|
Since the Sub-Saharan Africa thread is way too broad, I'm getting a lot more interested in politics back home, and there's an election coming up in May, here's a South African Politics Megathread. South African Citizens overseas who want to vote and don't know how, skip to the bottom of this post Some history in very few words: 1600s--1910: Colonialism. Europeans, mainly Dutch (and a handful of French Huguenots), then later British, steadily overtake the country. Dutch-descended farmers ("boers") move inland, form independent republics, get conquered by the British. Native Africans get treated pretty shittily but have a measure of independence. Gold and diamonds discovered. 1910--1948: Late empire/Commonwealth. Democratic elections begin to be the norm, but only for white people. British rule begins to soften, some non-whites given the vote. The Dutch-descendants create a unified national identity as "Afrikaners", and establish a nationalistic party (literally called the National Party) using softer versions of political tactics copied from Hitler. The labour movement rises, but in a whites-only democracy mostly ends up with the creation of racist laws preventing non-whites from holding skilled jobs. Organised resistance to oppression of non-whites begins -- Gandhi, establishment of the ANC, establishment of the South African Communist Party. 1948 -- 1990: Apartheid. The 1948 election sees the NP gain a majority in parliament with only 38% of the vote due to lovely voting ward boundaries. They remain in power until 1994, and produce vast quantities of racist legislation. Laws restrict where non-whites can live, what jobs they can hold, what education they can receive, which beaches they can go to, etc, etc. "Morality" laws forbid sex and marriage between races. In response, resistance to oppression stiffens. Mass protests sweep the nation in the 50s; these are met with government bullets (see the Sharpeville Massacre). At the same time, the government cracks down on resistance movements, and attempts, unsuccessfully, to put their leadership on trial for treason. The ANC decides, since the government is trying to kill them anyway, to begin armed resistance. This takes the form of a non-lethal sabotage campaign (which, today, would be called terrorism, even though nobody was hurt  ). The ANC is banned, and its leadership (including Nelson Mandela) rounded up and sentenced to life in prison. The ANC goes underground and into exile in neighbouring countries.Things get worse. Millions of black people are forcibly removed from their homes and relocated to "Homelands" (think Indian Reservations). Armed resistance changes to bombings that actually kill people. The government introduces a law allowing for three months' imprisonment without charge, which is abused heavily to silence journalists and leaders of mass movements. In Soweto, there is an uprising by high school students against proposed changes to the education system (to make it even worse for blacks); 176 people are killed and over 1,000 wounded. Most are kids. Meanwhile, the white electorate continues living its happy middle-class lifestyle and voting the NP back into power election after election. By the 80s, parts of the country are in a permanent state of emergency. Guns have flooded the countryside, provided by Communist countries to the ANC and its allies, and by the Apartheid government to black nationalist groups with counter-interests to the ANC. The army is regularly used for crowd control. Major terrorist incidents begin occurring more frequently. The government begins using actual secret death squads to kidnap, torture and kill political opponents. The Congress of South African Trade Unions begins holding nation-wide general strikes. The writing is on the wall for Apartheid. 1990 -- 1999: Democracy and reconciliation Starting in 1990, the government begins repealing the racist legislation, releases Nelson Mandela from prison, and begins negotiations for holding a fully democratic election. Outbreaks of violence mar this process, but a date is set for an election in 1994. As the election nears, two nationalistic groups threaten to cecede: Afrikaner nationalists headed by Constand Viljoen (an army general who could take a chunk of the army with him), and Inkatha (a Zulu nationalist organisation) headed by Mangosuthu Buthelezi, who also have an organised armed wing. Civil war looms, but through a process of delicate negotiations handled primarily by Mandela, is averted, and both organisations agree to instead run in the elections as political parties and allow the people to decide. This crisis heavily influences the writing of the new constitution, which includes clauses protecting the (many) cultural identities of South Africans. The election happens, and the ANC (allied with the SACP and COSATU) sweeps to victory, with Nelson Mandela as president. Steps are taken towards creating a welfare state -- housing is built, healthcare is made free to all, the previously squalid neighbourhoods where black people are forced to live are provided with electricity and running water. A truth and reconciliation commission is created to try to air some of the worst of the atrocities committed during Apartheid. The country walks a fine line between neoliberal economic policies and its socialist domestic leanings. 1999 -- 2009: The Mbeki Years The ANC is voted back into power with a strong majority in 1999 and 2004, with Thabo Mbeki taking over as president. His presidency is mostly competent, apart from his courting of HIV-denialists and obstruction to providing antiretroviral therapy to the very large proportion of the country (maybe 10% of the population) with HIV. Crime is high, but steadily decreasing. The middle class is diversifying as some black people start to earn money in government and business, but the dirt poor underclass remains mainly black. Unemployment remains steady in the 20% range. 2009 -- now: The Zuma Presidency Jacob Zuma wrests control of the ANC from Mbeki, and stands for election in 2009, while also standing trial for rape and for corruption. He is acquitted in both cases, but makes an absolute fool of himself in the rape trial, and politicises the corruption trial, getting off because Mbeki interfered in it. Regardless, he rides a wave of populism to victory, assisted in part by ANC Youth League leader Julius Malema. However, the ANC shows the first signs of fracturing, with a breakaway party, Congress of the People (COPE), forming and despite terrible disorganisation and infighting, gains 7% of the national vote. In recent years, Julius and Zuma have a falling out over Malema's radical opinions. Malema is expelled from the ANC and forms his own political party, the Economic Freedom Fighters. Meanwhile, the massacre of striking platinum mine workers by police in 2012 has begun to drive a rift between the ANC and Cosatu, its trade union base. Some Ethnology South Africa is very culturally and ethnically diverse. We have eleven official languages. The least-spoken of those has over a million native speakers. So that's eleven ethnic groups right off the bat, but not the whole story. Here's a rough listing of the major ethnicities around today. Some of these I'm phoning in, because I actually don't know too much about them. Population numbers are fudged together from census categorisations of ethnicity and first language. Zulu (11.5 million): Zulu people are the most numerous ethnic group in South Africa, and, due to the establishment of the Zulu Empire under Shaka in the early 1800s, one of the more cohesive. The Zulu monarchy and aristocracy still exist as community leaders with some political power. The Inkatha Freedom Party is a Zulu nationalist party, under Mangosuthu Buthelezi, who is also a Zulu prince. Jacob Zuma, the current president (of the ANC and the country), is also a Zulu lord. Zulus are originate from northern KwaZulu-Natal, but significant populations went to Johannesburg to work the mines and stayed. Xhosa (8.1 million): Xhosa people are the second most numerous, but far less cohesive than Zulus. Much of the ANC leadership, both during and after Apartheid, was Xhosa. This included Nelson Mandela and Thabo Mbeki. Xhosas originate from the Eastern Cape, but are represented in Johannesburg as well as Cape Town. Pedi (4.6 million): I don't actually know much about the Pedi people. They are found mostly in the Limpopo Province, and they are somewhat culturally related to the Sotho (their language is sometimes referred to as Northern Sotho). Coloured(4.6 million): A classification describing people found mainly in the Western Cape, descended mainly from a combination of the non-Bantu native peoples there, European settlers and Malay peoples historically brought in as slaves and exiles. Coloured people are primarily Afrikaans speaking. Those with stronger ties to their Malay roots tend to be Muslim. Tswana (4 million): Found mainly in the Northwest Province. Sotho people (3.8 million): The Sotho people actually have an independent nation (Lesotho) enclosed within South Africa, but there are more in South Africa than in Lesotho. They are mostly found in the Free State Province. Afrikaner (2.7 million): White people speaking a language very closely related to Dutch. This is the national identity around which the National Party and the Apartheid system was built. Afrikaners