to experts.

In marking Freedom Day over the weekend, Acting President Gwede Mantashe conceded that South Africa was one of the world’s most unequal societies, with many people losing hope.

“Poverty, unemployment and inequality are deep wounds that prevent SA from reaching its full potential. It is said that the richest 10% of South Africans own approximately 85% of the country’s financial assets. Millions of people are unemployed or earn wages that cannot sustain them or their families,” said Mantashe.

While there were pockets of achievements, political economist Sam Koma said the majority of SA citizens are “yet to enjoy the fruits of economic justice in relation to full economic participation, full employment, living wage, wealth accumulation and land ownership”.

But South Africa, said Koma, was “a different country today than it was in 1994”.

“Major strides have been recorded in many respects: exercising political and labour rights; media and academic freedom. We have a functional judiciary, progressive legislation in place – although implementation of these laws is fraught with challenges.

“South Africa has also assumed a moral authority in global affairs involving geopolitics, conflict resolution, global governance institutions and sport.”

Reasons for optimism

Despite ongoing tensions in the government of national unity, Koma said if the governing multiparty coalition fully implemented its statement of intent, involving the imperative to build inclusive economy and poverty eradication through the formulation and implementation of pragmatic economic policy, “then the prospects of realising the ideals embedded in our constitution, are real”.

Political analyst Dale McKinley said: “Despite our problems and challenges, we have a democracy with all the freedoms that we fought for intact – even if many of them are difficult to fully attain.

“We have not fallen apart, though we have cracks and fissures. Given what is going on in the world and on the African continent over years, we need to recognise, as South Africans, that we are still standing. We still have our constitutional organs in place, which is our biggest achievement. We also have to deal with a troubled society and internal conflicts,” McKinley said.

Policy expert Nkosiphendule Nyembezi said what eroded democracy was the election of the “wrong public representatives with the wrong values and tendencies to abuse state resources for patronage”.

“This involves buying more extensive political influence through pet projects or naked voter extortion. We can widely sense the wide-ranging political trust problem across the political spectrum.

“The core of our politics has inadequately addressed the trust problem in the wake of unscrupulous politicians continuing to negatively influence political decisions that directly affect our lives. This includes the current negotiations on government’s fiscal framework,” said Nyembezi.

He cited the April 2024 Ipsos survey which revealed that in South Africa “only 9% trusted political leaders”.

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