Is Incompetent Leadership the Root Cause of South Africa’s Racial Tension?

The scary thing is that until a week or so ago, Eugene Terre’Blanche was irrelevant. From being the leader of an ultra-right wing party in the early 90’s that everyone feared had the potential to seriously derail South Africa’s attempts at unification, Terreblanche gradually sunk into obscurity. The AWB lost popularity as most whites realised that the ‘swart gevaar’ they had been brought up to fear was really not so bad. Under the inspirational leadership of Nelson Mandela, our country managed to steer itself away from civil war and further racial bloodshed. Terre’Blanche’s politics lost impetus because so many South Africans were inspired by Mandela to forgive and to learn to relate to one another despite their fears.

It is highly ironic therefore, that the murder of a political dinosaur who has been living the quiet life for years has served as a fulcrum point for renewed racial tensions. It must be said that this racial tension has been boiling and simmering for months, and Terre’Blanche’s death only lanced a long-festering boil causing all sorts of ugly stuff to come spilling out. While the ANC has been quick to deny it, many are pointing to Julius Malema’s constant use of thinly disguised racial rhetoric as being one of the prime causes of the heightening of South Africa’s racial tension. Over the last 2 months, this column has twice focussed on Malema’s tendency to engage in verbal violence to score political points, and observed that this constant verbal violence all too easily could become something worse. Of course, Malema is not the only one taking the cheap and nasty road to newspaper headlines – opposition party leaders and other community leaders have been quick to respond with their own verbal barbs and insults. Furthermore, lest we forget, Malema only does publicly what so many of us do privately when we tell insulting jokes, or make prejudicial comments about others because of their race, gender or sexuality. In some way, we are all responsible for the festering boil of racial hatred – when we engage in verbal violence to others we play our part in making this world an uglier place.

This is where I remember Mandela and the crucial leadership role he played in making South Africa a more beautiful place. Imagine if you will an average home where two children begin fighting over the same toy. It gets ugly quickly with the toy tug-of-war transforming a playground into a battlefield. Ugly things are said, and before long the children lash out at each other with the inevitable result being tears from both parties. What do good, caring, concerned parents who are concerned with shaping and forming responsible, functional children do in this situation? Well, in a nutshell, they need to provide good leadership. They need to engage with each of their children, punish them if need be, but most importantly, they need to teach their children a better way of disagreeing. They need to teach them to handle disagreements and conflict with grace, integrity and mutual respect.

Is this the root cause of the present racial crisis filling every newspaper - a clear lack of responsible, competent and committed leadership? Is that the difference between how Mandela steered us through so many crises and the present government? Never mind whether Terre’Blanche’s murder was really about race or not, it is clearly a wake-up call for us all and it should be a serious wake-up call for those responsible for leading this country. Surely, they should be setting the tone for thoughtful and respectful dialogues instead of the gutter politics they allow their members to engage in? The leadership of our country have seemed largely disinterested and frankly, incapable in guiding their younger and more immature “children” through what has become a quagmire of human ugliness. This present mess we find ourselves in should have been firmly dealt with months ago.

This present crisis is probably nothing more than a serious wake-up call but let us hope it is responded to wisely and proactively because it could easily become something worse. The good thing about a boil being lanced is that it does bring the ugliness out into the open and gives the wound a chance to heal. The leadership has been poor up to this point, yet this remains an ideal opportunity for inspirational figures to step in and help South Africans negotiate their differences in a way that will be a whole lot more life-giving for all concerned.