are found throughout the country, with slightly less presence in the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal. Tsonga (2.2 million): Found mainly in Mpumalanga, but also found in Mozambique and other neighbouring countries. Related to the Zulu, Xhosa and Swazi. British South Africans (1.6 million): White people speaking English. Found throughout the country, but more so in the urban centres, Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal. Asian (1.3 million): In the South African context, this primarily refers to descendants of South Asians, mainly Indians, who arrived primarily as indentured labourers in the late 1800s. Many speak Hindi, Tamil, Gujarati and Urdu, but most are native English speakers. Found mainly in KwaZulu-Natal around Durban, there are also significant numbers in and around Johannesburg. Swazi (1.3 million:) Like the Sotho, Swazi people have an independent nation (Swaziland), but many live in South Africa in the Mpumalanga Province. Venda (1.2 million): Found in the eastern Limpopo Province. Ndebele (1 million): Historically a recent offshoot of the Zulu people. Found mainly in northern Limpopo (and southern Zimbabwe). Racial categories: Under Apartheid, people were classified as either white, black, coloured or Asian. Leaving aside the absurdity of trying to form hard boundaries around human ethnocultural groups, these categories remain imprinted in South African culture and politics today. The current make-up, according to these categories, is 79% black, 9% coloured, 9% white and 2.5% Asian. (Census 2011). Phew, maybe not so few words. So where are we now? There is an election coming up on the 7th of May. An ANC victory is pretty well assured, but predictions are for a much narrower margin of victory than ever seen before, probably less than 60%. Mostly, the question is where the electorate will turn to instead, and whether we could see the ANC lose in 2019. The players: The ANC, under Jacob "Jayzee" Zuma: Cosatu still stands with them, and people still remember them as their saviours from Apartheid. Victory is assured, but watch for rifts. Election manifesto here (pdf). The Economic Freedom Fighters, under Commander-in-Chief Julius Malema (literally The Democratic Alliance under Helen Zille: the remnants of the only officially-sanctioned opposition to Apartheid, South Africa's liberal party, and the official opposition since 1994. Although they only got 16.7% of the vote in 2009, this is the most any opposition party has held since 1994, and was a 50% increase over 2004. Crippled slightly by being the party rich whites vote for, the DA remains strong in the Western Cape, where they are also the party of coloured voters, but has been making gains in rural areas country-wide through focused campaigning. COPE: Although COPE gained 7% in the 2009 national election, their showing in the 2011 municipal elections was much poorer at around 2%. Regardless, they held their first national congress in January, and can maybe pull it together to make a showing. Agang SA under Mamphela Ramphele: Mamphela Ramphele was the life partner of Steve Biko, who founded the Black Consciousness Movement and was martyred by Apartheid police. Also new kids on the block, having formed in February of 2013. Agang had a brief moment of fame in late January 2014 when they announced a merger with the DA, with Ramphele standing as presidential candidate. This move, which had the potential to give the DA appeal among black voters and to give Ramphele access to the DA's electoral base fell apart five days later. In case you missed it, "right wing" in South African politics is an epithet, and the political spectrum has liberals on the right, social democrats in the centre, and actual socialists and communists on the left. Non-tabloidy Newspapers http://www.iol.co.za/ http://mg.co.za/ http://www.timeslive.co.za/ Useful Links http://africacheck.org/ -- like PolitiFact but for (South) Africa What this thread is for: Talking about South African politics, political history, and the upcoming election. What this thread is not for: Bitching about crime in South Africa with terrible personal anecdotes. If you're gonna discuss crime, come with facts and figures please. Whining about your lost white privilege. By every measure, white South Africans are still the most advantaged group in the country, so  South African Citizens overseas who want to vote, read here Yes, you can vote, but if your nearest consulate is thousands of km away and you don't feel like booking time off work so you can travel that distance on elections day, you are SOL. What you need 1. A green, bar-coded ID book. (If you don't have one, you can apply at a consulate.) 2. An SA passport 3. To be registered on the voters' roll (If you are not, you can register in person at a consulate.) 4. To have indicated on the VEC10 system that you will be voting at a consulate 5. To show up in person at the consulate you indicated, on the day designated for overseas voting, to cast your ballot Important dates 25 February: Election is officially called; voter registration closes; VEC10 system opens 30 April: Overseas election date (yes, on a Wednesday) 7th May: Official election date within SA Sources of information: Unofficial but quite helpful Facebook group Official but actually slightly less helpful IEC page Info from the SA Embassy in Washington DC List of SA consulates where you should be able to vote VEC10 system to register to vote overseas Lead out in cuffs fucked around with this message at 23:24 on Mar 3, 2014 |
#
¿
Feb 17, 2014 19:56
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 9, 2024 15:17 |
|
|
Thanks, I've amended the OP. It's interesting with all these newer, smaller parties running to look at poll figures (which are actually pretty hard to dig up). http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71654?oid=507537&sn=Detail&pid=71616 ANC around 55%, DA around 18%, EFF 4%, COPE and Agang with 1-2% each. It really is a pity about that merger. It could've been a game changer. It's also a relief to know that Malema's appeal isn't too massive. What I'm really interested in is where the unions end up standing, especially with the ongoing strike. For outsiders: the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union was formed two years ago, and rapidly displaced the Cosatu-affiliated National Union of Mineworkers as the dominant union in the platinum sector. They now represent around 80,000 workers. They are currently on strike, shutting down roughly half the world's platinum production. So far they have declared themselves "apolitical and noncommunist", but the timing of the strike right before the election feels anything but.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 18, 2014 01:32
|
|
|
Mauser posted:I understand the concern but I'm not sure how relevant the pre-colonialism era actually is to a discussion of modern politics. You don't start a discussion of Egyptian politics talking about the Pharaohs and the Romans. Thanks, I think that's a reasonable response. When we're talking South Africa, it can be a question of how far back you want to go. The Bantu expansion? The Khoisan peoples? Hominids? Australopithecines? That said, yes, an ethnological breakdown of the country is probably in order. When I get some time, I'll see what I can do. It's kinda complicated, though. The Apartheid government divided people into four ethnic groups -- European, Asian, coloured and black. Another way of looking at ethnic diversity is by languages -- South Africa has 11 official languages, two of which are European in origin, the other nine of which are native African. The least spoken, Ndebele, has over a million native speakers. The diversity of the country is pretty substantial, and that does inform and influence the politics. Meanwhile, here are some Wikipedia links for the curious: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_South_Africa http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_South_Africa http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bantu_expansion http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coloured http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_South_Africans http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khoisan
|
|
#
¿
Feb 18, 2014 19:25
|
|
|
R. Mute posted:Anyway, considering those poll numbers, isn't it a bit early to even be thinking about ousting the ANC from power? The ANC's main opponent seems to be apathy, not another party. That's fine, but it won't cost them the election any time soon without a worthy alternative. You know, personally I support most of what the ANC's done, albeit less so under Zuma. I just worry when one party retains power for so long, and I'd much rather see the country get a political system where parties actually have to compete with each other. And yes, a worthy alternative is a problem -- so far the strongest opposition parties have been quite racially based, with the NP and later the DA garnering most of the white and coloured vote, and the Inkatha Freedom party garnering most of the Zulu vote in 1994, but vanishing into obscurity today. Given that 80% of the voter base is black, the only strong opposition to the ANC would have to have non-racial appeal. For a long time, I've been convinced that that would only happen via a rift in the ANC itself. Last election saw the first rift with COPE, although it seems they were a flash in the pan. This election has the EFF, who are hampered by the their leader being fairly obviously a megalomaniac would-be dictator. Nobody's talking about the ANC losing this election, but the breaking away of parties and the brief but failed suggestion that the DA could run a black presidential candidate are definitely signs that they could in the next or the one after. Even a majority of less than 60% would be the lowest the ANC had ever received. There's also the possibility of opposition parties forming coalitions. And there's the fact that the poor are pretty unhappy. The figure cited in the title is from a statement the police have been putting out in response to concerns about them shooting protesters -- there were over 12,000 "crowd-related incidents" last year, nearly 2,000 of which were violent. There is definitely room for change, and 5-10 years can be a long time in politics.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 18, 2014 19:34
