LETTER: Nothing noble about cadre deployment

Dr Lazola Vabaza commendably recognises that catastrophic effects of cadre deployment, but mistakenly attributes this to a misapplication of the initiative (“Fix patronage and the deployment of greedy cadres”, January 8). 

It is surprising to read the suggestion that “greed and patronage” are new phenomena, but it is a fundamental misunderstanding to characterise cadre deployment as being inspired by “noble objectives”. Cadre deployment was unashamedly introduced as part of the ANC’s drive for “hegemony”, to extend party control over the “levers of power” in society.

There is a wealth of evidence for the practical damage cadre deployment has done, not least to SA’s prospects for economic growth. As a court judgment, Mlokoti v Amathole District Municipality, and more recently the report of the Zondo state capture commission have made clear, the entire concept was counter-constitutional and illegal.

It is a flagrant contradiction of section 197 of the constitution, requiring that “no employee of the public service may be favoured or prejudiced only because that person supports a particular political party or cause”. 

This would be true whether or not the party’s “deployees” are scoundrels or people of unimpeachable integrity — though it seems there are rather too many of the former and too few of the latter. 

The corruption it represents is less the misappropriation of resources than the degradation of the country’s institutions. Cadre deployment was the original, intentional, unalloyed state capture and vandalisation of the constitutional order.

If SA is to restore its promise a necessary step will be to recognise its constitution as binding on us all, and not niceties that can be dispensed within the interests of a party programme. Cadre deployment cannot be “done better”. It has no place in a constitutional democracy and must be disavowed and abandoned. 

Terence Corrigan
Institute of Race Relations 

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