Current budgeting difficulties evidence how ANC and SA interests are tightly linked, whereas US-SA relations reflect ANC indulgences which are as reckless as they are inadequately understood.
ANC elites have lived lavishly for over three decades while bequeathing the next generation the world’s most severe youth unemployment crisis. While our national dialogue advocates for measures to lift GDP to 2%, long-term prospects decline further.
The ANC faithful have been programmed to believe that their party leaders should lecture the leaders of Western countries who are depicted as unjust beneficiaries of greedy colonialists. President Ramaphosa is good at this as he has had much practice.
With over 340 million people, the US must have some white supremacists and those that voted last November would have chosen President Trump over former Vice President Harris. But millions of blacks, hispanics and other disadvantaged groups also voted for Trump.
Trump can be quite annoying and he has made comments about women which are cringeworthy − yet millions of women also voted for him. Various progressive commentators have acknowledged that Trump was able to win so decisively because the Democratic party had been so accommodative of the far left. Many from the centre joined those on the right in wanting the pendulum to swing decisively in the opposite direction.
People accuse Trump of being unpredictable yet much of what he is doing is exactly what I expected. Whereas Joe Biden intentionally closed the door on meaningful negotiations with Russia by labelling their president a war criminal, Trump seems likely to arrange a ceasefire in Ukraine by escorting Russia back into the North Atlantic economy.
Some of the talking points Trump is using to coax President Putin to the negotiating table are annoying to hear but that is not a heavy price to pay. And while many will object to Russia not being punished, the Second World War ended with West Germany and Japan being integrated into the North Atlantic economies. This was motivated by the Soviet threat and today Trump is motivated by China’s belligerence. Yes, he is pragmatic and transactional.
Serious about defence spending
It isn’t really clear what happened during Ukraine President Zelensky’s recent visit to the Oval Office but it led to Ukraine being much better off as European nations, particularly Germany, have finally gotten serious about defence spending. Trump’s threat − subsequently walked back − to relocate a huge portion of the population and then commercially develop much of Gaza provoked Egypt, et al, to propose alternatives. Previously they had sought to minimise their involvement.
After the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the release of Nelson Mandela from imprisonment, the early 1990s post-Cold War enthusiasm induced peak idealism which was reinforced by globalisation lifting nearly 1.5 billion people out of poverty. This led to indulgences which included inadequate deterrence. The post-Cold War ended when Russia invaded Ukraine three years ago. Trump seeks to end that war and reverse the excessive embrace of Diversity Equity and Inclusion. Whereas it is easy to justify diversity and inclusion, equity, like BEE, is routinely manipulated to benefit elites at the expense of the disadvantaged.
ANC culture is quick to judge while, for over fifty years, Trump has been a deal maker who would do business with nearly anyone. These differences must be transcended so SA can meaningfully increase value-added exports to the US. This is by far the easiest path to create millions of SA jobs but it doesn’t suit the ANC’s reliance on patronage politics and they are the ones who need to show a willingness to engage with Trump.
The ANC can be seen as the provider of jobs if it maintains its BEE and localisation policies − but this ensures that job creation will remain woefully inadequate. Our current volume of jobs is in balance with the size of our stagnating economy. We can’t suddenly increase our GDP by a third but we could add value to exports destined for the one country which maintains a massive trade deficit, the US, and which wants to diversify away from its main source of value-added imports, China.
Commodity exporting
The alternative is to maintain the status quo and hope that commodity exports can be meaningfully increased. Among the problems with this option is that commodity exporting creates remarkably few direct or indirect jobs. It does however provide tax revenues which can be used to further entrench ANC rule.
If two ten-year-olds meet on a playground and one says, ‘Your mom dresses you funny,’ he isn’t looking to discuss fashion. He is testing the other. Trump knows that undermining property rights will be very costly to SA but his expropriation-without-compensation accusations aren’t meant to be accurate and responding with factual references misses the point.
Hosting the G20 and accusing Israel of genocide has made it nearly impossible for Trump to ignore SA. Cancelling SA’s AGOA benefits is insignificant relative to SA’s massive self-sanctioning through localisation-styled legislation. If the ANC doesn’t offer to engage meaningfully, Trump could cancel all flights to SA, to get their attention.
An obvious conversation starter which would cost the ANC nothing while helping SA a lot, would be to provide special dispensations for value-added exporters from anti-competitive regulations such as BEE. The ANC could also signal openness regarding modifications to expropriation without compensation legislation. This would be more likely if commentators better understood why what Trump wants is, ultimately, in SA’s best interests − though often not in the ANC’s.
[Image: Gerd Altmann from Pixabay]
The views of the writer are not necessarily the views of the Daily Friend or the IRR.
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