|
|
|
Dopilsya posted:Apathy isn't such a big issue, voter turnout is something like 75-80 percent. http://www.elections.org.za/content/Voters-Roll/Percentage-registered-voters--Summary/ Dopilsya posted:I think there's a poster on the forum who works for the DA in some capacity, I would be curious to hear his thoughts. That would be great! I was kinda worried this thread would just be me talking to myself.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 19, 2014 05:45
|
|
|
If nothing else, Zuma is also in his 70s. By 2019, he'll be 76, and quite possibly looking to retire from politics if the scandals don't catch up with him first. I'm guessing Cyril Ramaphosa is next in line, but I think his credit with the working class is pretty limited after Marikana. News from COPE: Their chief whip in the Eastern Cape Provincial Legislature publically defected to the ANC four weeks ago, but kept coming in to COPE offices, sitting in the legislature, and trying to direct COPE MPLs until yesterday, when the Mail and Guardian called him on it. Oh, COPE.  News from EFF:  for Policy and Research, Floyd Shivambu, began outlining EFF policy positions. Some of these sound pretty reasonable -- increasing the autonomy of the public protector and the auditor general in carrying out corruption investigations, and nationalising various things the government currently contracts out, like school text books and road building. And some of them sound ideologically noble but likely to crash the economy (especially if carried out over less than a multi-decadal time scale), like nationalising all land ownership and agricultural production. They describe their ideology as Marxist-Leninist Fanonian.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 21, 2014 19:59
|
|
|
redreader posted:I'm South African and have a valid SA passport although I left to see the world 11 years ago (london, of course, like all south africans) in 2003 and by strange circumstance ended up in the USA, where I'm living now. Can I vote? If I do I will make sure to educate myself and think about it, of course, instead of just pressing the "DA, since I am white" button. There's a pretty good (unofficial?) Facebook page giving out advice for voting overseas, and I recommend you read up there. Here's the official but actually slightly less helpful IEC page. You can get your ID book at a South African consulate. It doesn't cost much, but you do need to get fingerprints done. However ... if you never got your ID book back in SA, I'm gonna guess you also never signed up on the voters' roll, If you are on the voters' roll already, there's an online system on the IEC website which will be made available for a period of 15 days from 25 February. If you want to vote, you have to indicate so, and select a consulate via that system while it is available. After that, you actually have to get to a consulate (a full consulate, not one of the honorary ones) on the day designated for overseas voting (which hasn't been announced yet). In the USA, your options are New York, Washington DC, Chicago or Los Angeles. I'm basically SOL since there isn't a full consulate within 3,000km of me  I'll amend the OP to put this info in.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 22, 2014 00:12
|
|
|
 At some levels, the EFF seems like a pretty solid (socialist) party. And then you see the giant paintings of Malema and the fawning over Mugabe. I'd like to actually read that manifesto, though. The more reasonable sounding stuff (like a national minimum wage of R4,500/month) is basically ANC policies but firmer. The ANC's proposal is only to "Investigate the modality for the introduction of a national minimum wage", with no guarantees that they'll actually implement it. The DA's manifesto comes out tomorrow. E: Also, if anyone from the US wants to know what real socialists look like (not liberals being called socialists in acts of naked ignorance/trolling), you have socialists.jpg right there. Lead out in cuffs fucked around with this message at 23:50 on Feb 22, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Feb 22, 2014 23:48
|
|
|
R. Mute posted:This is such a good idea, I'm amazed I don't see it pop up more often. Because most of DnD deals with countries that are firmly in the grip of neoliberal economic policies and corporate influence in government, so stuff like actually nationalising things that should be nationalised rarely comes up? But yes, that, along with other actually smart ideas like nationalising resource extraction along with any monopolistic industries (telcos, utilities, etc), are very good ideas. To be honest, the ANC are pretty much in bed with corporations, but they walk a fine line between corporate interests and the interests of their alliance partners COSATU, who represent more than half the unionised workers in the country. COSATU are strongly in favour of both nationalisation of industries and of a national minimum wage. Apparently the R4,500/month figure comes from them. It'll be interesting to see how things develop within COSATU as the EFF, (ostensibly their political opponents), keep aligning with their demands while the ANC (their alliance partners) keep equivocating on them.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 23, 2014 02:38
|
|
|
It's interesting that the DA is calling for a massive public works programme and a youth wage subsidy. Both of these are carbon copies of ANC manifesto promises (though the DA claim they can create 7 million jobs vs the ANC's 6 million). It's worth noting, though, that based on the definitions from the last major public works programme, by "job" they mean "temporary work opportunity". They're not really proposing to employ 6-7 million people, since a lot of those will likely take up multiple temporary jobs in succession. Still, given how much of the country lacks infrastructure, and how many people are unemployed, this kind of thing is sorely needed, and it's good to see the top three political parties more or less agreeing on that.Ardennes posted:Thanks for all the info, I don't think it would be that easy to piece otherwise. I could see there being tension in the DA since on one hand it is trying to grow itself into an opposition force but in many ways it seems like a liberal (white) middle class party. Every time I see the words "job creators" in DA messaging, I cringe. Ardennes posted:There is also the issue with the Rand which at last check continues to devalue(up to 11 to USD). One real worry I have is that capital outflows from emerging markets, including South Africa are going to put a sizable hit to their economies much farther in advance than the first world. This is a tricky one. The South African economy has a pretty good balance of trade (close to parity), and GDP has almost tripled over the last decade. Yet, the Rand continues to depreciate. I'm fairly convinced that both capital outflow and the currency devaluation have everything to do with speculators manipulating public perception. It's not actually too hard to do that, since investors in the developed world have some pretty major negative preconceptions about African countries already. Hell, every time Nelson Mandela visited a hospital, even years after he had retired from politics completely, newspapers would rush out stories about his death and the certain collapse of the country being imminent. And the Rand would devalue. And somebody would make a lot of money. It gives you some sense of the popular appeal of nationalising large chunks of the economy. The country has been getting screwed by foreign speculators for two decades now.    Badger of Basra posted:Also in regards to the ANC left, is the SACP basically moribund at this point? It seems like if anyone should lead a left rebellion, it should be them, but I haven't heard anything about them. In 2012 the SACP announced a threefold increase in membership to 150,000 from around 50,000 in 2007. I think they're definitely part of the pressure on the ANC within its own alliance. Just for context, however, the EFF passed the 400,000 member mark last month after less than six months' existence. E: http://www.sacp.org.za/main.php?ID=3679 SACP following their 2012 national congress posted:Our disciplined unity in the midst of an Alliance facing many challenges; our Marxism-Leninism; our principled commitment to Communist values of solidarity and to fighting all negative tendencies – including individualism, self-enrichment, and corruption – all these attributes of the SACP and its cadres place an enormous vanguard responsibility upon us, now more than ever. Lead out in cuffs fucked around with this message at 22:18 on Feb 23, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Feb 23, 2014 22:14
