‘There is hope,’ says panel on SA’s recovery

There is hope. South Africa can build back better and the way in which the public and private sector came together to fight Covid-19 proves this, says Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana.

He was part of a panel on Sunday, with Eskom CEO Andre de Ruyter and Advocate Wim Trengove SC, speaking on hope and recovery as part of the South African Jewish Board of Deputies biennial conference.

Hope, said Godongwana, rested on South Africa’s ability to grow the economy and build a common nation with a common understanding.

“The key challenge is recovery and reconstruction,” he said.

While there was consensus among all South Africans about this – government had a document as did business – what was lacking was a common engagement to address this.

“The lesson from Covid-19 was that South Africans across the whole spectrum worked together without a plan.”

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Trengove said there was much to be hopeful for in terms of upholding and entrenching the rule of law, which only a decade ago had been under sustained pressure from the government itself attacking the judiciary.

“In the decade of state capture, the rule of law prospered,” he said, “due to the extraordinary leadership of the Constitutional Court and the Judge President of the Gauteng High Court.”

Unfortunately, these gains were being undone by the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) which was failing to appoint the best judges and hold errant ones to account, making irrational decisions and following an agenda that had nothing to do with transformation whatsoever.

“We’ve always had bad and brilliant judges, but recently there are too few brilliant judges being appointed and too many not so brilliant,” Trengove said, noting that business was now choosing to settle disputes through private arbitration rather than take the chance of having a matter ruled on in court.

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To uphold the rule of law, he said, judges needed to be courageous, which required being confident and smart. The “impoverishment of quality”, he said, was now extending into the Supreme Court of Appeal and the Constitutional Court, and this would be the most urgent challenge of the new chief justice to reform the JSC.

De Ruyter conceded that Eskom was technically insolvent, failing its customers through load shedding, being failed by its ageing plant and non-payment by its biggest customers, the municipalities.

“It’s difficult to spin a story of hope, but from the ashes of what was in 2000 the world’s best utility can arise new opportunities and the catalyst for economic growth.”

South Africa is a very large emitter of carbon and other pollutants with a very carbon intensive economy and would disproportionately be affected by climate change. But, De Ruyter said, the country was also endowed with the best wind and solar potential.

“Our worst (solar and wind) acreage is better than the best in Germany,” he said, which had already successfully moved to renewable energy.

The key was to align fiscal, environmental, industrial and economic policy to pivot to a greener and cleaner future in a just way, addressing those with interests in the coal supply chain too, while ensuring that the communities that surrounded the coal power stations did not become ghost towns, but became part of the green energy mix.

South Africa needs 4,000 to 6,000MW of new generating capacity if it is to support economic growth. Addressing this shortfall, he said, would catalyse economic growth in itself. The utility will need to find 60GW of new generating capacity by 2035 when at least half of its power station fleet will be retired.

“Our solution is not to fix this old car but to rather transition to new.” Natural gas and renewables would be the best option, he said.

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Asked whether South Africa is still a viable investment destination, Godongwana cautioned investors against being influenced by “isolated incidents”.

“Crime prevention is going to be a top priority of the government,” he said, “watch this space.”

The biennial conference also used the opportunity to honour leading members of the South African Jewish community.

Netcare CEO Dr Richard Friedland and Wits Professor and Covid-19 Ministerial Advisory Committee chair Barry Schoub both shared the top award – the Eric Samson Mendel Kaplan award for a lay leader – for their service not just to South Africa in the forefront of the Covid-19 pandemic, but to the Jewish community itself.

Both men, said the board, had provided the community leadership with vital information informing key decisions like the closure of schools and shuls, while reassuring community members in their greatest hour of need.

Friedland accepted his award in honour of the hundreds of thousands of South African healthcare workers who had put their own lives on the line over the last 18 months to save others, remembering the 75 members of his own company who had perished from the virus during this time.

“If we have learnt anything during this time, it is of humility, the sanctity of life and most importantly how we cannot afford to lose our own humanity. We are social distancing (and keeping ourselves safe) but the challenge is to be kinder and more compassionate,” he said.

The Kirsh family were honoured with the Chief Rabbi Cyril and Ann Harris award for their lifetime of philanthropy to the community and the broader South African society, but especially for their incredible generosity during the pandemic.

Shaun Zagnoev, the outgoing chair of the board, was elected SAJBD president, replacing Mary Kluk, who had served in this office for 10 years.