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Mazrui and the South African service delivery problem
As much as Ali Mazrui saw in West Africa, the problem of western appetites without complementing and satiating western technologies, the same comparison could easily be made in urban South Africa, especially with regards the roots of violent service delivery protests and the tragedy vulnerable people living in shanty town along the urban periphery.
In this regard housing, access to water and electricity are typically the main issues behind protests. This is compounded by the reality of aging infrastructure; a clearly un-adapting economy and the lack of technologies to create vibrant industries that will absorb our masses. The content of the South African service delivery and labor protests will likely become more desperate and daring in it being protracted until tough decision and national reform takes place.
Tough decisions will have to emanate from the realization that there is no benefit in accommodating and housing every South African and Southern Africa citizen in Gauteng and other economically active provinces, since there are not enough economic opportunities owing to many things including but not chiefly because of (a) a racialised economy; (b) corruption and nepotism; (c) and the skills shortage, but because of the South African economy that was built on largely labour intensive practices.
This means that our economy does not absorb a large part of the population because as Mazrui said the dual mandate of colonialism of Lord Luggard actually never realized. Luggard basically said that Europe is in Africa to benefit from its minerals and that there would be a mutual benefit since Europe would transfer technologies in turn.
We know that the later part never took place but instead the only transference that took place was appetite- Africans developed an appetite for Western consumer goods and lifestyles. We know that African wealth and resources we looted by the like of Cecil John Rhodes who also pillaged an historic Southern African site of sophisticated settlement, architectural glory and environmental sustainability just north of the Limpopo.
The above is relevant because of the extent to which Western appetites are prominently the desire angry protesters who cannot even conceive of a life outside, western programmed prescripts of comfort and livelihood, results in the violence, looting and arson. In addition, protestors are according to Harold Wolpe also victims of not only unpaid extractions of resource but the development of an exploitative economy destroyed the South African livelihood through taxes on land, animals and their head to create a cheap, dependent and desperate labour force for mines, factories and farms.
In sum the average protester is faced with the double jeopardy of (1) a western consumer appetite –also seen when there is looting of shops and private property during protests; and (2) there being no alternative to the urban periphery in the form of a sustainable, thriving coexistence with the natural environment. Furthermore the average protester is in this position because the West has not actually transferred technology to Africa and South Africa.
Most people are now probably thinking: “there we go again blame the West and Apartheid for every problem”.
At this stage I would then hasten to propose the following: (1) that technology transfer debates at United Nations and WTO between the global north and south-should continue; (2) the debate over the sustainable development agenda be extended beyond the responsibility of governments and transnational companies (without absolving them) to individuals and the civil society to speak to attitudinal change.
Put practically- Africans should rehabilitate from western consumerism (hinted to by Mazrui) towards conservationism use of water, energy and environment; (3) the above rehabilitation and the Zuma administration’s unique focus on rural development should be a rallying point for a developmental social contract through sustainable industrialization and radical economic reform.
The above proposal means that there should be a straddling of environmental investment in the planting of tress, cleaning up of the environment and changing consumption patterns (less papers, more recycling and green technologies); balanced with creating more cheaper electricity for industrial development ( if this is going to be through nuclear there is admitted potential contradiction with the environmental investment ,but careful implementation can make this work and result in increased productivity).
The offshoot of this balance is a positive impact on the content of radical service delivery protests. When there is less dependence on the urban job and being located in urban areas for opportunities then the desperation for housing, water and electricity in places like Gauteng will likely decrease. With a less destitute and vulnerable population in informal and largely poorly planned housing as in Kya Sands, there would be less strain on tax for the provision of urban housing.
In addition, we could then conceive of reinvesting in South African initiatives to create our own technologies to process raw materials and create vibrant industry as was the case with Sasol, Dennel, Iscor and Eskom under a unique era in politics and globalization, this time however it should be balanced.
Percy Makholwa-