|
|
|
SirKibbles posted:So what's the differences between the EFF and SACP they seem pretty close ideology wise? IS it methods or speed of hypothetical changes? Affiliation, mostly. The ANC and the SACP go way, way back (at least to the 1940s), so: Rogue0071 posted:The SACP has historically* served as a shield on the left flank for ANC neoliberal policy. I wouldn't be looking to it for any sort of leadership in a "left rebellion". To be honest, this goes right back to the 1940s, although in those days the ANC was somewhat more left. The Freedom Charter illustrates this, especially the parts about land and wealth). Both the SACP and COSATU regularly cite the modern ANC's non-fulfilment of the Freedom Charter in their grumblings, but they're not ready to break ranks just yet.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 24, 2014 18:34
|
|
|
Ardennes posted:http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-02-24/lamb-for-12-on-400-monthly-shows-south-africa-welfare-addiction.html There's probably some reasonable economic points to be argued over in terms of paying for social grants. It's kinda lost under the "welfare queens!" bullshit. Everything wrong with every US poor-baiting article is amplified here by the fact that they are literally trying to say that a family of 12 is coddled for getting $400 in welfare grants as their sole source of income. Admittedly that's not the entirety of the article, but the subeditor who chose that headline should be sent to live the rest of their life in a tin shack on $33 a month. PS: here's a mugshot of the journalist. Care to guess what her salary and living situation are like?  Anyway, what's interesting about it is the permeation of right-wing US talking points into the South African political consciousness, at least among rich white South Africans. Extensive and more thoughtful edit follows: To articulate this a little, supermarket price for lamb mince seems to be around R110 per kilo (~US$10). They're obviously a Coloured family, so quite likely making bobotie (just for reference, minced lamb is a huge part of Coloured people's traditional cuisine). Checking up on a few recipes, 2kg of mince would serve 12 people. Add in the cost of the other ingredients, and the meal probably comes to over R300, about 1/15th of the family's monthly income. What this article has done is to take the family's Sunday meal, the one time in the week, and possibly the month, when they can afford to eat meat, and made it sound like they're eating loving caviar every day. Rene Vollgraaff posted:Over three days following the lives of those in the Matthys house, two young family members expressed the unhappy truth: They need the payments to survive -- yet they would look harder for jobs if they had no such income. "Find a job or die, you scum." Oh, there's also a video to go along with this story. Listen to the narrator's £100,000 British public school accent wobble up a note or two whenever government spending is mentioned. Terrible Bloomberg video posted:
Um, what proportion of Canadians, Brits or Americans receive child tax benefits? Care to take a bet on whether more of them receive aid than have jobs when you include every tax credit and other benefit? Terrible Bloomberg video posted:
Guess what proportion of the US Federal Government's budget goes to social security, medicare, medicaid, unemployment, other welfare spending, other health spending, and education? About 60%! Welfare Dependency Near Danger Level in US of A! And that obvious bit of hyperbole brings us back to the fact that this is a) typical US right wing small-government bullshit and b) a way to assuage Bloomberg readers/users' guilt as they screw the country with their trading practices. Lead out in cuffs fucked around with this message at 06:10 on Feb 25, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Feb 25, 2014 03:56
|
|
More South Africans receive aid than have jobs
|
(Yet) another thing that bugs me about the whole Bloomberg thing is that they picked a soon-to-be ghost town in the middle of the loving Karoo* and tried to pass it off as being typical of the national situation. The bustling metropolis of Brandvlei. Notice how two thirds of the town has already been swallowed by the desert (see the remnants of the road grid pattern on the satellite image). If the people there are being supported by the government while they decide to move to a town that isn't moribund, I'm totally OK with that. Apparently the surrounding area is actually pretty not too badly off, with only 11% unemployment. (Brandvlei isn't even typical of its local municipality). *The Karoo is basically like the Arizona desert, for those not familiar with South African geography. We don't tend to call it a desert because we have an actual desert that's drier. Dopilsya posted:The real problem is not that welfare exists, but that there's really no means for these people to do without it. Jobs are so scarce that they don't have an opportunity to get one and whatever education they received is so poor that when limited opportunities do become available, they simply don't have the means to take advantage of it. In a lot of theses communities, things like basic literacy are in scarce supply and because of things like that, a good chunk of these people aren't just unemployed but completely unemployable. I suppose they could just be kicked off and then they would be forced to find work in the exciting growth industries of prostitution and drug muling, but it seems to me that improvements in education and the economy would crater the amount of people on welfare extremely quickly, since they would have the opportunity and ability to work for a living. Actually, one of the aspects of them having chosen a Coloured family, and not, say, a rural Black family, is that the education aspect is downplayed. I totally agree about the need for education (something else which Bloomberg doesn't seem to like). At the same time, both welfare grants (to keep people alive and able to send their kids to school), and labour-intensive jobs for the less educated seem like the right solution.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 25, 2014 07:10
|
|
|
A large, labour-intensive public works programme could do that, and that's probably why that's an election promise of all three of the top-running parties. There's good historical precendent, too, in such schemes as the New Deal. In fact, there's been a public works programme over the past decade, which has almost certainly helped to bring down the unemployment rate: http://www.epwp.gov.za/
|
|
#
¿
Feb 25, 2014 22:47
|
|
|
/\/\/\/\/\/\ The thing is, this all plays into a political narrative of Malema as having lived the corrupt, bling lifestyle of an ANC politico, but now being a reformed EFF Marxist. It may even be true.3peat posted:I'm curious, how does Malema reconcile his corruption scandals and his fleet of luxury cars with that ideology? From that interview with Floyd Shivambu I posted earlier: Floyd Shivambu interview posted:Your promise to fight corruption is tainted because your leader is himself facing corruption charges. Why should voters believe you? It seems from the charge sheet like the link to Malema in that case is pretty tenuous -- the most they can accuse him of is that he benefited indirectly from a misrepresented tender. It's entirely possible that, even if the tender turns out to have been fraudulent, he was just strung along by his friends without any personal knowledge of that. http://constitutionallyspeaking.co.za/malemas-money-laundering-charge-will-it-stick/ Pierre De Vos, constitutional lawyer posted:Judging from the charge sheet, the state does not have sufficient evidence to link Malema directly to the payment of a bribe to anyone involved in the granting of tenders to one of the companies in which Malema has a stake. While several of Malema’s co-accused are indeed charged with corruption for offering or accepting bribes to secure tenders, Malema himself is “only” being charged with money laundering in terms of POCA. If he was indeed involved in criminal activity, he was astute enough to place some distance between himself and other perpetrators more closely involved in the offering of bribes. But yeah, the EFF manifesto talks about protecting the independence of the Public Protector -- the very institution currently pursuing charges against Malema, and for the elimination of tenders, which Malema is accused of corruptly benefiting from. That's either hypocritical or incredibly ballsy. There are various possible stories. He could just be cynical and corrupt, happy to find some other means to enrich himself if a hypothetical (and deeply unlikely) EFF election victory could come about. He could be sick of having to be caught up in the corrupt tender game (which is probably about as difficult to avoid as the revolving door is in US politics), and looking for a way out by eliminating the game entirely. He could be a completely innocent and naive idealist. I suspect it's some convoluted blend of all three. http://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2013/12/22/hours-late-for-fund-raising-dinner-malema-jokes-can-t-risk-another-speeding-fine Julius Malema posted:Tenders are not sustainable business
