Land expropriation will take SA to the brink
The court appearance of ANC secretary-general Ace Magashule on corruption charges risks being misjudged as a significant step in confronting the damage corruption is inflicting on South Africa.
Fraud, looting and malfeasance by politicians and state functionaries are undoubtedly a threat to South Africa's chances of succeeding in becoming a fair, stable and prospering country.
But a far greater threat is the corruptive impact of ANC policymaking, and particularly, the ruling party's drive to undermine property rights.
As long as the ANC remains hell-bent on pursuing its policy of expropriation without compensation (EWC) - the fight against corruption itself will be emasculated, and the prospect of attracting the investment, achieving the growth, and creating the jobs on which a brighter future for ordinary people depends, will remain beyond South Africa's reach.
The moral collapse on the part of the ANC is inescapable, so too are the wholly predictable consequences of its policy-making priorities.
The fate of freedom, enterprise and success in South Africa hinges on abandoning the damaging expropriation without compensation (EWC) policy along with race-based empowerment and other policies which have all been shown to be central to the scourge of corruption in the state under ANC rule.
Property rights underpin human rights in all free societies; eroding them is the first corruptive step towards tyranny and the abuse of citizens.
The choice facing the government is plain: it can either have EWC, or corruption-free governance, but it cannot have both.
| Institute of Race Relations deputy head of policy research.
The Mercury 16 Nov 2020 Email mercletter-AT-inl.co-DOT-za HERMANN PRETORIUS
Posted at 09:41AM Nov 17, 2020 by Editor in Market |