CLAIRE BISSEKER: Temper the hype with honest reflection

For the past 15 years the ANC government has persistently failed to make SA a welcoming place to do business — or even understand why a stable, enabling business environment is so vital for economic growth.

So, I’m glad I’m not a CEO in SA who was faced with the decision of whether to sign the (latest) “CEO Pledge”, in which more than 120 business leaders have committed “to being a force for good” through joint strategic partnerships with the government.

The intention is to provide private sector expertise, and lots of techy backroom support, to bolster the reformers in the presidency and National Treasury and recapacitate failing parts of the system. The idea is that by propelling forward a series of practical steps to fix the country’s biggest challenges — in the areas of energy, logistics and crime — the bureaucratic and ideological blockages will finally be swept away, clearing a path to faster growth.

Think of it as business providing some big okes, and fancy footwork, to help a line of fatigued rugby forwards get the ball over the try line against deeply dug-in opposition.

As a last-ditch attempt to save a country in free-fall, it isn’t a bad plan. Those close to the coalface say all the reforms will happen — it is no longer a matter of “if” but “when”. If I were a CEO heavily invested in the domestic economy I would probably check my cynicism and sign up too. But I would still feel queasy about it.

That’s because business has been down this road before with the Zuma administration, and got badly burnt last time. In 2016, after Nenegate, almost 100 business leaders rallied around Nhlanhla Nene’s replacement as finance minister, Pravin Gordhan, forming what became known as the Presidential CEO Initiative. Several business-government working groups were created to expedite practical reforms to save SA from a junk rating and boost investment and confidence.

By adding private sector conviction to the message that the country was reforming and growth would soon accelerate, SA was spared further credit rating downgrades in 2016. But when state capture continued unabated, it was clear that business had been politically naive in believing the ANC government was capable of real reform. Instead, it had allowed itself to be co-opted by its desire to work with the government in the mistaken belief that it was building trust.

Organised business says it won’t make the same mistake this time, but it has already come dangerously close by agreeing to a joint communication strategy around the new initiative, “to provide a positive narrative to society and investors”.

The joint message after the first report-back meeting with President Cyril Ramaphosa was that “progress has been made”, and that “the meeting agreed on critical next steps to restore confidence”.

This may be true, but it played nicely into the hands of Ramaphosa, who emphasised “the importance of putting forward a coherent and consistent public narrative to restore confidence in our economy”.

He added in the joint press release that “without minimising the steep challenges that the country faces, we must respond to the relentless negativity about our country which has become a self-fulfilling prophecy”.

The joint initiative may well be cause for cautious optimism, but it is crucial to remember that the “relentless negativity” about the country, and the sole reason for business’s intervention, is because the government is relentlessly failing on so many fronts.

Tempering expectations as to what the initiative can achieve is equally important. The economy is not going to be growing 3% by 2025, as some business leaders have suggested. At best, it may arrest SA’s fall and enable us to just keep our heads above water until a new administration can execute the actual U-turn required to make the country a safe, easy and welcoming place to run a business.

Now that is something I would be happy to pledge my allegiance towards.

• Bisseker is a Financial Mail assistant editor.