|
|
#
¿
Feb 26, 2014 19:23
|
|
|
The Haitian posted:I'm not South African but I'm really glad this thread exists, I've been kind of fascinated with SA for a long time and it's definitely enlightening. Anyway, a totally random question: I know the SA constitution guarantees freedom of speech, but how does this apply to hate groups or anti-democratic parties? Is it like Germany where the AWB would probably be banned and Terre'Blanche (when he was alive) probably convicted of hate speech, or more like the US where they can organize/say whatever they want until an actual crime occurs? Also, I'm sure in polite company no one would say they want apartheid back, but is this something that you'd hear from reactionary whites (think the SA equivalent of Freepers) or have even they moved on? Hate speech is definitely illegal, both under the constitution and in common law. In fact the laws against it were around even in the later days of Apartheid, but good luck to you if you were black and wanted to bring that to court. And no, I don't think you're breaking any rules by bringing this up. Yes, it's definitely relevant, in as much as white people still hold a good portion of the economic power in the country. Eugene Terre'Blanch (and the rest of the AWB) were granted amnesty by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission for their crimes under Apartheid. He did, however, spend three years in jail (in 2001) for beating the poo poo out of a black security guard and a petrol pump attendant in 1996. Being one of three white guys in the whole prison he came out transformed (for the better). The AWB actually isn't banned, they've just filtered out the racism and transformed into an Afrikaner nationalist/cultural group (cultural expression, where it doesn't infringe on other people's rights, is OK and even encouraged under the constitution). But sadly, yes, there are definitely the equivalent of Freepers. And yes, there are also whites who will, in polite (white) company, say that they want Apartheid back, and use horrific racial slurs. I don't think it's much worse than, say, the Deep South, but that's not saying much. They wouldn't say those things in public, though. I'd also guess that a lot of the people joining the AWB (or, say, voting for the Freedom Front Plus) would fall into that category. Our constitution is a sometimes strange but mostly wondrous thing. For instance, we were fairly ahead of the curve in legalising same-sex marriage in 2005, despite South Africa being mostly quite staunchly Christian and often socially conservative. What this took was a Constitutional Court judgement, rigorously interpreting Section 9 of the Constitution, and giving parliament a deadline to pass the law, failing which they would have amended it themselves. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minister_of_Home_Affairs_v_Fourie http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Union_Act_(South_Africa) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_Nine_of_the_Constitution_of_South_Africa
|
|
#
¿
Feb 28, 2014 11:00
|
|
|
Specifically related to hate speech, though, here is the relevant section of the constitution:South African Constitution Section 16 posted:16. Freedom of expression Hah -- I'd forgotten about that ban on war propaganda.  Back to hate speech, though. Here's a bit of legal analysis (from a constitutional lawyer's blog): http://constitutionallyspeaking.co.za/hate-speech-versus-free-speech/
|
|
#
¿
Feb 28, 2014 22:32
|
|
|
Badger of Basra posted:Why is Freedom Front Plus part of the ANC government? They aren't? It's just that their leader got given the position of Deputy Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries after the last election. Zuma and Mulder are quite happy to tear into each other in public, and the FF+ has no formal coalition with the ANC. Unfortunately parliamentary votes don't seem to be available online, but I'm pretty sure the FF+ are quite happy to vote in opposition to the ANC. http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71627?oid=128250&sn=Detail Politics Web in 2009 posted:Mulder dismissed the idea of a coalition between his party and the ANC. It probably had a lot to do with the fact that a good many commercial farmers are still Afrikaners. At the same time, commercial farmers, being beacons of wealth in a sea of rural poverty, tend to become victims of fairly horrific crimes (the term generally thrown around in SA politics is farm murders). Although there isn't a racial bias to them (wealthy farmers of other ethnic groups get targeted just as much), that hasn't stopped more nationalistic Afrikaners crying "genocide!". This has not been helped by there being an Apartheid-era protest song whose lyrics literally translate to "kill the farmer", which leftist radicals (notably Julius Malema) have been known to sing in public (and get charged with hate speech for doing). Zuma appointing the head of the party representing Afrikaner nationalists to a prominent position in the Department in charge of agriculture was most likely an olive branch. Farm murders is a touchy issue, which statistically speaking is somewhat of a non-issue. There's a Human Rights Watch report from 2001 which looks into the issue in depth. What it kinda boils down to (and I'm vastly oversimplifying) is that if commercial farmers would stop raping and beating their poor black workers, they would get treated a lot less horrifically when they were robbed. E: I also just realised you meant "government" in the UK parliamentary sense of "the executive". Although the South African parliamentary system is functionally very similar to that of the UK (being Westminster-based), we don't (AFAIK) tend to use that particular turn of phrase. More commonly we would just talk about the cabinet. Lead out in cuffs fucked around with this message at 06:07 on Mar 2, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Mar 2, 2014 00:37
|
|
|
Phaeoacremonium posted:Good OP. Yikes. Actually, one of the most annoying things about this for me is that it took nearly half an hour to track down the actual article she was complaining about. I think it's this one. While I get the impression that City Press can be a bit tabloid-ish, that seems fairly well researched and balanced. I really don't know why it got Zille so riled up, let alone spouting racist bullshit. Ugh, and she doubled down on it, too. Highlights include "Who cares if I piss off journalists? I don't need positive press. I've got Twitter!", and the unironic citation of Urban Dictionary. This seems like a pretty good breakdown of what's wrong: Sisonke Msimang posted:For some time now, Zille has been on the ropes. She has mis-stepped badly on a number of occasions. Her hectoring tone, her harking back to old ways of understanding the world (progressive for then but hopelessly out of touch now), her mastery of new technology, seem desperate rather than relevant. I think what bugs me the most about the DA is looking at how slick (and obviously well funded) their manifesto launch was. I strongly suspect that they're getting a lot more private money than the other parties. And, unfortunately, we don't get to know, because SA electoral funding laws don't limit private funding or require its disclosure. http://www.elections.org.za/content/Parties/Party-funding/ http://www.content.eisa.org.za/old-page/south-africa-political-party-funding
|
|
#
¿
Mar 3, 2014 18:58
|
|
|
Badger of Basra posted:Is "Missus class" a South African thing? Also, who will you be voting for if not DA (if that's not too personal)? As far as I can tell from Google, "missus class" was created from whole cloth by Zille. Phaeoacremonium's explained what she meant by it, and what everyone understood, but it's definitely a new turn of phrase, and not one that I think is likely to catch on, since South Africa's wealthy elite is pretty racially diverse these days. It's a pity about Zille. One of the things the DA did get right under her leadership of the Western Cape Province was rules for the tender process to prevent nepotism. She also has strong struggle cred as a journalist who stood up to the Apartheid government. But she seems to be living far in the past in terms of race relations. That and some weird American/internet pop culture future. Phaeoacremonium posted:It worked like this: I'd vote DA in the provincials (Western Cape) because it made the ANC so desperately unhappy to lose it and I'd vote for every trendy alternative to the opposition in the nationals to spite the DA because I don't like their style of opposition and am not particularly impressed with their manifesto. It's always made me childishly happy to do so. Yeah, this has been pretty much my voting strategy. Independent Democrats in 2004, yes?   I think I once voted ANC in the provincial elections, but mainly because it was them vs the IFP, and they promised to sort out the Ulundi-Pietermaritzburg-as-capital of KZN kerfuffle. To be honest, the ANC aren't too far from where I'd consider voting, if I weren't deeply concerned about them having no strong opposition (and being deep in corporate pockets). Phaeoacremonium posted:Edit: I might just vote red for the hell of it (to spite the ancestors and the ANC in one fell swoop, hah), but I have issues with Malema and the fact that he's basically exploiting some really worthwhile policy ideas to try and keep the taxman and the law from his door. But he won't need my help, I'm pretty sure he's going to do really well anyway. Numsa are apparently considering forming a political party. It's too late for this election, and they're giving themselves a year to research it before they make any decisions, but maybe in 2016 or 2019 there'll be a real, union-based, non-populist, non-neoliberal workers' party.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 4, 2014 08:05
|
|
|
So, not much happening this week. Rwanda got angry with SA for kicking out some of its officials after they kept trying to assassinate a former spook within SA borders The EFF are taking the IEC to court over R200,000 in fees they have to pay to participate in the elections, saying this is a barrier to participation for new parties. This is almost certainly a publicity stunt, since they've been reported to have more than R2 million to their name, and their legal fees are likely to cost more than that. Still, it's kinda legit in principle. The Mail and Guardian have released a nifty web app that lets you plug in your home address and see who your electoral ward voted for in 2009. Back home in Pietermaritzburg, it's about a 2:1 split between DA and ANC. In the Northern suburb I was staying in in Cape Town, far behind the Boerewors Curtain, it was more like 95% DA, with a smattering of COPE, FF+ and ACDP. Oh, and some silly hazing ritual by hopelessly naive girls at a boarding house at North-West University Potchefstroom had them briefly giving the Nazi salute (before some silly wiggle). Constitutionally speaking has a good breakdown of why (besides the obvious) this is not a good thing.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 7, 2014 20:21
|
|
|
Minimum wage/nationalisation update: Widespread rebellion of its leftist allies finally prompts the ANC to start talking seriously about a national minimum wage. They plan to model the policy on China's. They're also talking about creating a national bank. Unions update: Numsa argue for staying in Cosatu, and potentially initiate a power grab within the union confederation. It's unlikely they'll succeed. Nonetheless, it's interesting to see how this plays out. Nuclear power update: Deal with Russia for nuclear power plants delayed by "intrigue". MG posted:Another source, who claims to have lobbied for the Russians, said that there is a difference between how Russia and South Africa operate. “When something’s done, the Russians believe it’s done, and they say it’s done. But they forget that here in South Africa we have something complicated called a democracy.” Sanitation and drinking water news: South African Human Rights Commission is launching a report on access to clean drinking water and sanitation tomorrow. Some hints as to what might be in it. Part of the problem seems to be that dirt-poor municipalities with no tax base aren't being provided with consistent funding from the national government. Instead the money comes through intermittent grants that tend to vanish through corruption. Lead out in cuffs fucked around with this message at 18:39 on Mar 10, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Mar 10, 2014 18:36
|
|
|
So far everything I've read on AfricaCheck has been solid, evidence-based and in-depth. They're independently funded, and that funding seems to mostly come in ways that aren't likely to have strings attached. They're also hosted at the University of Witwatersrand's journalism department; Wits is a very reputable university. For news, as I posted in the OP, the Mail and Guardian and IOL seem to be not too bad. There's also the publicly funded South African Broadcasting Corporation, modelled somewhat after the BBC. There are accusations of them being a government mouthpiece, but the fact that they're willing to report negatively on both the government and their own leadership suggests otherwise.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 15, 2014 17:26
|
|
|
The Haitian posted:So here in the US we have various fact-checking organizations such as PolitiFact, Factcheck.org, and the Washington Post fact checking page. All of them are considered pretty good and unbiased, except of course when lots of people disagree with their verdict on a particular statement. Is AfricaCheck.org as good and as independent? In fact, to build on that, if I want to follow SA news in general what's a good site that doesn't have a blatant political bias? Oh, also, ISS Africa is pretty amazing if you like reading and have a lot of time on your hands. One of their monographs I've read is Volk, Faith and Fatherland, a history of the extreme white right in South African politics. Phaeoacremonium posted:So who's anxiously awaiting the Nkandla report today? Holy poo poo, she certainly does. For those less familiar, Madonsela is the South African Public Protector. Her office is responsible for prosecuting political corruption. She had religious crazies praying for "demons" to be cast out of her office a few weeks ago for going after the head of the SABC. Anyway, from what I've read the report is pretty balanced, and mainly recommends tightening up procedures and ministers taking more responsibility for these kinds of projects. But some of that stuff, like sourcing money from an inner city renewal fund to build Zuma's mansion in the middle of nowhere? Yikes.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 19, 2014 21:23
|
|
|
Spamtheman posted:The harm the ANC is doing with their eduction policies leaves me constantly wondering how people are not rioting in the streets constantly. Well, actually: ISS posted:According to the SAPS Incident Registration Information System (IRIS), police officers were deployed to monitor a total of 12 399 crowd-related events (34 incidents a day, on average) between April 2012 and March 2013. Most of these were public gatherings that had been given permission in terms of the Regulation of Gatherings Act 205 of 1993. However, as many 1 882 (15%) of these gatherings turned violent, resulting in 3 680 arrests. I think it's more over service delivery, though. It's easier to riot because you have no drinking water and may soon die of thirst than because your kids' education sucks. But yeah, education is hella depressing, not least of all because we spend a shitload of our GDP on it. A lot of it can be blamed on Apartheid, since education for black people was pretty lovely then. But the fact that it hasn't gotten better despite 20 years of money being sunk into it suggests that corruption and inefficiency are playing a role.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 25, 2014 21:00
|
|
|
Spamtheman posted:Actually a couple of high profile black intellectuals have come out saying that things are so bad now that the education being received by most poor black children is worse than it was under the apartheid bantu education system (http://www.citypress.co.za/news/bantu-education-was-better/). Yeah ... that article's pretty terrible. The particular "black intellectual" they cite is a lecturer in business, not education, and makes some obviously false statements (like the claim that South Africa's education is the worst in Africa). The other expert they cite is professional Apartheid apologist Pik loving Botha. Note, when I say obviously false, I have read that WEF report cited in the Mail and Guardian story in your last post, the one that claims that maths and science education in South Africa is the second worst in the world. And guess what? It was a questionnaire, asking respondents (wealthy businesspeople, presumably) to rank their country's education. So for sure, South African businesspeople have the second-lowest opinion of their own country's maths and science education in the world, but that's almost certainly related more to the Gini coefficient than to any objective measure of the actual quality of that education. The PIRLS 2011 study, by contrast, seems to be an objective measure of literacy, which showed that things are bad, but not worst-in-the-world bad. Also, "black people were better off under Apartheid" is a classical cryptoracist canard, which instantly sets off my BS detectors. Bah, and I spent half an hour researching this, when Africacheck has done this already. They say pretty much the same things I did, just more expansively. Spamtheman posted:The relentless push to increase matric pass rates has meant that schools force children out before they get to matric and fail, less than half of children who start grade 1 finish school (there are also other socio-economic factors that influence this). The standards are also so bad that only 11% pass maths with more than 40% (http://www.ngopulse.org/article/education-south-africa-where-did-it-go-wrong). This is all pretty valid, though I would like to see statistics over time. Lead out in cuffs fucked around with this message at 06:41 on Mar 27, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Mar 27, 2014 06:17
|
|
|
Discendo Vox posted:Just as a Quite right, and fixed. Also, for reference, that is something which South Africa is among the world leaders for.
Lead out in cuffs fucked around with this message at 06:43 on Mar 27, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Mar 27, 2014 06:41
|
|
headsup, I think it's Gini with a G.
|
Yeah, it'll be interesting to see how it plays out, especially in terms of election timing (7th May). The SIU report isn't due until the end of May.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 4, 2014 23:02
|
|
|
Happy Freedom Day everybody! Twenty years of every South African over the age of 18 having the right to choose their government, for good or ill (mostly good!) Twenty years of one of the best, most human rights-based constitutions in the world -- a constitution that gave us legalised gay marriage in the face of staunch social conservatism. Here's hoping for centuries more of strong democracy. 
|
|
#
¿
Apr 27, 2014 09:25
|
|
|
So, some content: The ANC under Zuma has been turning really creepy in terms of the degree of control it exercises over its supporters and members. This story broke about a month ago, but hasn't been discussed yet, so... For the past year, the ANC has been running its own intelligence wing, called Project Veritas. Made up of ex-government spooks, it is tasked with vetting ANC parliamentary candidates, and presumably other projects. A likely candidate for those other projects would be their strict security at the ANC's upcoming final electoral rally, where every one of the 250,000+ attendees have had their details recorded, and "anyone who tries to disrupt or engage in booing will be dealt with harshly".
|
|
#
¿
May 2, 2014 17:23
|
|
|
Spamtheman posted:It's like a bad case of deja vu all over again. Between the project veritas stuff, using the national key points act (apartheid era security legislation) to try and cover up Nkandla, shooting protesters and mineworkers, the push for new secrecy laws and my personal favourite, rumours of a ministry of information (http://mg.co.za/article/2014-05-01-mac-the-mouth-to-oversee-zumas-legacy) it feels like watching and even more incompetent version of the old NP government. Yeah that cycle of abuse analogy is pretty apt. It bears remembering that this goes way back, though: Zuma was the ANC's chief spy from 1986 to 1993. This was the messiest time, when the NP's assassins and death squads were at their peak, and brutality was the norm on both sides. Although nothing has been specifically linked to Zuma, the ANC's counter-intelligence activities at the time were pretty nasty, involving torture, long solitary confinement, etc. For that matter, probably a better comparison for Zuma than the former NP government would be Vladimir Putin. Both were former (Soviet-trained) spooks turned democratically elected but creepily authoritarian politicians. http://www.anc.org.za/list_by.php?by=Jacob%20Zuma http://politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71619?oid=117713&sn=Detail http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71619/page71639?oid=119782&sn=Detail&pid=71639 http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page72308?oid=119782&sn=Marketingweb%20detail The good news is that it is extremely unlikely that the ANC will ever again have enough of a majority in parliament to unilaterally change the constitution, and the constitution gives a president two terms only, so one way or another, Zuma will be out of power five years from now. Baudolino posted:Why would a opposition party that wants to appeal to black voters choose a white woman as a leader? Perhaps as a European I am not capable of understanding how things are in South Africa. But I thought that there was still a lot of subdued resentment about Apartheid ( Why else would it be popular to sing “ kill the farmer”? ). It just seems like a really bad idea from purely tactical point of view to not have a black party leader. If you read the thread (like you should proofread your short fiction or your posts), you might see that the DA tried to form a coalition with Agang SA, to run with Mamphela Ramphele as their candidate, but that fell through. I think the DA is slowly but surely transitioning away from being a mainly white (and coloured) party to something more multi-racial. Their youth league and junior politicians are looking very much more racially representative than the top tier of the party. Whether they'll ever transition away from being a (neo)liberal party of the middle class is another matter, and they are probably doomed to be a minority party in the long term due to class rather than racial divisions. As to why they are running with Zille, specifically: she is a strong politician with a solid track record as Western Cape Premier (although some of her gaffes lately make me seriously doubt her character).
|
|
#
¿
May 6, 2014 17:50
|
|
|
Thanks -- I'd checked that site about an hour ago and it wasn't live yet. Only 1.2 million votes counted so far, so anything could still happen, but the DA results so far are looking pretty high. Like, they might actually be heading towards being a credible opposition party high. I wonder if that's just an urban bias in getting votes counted earlier, though. E: Anyone care to prognosticate? Looking at results so far, I'd guess ANC around 60%, DA around 24-26%, EFF around 4-5%, NFP, IFP, COPE, FF+ and ACDP around 1-2% each. The EFF's showing is fascinating -- they haven't got a stronghold anywhere, though they're bringing in about 10% of the vote in Limpopo (Malema's home turf) and only about 1.5% in the Western Cape. But their 4.6% vote so far is fairly evenly spread across the country. If nothing else it will liven up parliament to have a few actual hard line socialists sitting in it. Also, while the DA will still only likely be sitting with around a quarter of the votes, that will make them the strongest national opposition party in the history of post-Apartheid South Africa (the runner-up being the NP in 1994 with 20% of the vote; arguably the DA are the continuation of the NP, of course). I'm not the biggest fan of the DA, but I am happy to see the country moving towards a more balanced party system. Lead out in cuffs fucked around with this message at 05:48 on May 8, 2014 |
|
#
¿
May 8, 2014 02:39
|
|
|
Spamtheman posted:Western Cape is already looking like it's going DA again with big gains all around the country, they may win a few previously ANC municipalities and the local ANC branches will lose their poo poo. They ANC should take a bit more than 60% of the vote, but it's probably not enough of a dip to see any kind of meaningful change on their part. On the other hand, it looks like the ANC is winning back a few DA municipalities. It's not too surprising, since the votes are so close in so many of them. It does kinda look like a lot of the COPE voters in the Western Cape have gone back to the ANC. Not that it matters at all (except for local government), because proportional representation. Overall, yes, the DA are looking like they're gaining about 8% of the vote more than last time. I suspect a lot of that will be from re-absorbing the ID vote, and a little from taking in COPE voters. I wonder if any substantial number of voters actually switched from ANC to DA? Spamtheman posted:I'm not really sure that it's fair to say that the DA are the continuation of the NP. Back in the day the day they were the party that white liberals good vote for and feel good about being anti-apartheid without actually having to go into a township or mingle with the ANC. The old NP members of parliament actually all ended up defecting to the ANC, which tells you more about the ANC than anything. I'm not saying that they maybe haven't received a lot of votes because they are mostly white candidates but that has changed these days. I suspect that most of the people who would have made a vote that way are either dead, left the country cause of the swart gevaar (black threat) or now vote FF+, there are far too many women and people of colour in the DA these days for them to be happy. Well, technically the DA is the alliance of the DP and the NP, but yeah I do remember that a lot of the NP MPs defected to the ANC. I think a lot of them ended up in the DA, too, though? And that really says a lot about the political situation, when the top two parties both contain elements of the apartheid government.
|
|
#
¿
May 8, 2014 20:30
|
|
|
Also, the EFF look like they're doing slightly better than expected, at 5.5% of the vote. That's not bad at all for a party that was formed barely six months before the election. And, since they actually stand for something other than "we're the ANC but not the ANC", I don't think they're a one-trick pony like COPE was. It would be very encouraging if the next election started looking closer to a three-way split between the DA, ANC and EFF, and parties started talking electoral coalitions. I don't see the EFF allying with the DA ever, but maybe the IFP or NFP could choose sides?
|
|
#
¿
May 8, 2014 20:40
|
|
|
OK, so election post-mortem: ANC victory with 62.15% of the national vote. DA at 22.23%, EFF at 6.35%. The ANC made slight gains in the southern half of the country, and slight losses in the Free State. They lost 6-10% of the vote in Gauteng, Limpopo, Mpumalanga and the North West Province compared to 2009. In Gauteng, the ANC lead narrowed down to 55% of the vote (from 65%). The DA made solid gains in the southern half of the country, and smaller gains in KZN and the north. Their showing wasn't as high as their internal polls suggested (22% vs 28% predicted by polls), but was still a massive gain from the previous 17%. The EFF did better than expected, with 6.35% of the vote. What's interesting is that, while their greatest support was in the northern regions (where they got 10% or more of the vote in most provinces), they received a portion of the vote country-wide. If they don't collapse in the next five years, Malema stays out of prison, and they can get a firmer backing from the unions (who are strongest in Gauteng), 2019 could get very interesting. Provinces to watch in future: Gauteng: the opposition vote this year was almost entirely accounted for by the DA (at 28.5%) and EFF (at 10%). If the EFF gets organised, the 2019 vote in that province could be a three-way DA/ANC/EFF split. Western Cape: the DA consolidated their majority this year, from 49% to 57%. The ANC actually slightly gained in votes, but most likely from the collapse of COPE, who took 8.4% in 2009. It's still close, and the ANC could theoretically come back, but it looks like the DA is there to stay. Saddest thing: The DA's results correspond very closely in many parts of the country with the proportion of the residents who are non-black. Maybe they'll be able to shake that by next election, cause it kinda puts a hard cap on the votes they can get. Yay, five more years of Jay-Zee
|
|
#
¿
May 15, 2014 23:28
|
|
|
In other news, Numsa, freshly broken away from Cosatu and the ANC, are talking about striking in solidarity with the ongoing Amcu platinum workers' strike, and have confirmed they are going ahead with forming a labour party. It will be interesting to see how they interact with the EFF, who also seem to be trying to fulfil that role.
|
|
#
¿
May 15, 2014 23:31
|
|
|
There's also the ACDP, a multiracial "Christian right" party. But their vote share is tiny and shrinking (from 1.6% in 2004 to 0.6% in 2014). In many ways they're the closest cognate of the US Republicans. Social conservatism is an interesting facet of South African society -- we have a quite strongly and often fundamentalist Christian bent. However, we also have a constitution that guarantees freedom and equality for all regardless of religion, sexual orientation, etc. This has led to some interesting clashes between a socially conservative parliament and the constitutional court (e.g. the legalisation of gay marriage, where the court forced parliament to amend the laws to be in compliance with the constitution).
|
|
#
¿
May 16, 2014 18:41
|
|
|
More the latter I think. They still have (most of) their leftist allies, but the SACP and Cosatu have been supporting them with gritted teeth lately, and as mentioned a few pages back, one of Cosatu's four member unions has already left in disgust. In some ways, though, ruling the country is a tricky tightrope to walk. The poor are disgruntled by the massive wealth inequality, but the second anything vaguely leftist happens (e.g. the platinum workers strike), international investors and currency speculators trash the economy through disinvestment. For examples of this, try reading British newspapers talking about labour unrest in South Africa, or see the first page for a really terrible Bloomberg article.
|
|
#
¿
May 16, 2014 19:37
|
|
|
BlueBull posted:How do you recognize the platinum worker's strike as something "vaguely leftist"? I mean, what should they be doing to move from vaguely to 100% leftist? On a scale of leftist courses of action between engaging in social democracy and actively pursuing violent proletarian revolution, industrial action is certainly "vaguely" leftist. That, and the current move towards forming ANC-independent labour parties, is probably about the best case scenario given the vast wealth inequality in South Africa. BlueBull posted:In any case, I don't really see any sort of major negative effect of the strike to the currency, nor to the economy as a whole, looking at FDI anyway. Even the platinum price has remained relatively stable, considering the circumstances. The rand lost about about 40% of its value over the past year and a bit.  There are almost certainly other factors feeding into that, but the timeline fits with Marikana and the strikes a little too neatly.BlueBull posted:In terms of the platinum worker's strike, I believe they have overplayed their hand. I will readily agree that these guys should be earning more money than they are, but the approach of R 12500 or nothing isn't viable, and it's not a position suitable for negotiation if they never move from it. We are now at a point where miners would rather starve than accept R 12450 for example, spurred on by Joseph Mathunjwa whilst he figures out which one of his BMWs he will drive today. How much money is reasonable for one of the highest-risk jobs in the country? How much do you personally earn? BlueBull posted:I also have a huge issue with the fact that the striking miners are essentially a murderous mob, with however many people having been hacked, burnt, shot etc to death now. It really makes it difficult to feel any sort of sympathy when these guys stab a guy to death for going to work with the intent of earning a few bucks to feed his bloody kids for example. So let's break this down. One NUM member was found stabbed yesterday, after scabbing. There have been no arrests and no witnesses, only the allegations of NUM (who have an axe to grind with AMCU). But even if this was actually a case where the scab was stabbed by AMCU members, which is certainly possible but not in any way verified, you are willing to generalise from the actions of a few members to calling the entirety of a union of 50,000 a "murderous mob". That's just not very rational thinking, there. BlueBull posted:The wealth inequality issue can only ever be solved through firstly education. South Africa is not a poor country, SARS ensures that we have AMPLE cash to spend, certainly on important areas. Education is one of those areas. And we spend HUGE money on this area....yet, it is a failure, and results for Matric are PISS loving POOR! Every year. I don't think most of us in the thread would strongly disagree with what you are trying to convey in these two paragraphs. As I'm sure you've read on the last two pages, both education and tenders have come up. You seem to have valid points to contribute, but frothing at the mouth in all-caps is not the best way to go about it.
|
|
#
¿
May 24, 2014 02:35
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 9, 2024 15:17 |
|
|
BlueBull posted:Do tell me more about these new labour parties, and how they will address the vast wealth inequality in RSA. How else do you propose addressing it? BlueBull posted:Drop in value against what, USD, EUR, Zim dollah? Please provide links to support this claim of a 40% "loss of it's value over the past year and a bit". Let's sweep that whole global economy story under the carpet as well while we at it. Versus the pound, for sure. It's closer to 30%, now that I do the sums, but you're firstly picking on semantics, and secondly arguing over a point which you could have verified in about five seconds of Googling. http://www.xe.com/currencycharts/?from=GBP&to=ZAR&view=2Y http://www.xe.com/currencycharts/?from=USD&to=ZAR&view=2Y BlueBull posted:You tell me how much money you feel they should be paid. Please make sure to also provide us with salaries of other high-risk jobs in the country, such as being a security guard for example, maybe a teacher as well, police officer and so on. I trust the workers' own assessment of R12,500 per month. You still haven't said what they should be paid, or what you yourself are paid, and why you feel you deserve to be paid that, while they deserve to be paid so much less. But hey, facts are good, even if your argument is terrible, so here goes: Teachers start at R13,500 per month and go up from there. Police officers start at R8,760 in Johannesburg, 6,205 elsewhere. This is shockingly low. Security guards apparently sit closer to R3,500 per month, which is pretty terrible. PS: the fatality rate of mine workers is around 0.75 per 1,000 workers per year. So a worker who is employed in the mines for 25 years has nearly a 2% chance of dying in the process. The police officer fatality rate is around 0.3 per 1,000 officers per year -- high, but not as high as mine workers. BlueBull posted:Except that it isn't just one guy stabbed the other day. There's also the two cops who were hacked to death. And a shop steward here and there. And a few guys who got killed for going to work by the union members, after all, how dare they try make some money to feed their family. Others have answered this quite nicely. BlueBull posted:Having read the last two pages, "most of us in this thread" is you and maybe two other loving posters before I rocked up. Maybe you can team up with them to conjure up supporting info on that 40% loss of value over the last year and a half for our currency. There have been half a dozen native South African posters so far, and plenty of DnD regulars poking their heads in. All of them have been civil and often witty. You have managed to be neither. I mean for gently caress's sake, I actually agreed with you in that post, and all you could do was to try to pick on a fact you could easily have verified and which supported your own arguments, just for the sake of being belligerent. Please at least make an attempt. 
|
|
#
¿
May 31, 2014 07:25
|
|